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Comment by Volundr | Hacker News Reader

> Unpopular opinion: Paper ballots with in person voting (with an ID) is the only 100% fool proof and verifiable voting system.

I don't know that it's that unpopular. I disagree with the 100% fool proof and verifiable claim though. I can think of lots of interesting ways of screwing with it, e.x. manipulating the chain of custody or tampering with the ballots to make errors likely.

Everything is a balance. Paper ballots aren't magically 100% secure, and in person voting comes with trade offs. Ex making it difficult for the military to vote, and making it such a big production for my highly disabled sister that she probably wouldn't bother.

I happen to think the pros aren't worth the cons and that most of the handwringing around mail in ballots and machines are FUD rather than measured concerns. That doesn't mean I disagree that in person isn't "more" secure.

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> I happen to think the pros aren't worth the cons and that most of the handwringing around mail in ballots and machines are FUD rather than measured concerns.

You can't trust the machines. You can't trust the election authorities. You can't trust the post office. Those are fundamental assumptions, not FUD or measured concerns.

Elections should be designed for bad situations, because the results don't matter that much when things are good. Maybe a civil war is likely, or maybe it just ended and people are trying to rebuild trust. In any case, people don't trust each other, and they don't trust the authorities, but they are still trying to have legitimate elections.

The goal is not 100% security, 100% correctness, or something equally silly. The goal is a system where either every major party has a justified belief that the elections were legitimate and fair, the reported results are mostly correct, and there was no substantial fraud. Or at least one party questions the results due to widespread fraud. You want to trust the results, even when you can't trust the people running the elections.

Many paper ballot systems have been designed under such assumptions. The system assumes that the people running the elections cannot be trusted, but they also can't trust each other. You can't trust the people, but you trust that the system will detect and report any attempts at large-scale fraud.

There has been no evidence of wide spread fraud and there is every evidence that elections have been legitimate and fair. A non trivial portion of the population still thinks the 202 elections was rigged. End of the day, somme people will consider whatever doesn't go their way rigged.

Right now the complaint for voter fraud are things like no ID requirements, mail in ballots etc. If those go away it'll be something else.

You have a short-term perspective. Republics often last longer than a human lifetime. They should prepare for scenarios that happen once every few centuries.

The most important aspect of elections is that the vast majority of losers accept the outcome. If they don't, the elections failed. It doesn't really matter if there was fraud or if the losers just don't accept the result. The fundamental reason is the same in both cases: too many citizens don't support the system.

I'm saying specifically even if we only allow in person voting with ID, there will still groups that cry foul when their team loses. Distrust in the system isn't from specific elements of how votes are cast, it's a function of the health of the society as a whole.

>The goal is not 100% security, 100% correctness, or something equally silly. The goal is a system where either every major party has a justified belief that the elections were legitimate and fair, the reported results are mostly correct, and there was no substantial fraud. Or at least one party questions the results due to widespread fraud. You want to trust the results, even when you can't trust the people running the elections.

Right. Which is why in all 3500+ elections (and yes, every county has a separate election, with separate ballots, separate rules and separate groups of folks managing the elections. In fact, it's your neighbors who manage and staff the elections in your county) every election day, there are generally representatives from each candidate and party involved in each race, from city council member, animal control officer, coroner, mayor, congressperson, etc., etc., etc. at each polling place and counting center (where different) who are there to make sure their candidate is not shortchanged.

This happens everywhere, ever time and is nothing new. IF there are claimed "irregularities," recounts are performed and lawsuits filed and adjudicated.

But don't believe me. Go ahead and work at the polls. They hire and train folks to work at polling places during the elections. See for yourself. Or is that too much work and you'd rather rely on someone else (you trust them, but not anyone else?) to tell you what goes on at the polls?

Please.

In the system I'm familiar with, votes are counted twice. The first count is done on site, by the same people who staffed the polling station. It's important that the votes are counted and the results are published before those people leave and before the ballots are moved.

Then there is a second count that produces the official results. That count is done at a higher level (county-equivalent for most elections and city/municipality for local elections), largely to ensure a more uniform treatment for various edge cases.

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