I was reflecting on the electoral operations, and how to modernize it for improving efficiencies. Please find my thoughts and let me know your thoughts.
Problem:
1. 83.45 cr registered voters this time and >100 Cr voter Population in next election.
2. Extensive and costly setup with earmarked polling booths and voter authentication.
3. > Month long voting.
4. 2014 elections were the longest and costliest after Indian independence, and this will increase in coming years.
5. The current system is not scalable.
6. There are obvious ways to exploit vulnerabilities in the system leading to bogus votes, and there are high type 1 (false positives) and type 2 (false negatives) errors in concern with listing of eligible citizens.
Solution:
1. Using Mobile Voting and Digital/biometric authentication like what is available for Credit Cards.
Detailed Solution below:
Data Creation:
a. Create Photo ID Cards with the Voter Finger Prints and other details. ( Banks can be asked to give the cards, and infra )
b. Hold Voter Camps, where individuals will go with their existing Voter ID Cards and Passport size Photo, and the following will be collected :
i. All 10 Fingerprints.
ii. Preferred Mobile Number, for Voting.
iii. Voter Card Details.
iv. Mailing Address.
v. Photo.
c. One Photo ID Card with Chip and Grid will be mailed for Each Individual.
Voting Day: (to allow people from anywhere and securely)
Mobile:
a. Individuals will call a 800 toll Free number for IVR from their registered Numbers.
b. The connection will get encrypted by the carrier to prevent radio wave hacking.
c. IVR will ask to enter digits from the GRID on the Voter Card and Voice biometric questions for authentication and authorization.
d. Will Provide List of Options for Voting using the Number Pad, with one dial each for individual contenders.
Booth:
a. Digital EVM’s will be available at the booth with :
i. Card Reading functionality.
ii. Capacitive fingerprint detection.
iii. LCD labels for buttons, so that lists can be displayed according to person voting.
b. Individual can go to any booth.
c. Insert the Chip side of the Card.
d. Place the mentioned finger on the capacitive fingerprint reader.
i. EVM will validate the Scanned Fingerprint with the fingerprint on Chip, and Display
options from memory based on their Constituency data, based on Election Category. ( Lok
Sabha, Vidhan Sabha, Corporation, Panchayat )
e. Place their Vote, using button, and will get an SMS confirmation that the vote was successful within 15 mins.
Counting :
Mobile:
a. Mobile Votes will be sent to Central Server, for counting.
Booth:
a. EVM will Save the votes, and display on LCD what vote is Placed.
b. A 256 Bit AES national Key will be created as a random configuration of 4, 64 bit keys, and saved on the all machines, so that nobody knows the key.
c. At defined frequency :
a. The Voter: Constituency: Voted Contender: Voting Timestamp will be saved, and the entire delimited collection will be encrypted using the AES key and sent to the central server.
Consolidation:
a. Server will create separate collections from Mobile and EVM.
a. Voter: Constituency: Voted Contender: Voting Time Stamp in the server.
b. Will decrypt the collections with the AES Key.
c. Will Sort the list by Voter, and keep only record for the first timestamp.
d. Will Sort the list by Constituency and Count votes for contenders
e. Sort Contenders in a constituency by votes for publishing results.
Problem:
1. 83.45 cr registered voters this time and >100 Cr voter Population in next election.
2. Extensive and costly setup with earmarked polling booths and voter authentication.
3. > Month long voting.
4. 2014 elections were the longest and costliest after Indian independence, and this will increase in coming years.
5. The current system is not scalable.
6. There are obvious ways to exploit vulnerabilities in the system leading to bogus votes, and there are high type 1 (false positives) and type 2 (false negatives) errors in concern with listing of eligible citizens.
Solution:
1. Using Mobile Voting and Digital/biometric authentication like what is available for Credit Cards.
Detailed Solution below:
Data Creation:
a. Create Photo ID Cards with the Voter Finger Prints and other details. ( Banks can be asked to give the cards, and infra )
b. Hold Voter Camps, where individuals will go with their existing Voter ID Cards and Passport size Photo, and the following will be collected :
i. All 10 Fingerprints.
ii. Preferred Mobile Number, for Voting.
iii. Voter Card Details.
iv. Mailing Address.
v. Photo.
c. One Photo ID Card with Chip and Grid will be mailed for Each Individual.
Voting Day: (to allow people from anywhere and securely)
Mobile:
a. Individuals will call a 800 toll Free number for IVR from their registered Numbers.
b. The connection will get encrypted by the carrier to prevent radio wave hacking.
c. IVR will ask to enter digits from the GRID on the Voter Card and Voice biometric questions for authentication and authorization.
d. Will Provide List of Options for Voting using the Number Pad, with one dial each for individual contenders.
Booth:
a. Digital EVM’s will be available at the booth with :
i. Card Reading functionality.
ii. Capacitive fingerprint detection.
iii. LCD labels for buttons, so that lists can be displayed according to person voting.
b. Individual can go to any booth.
c. Insert the Chip side of the Card.
d. Place the mentioned finger on the capacitive fingerprint reader.
i. EVM will validate the Scanned Fingerprint with the fingerprint on Chip, and Display
options from memory based on their Constituency data, based on Election Category. ( Lok
Sabha, Vidhan Sabha, Corporation, Panchayat )
e. Place their Vote, using button, and will get an SMS confirmation that the vote was successful within 15 mins.
Counting :
Mobile:
a. Mobile Votes will be sent to Central Server, for counting.
Booth:
a. EVM will Save the votes, and display on LCD what vote is Placed.
b. A 256 Bit AES national Key will be created as a random configuration of 4, 64 bit keys, and saved on the all machines, so that nobody knows the key.
c. At defined frequency :
a. The Voter: Constituency: Voted Contender: Voting Timestamp will be saved, and the entire delimited collection will be encrypted using the AES key and sent to the central server.
Consolidation:
a. Server will create separate collections from Mobile and EVM.
a. Voter: Constituency: Voted Contender: Voting Time Stamp in the server.
b. Will decrypt the collections with the AES Key.
c. Will Sort the list by Voter, and keep only record for the first timestamp.
d. Will Sort the list by Constituency and Count votes for contenders
e. Sort Contenders in a constituency by votes for publishing results.
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