I wish this essay could of expanded the ideological use of Blockchain in the form of voting, since in the mainstream, blockchain is cluttered through talks of transacting digital "money". Please hear me out (or give a care to read this)...
Bitcoin is considered immutable... Meaning, nobody can hack Bitcoin and make any changes. How does this solve a voting "issue"?
I live in the United States, and there's been accusations between political parties in previous elections of being "stolen" by adding "dead people" votes or fraudulent votes that should not have been counted. If the American people were informed to solve this issue to use the blockchain and switch the voting system to the blockchain, where its immutable, how could fraudulent votes can get passed through, if the votes will be verified on the blockchain by its citizen?
The real threat in blockchain is not only money, but a revolution to lead a nation through direct democracy. That's right! We don't need representatives to represent us! If you are an American reading this, when were you allowed to vote for social programs, help small businesses grow, grow the "middle" class, involve in international affairs (like war in Ukraine)? I believe a direct democracy needs to be amended where every citizen (speaking to Americans) participates in how our nation should run... By the people! For the people! If corporations had to buy the people's vote, think about how much money it would take to influence a large amount of votes to go their way? That's why having a representative democracy is a lot easier, since its only made up of 535 voting members, when it should of been in the millions (the entire nation)?
Think about the phone and internet infrastructure that we have, and lets not take it for granted! Anybody with a cellphone with internet access can send their votes ANYWHERE around the world! Think about it?! We can be thousands of miles away from our country and still participate where our votes will be immutable, thanks to... Yes! The blockchain.
Please counter this argument of the limitations of blockchain in democracy!
For those who are not Americans reading this post, your opinions, ideas, beliefs and your being matter too! Every human being are part of history. Its the population of people that defines a nation, not the political leaders!
I totally agree that voting is a great use-case. The challenge I think would be that you'd almost have the same problem with securing it as you do the voting because no-one is going to remember their private keys. You could run a blockchain on the backend, but there's not way to actually improve the security of the system on the front end without making it super hard to get in.
Hell, we can't even get politicians to agree that we need voter ID right now.
I think it could fix a lot but I think a lot of what it could fix could happen without blockchain too.
I think an experiment is needed. Inquire a survey of lets say 1,000 to 10,000 people to vote an issue that matters to them... On the blockchain? It could be a simple question like: Should clean water be accessible to everyone by law? Generally, this answer is a resounding "yes", but we will need professional hackers to try to turn the votes into "No".
Nobody can't remember their private keys? Have the person voluntarily post link their keys on their government issued IDs. Just a thought.
To play the devil's advocate on this matter, I think certain parts of the blockchain needs to be public, where everyone can verify a public key to identify anyone. However, a single person's vote would be submitted through a private key submission ideally. Yet... We can have citizens' with no 'bias' of political affiliation report the voters confirmation (For those who can't remember their private keys).
My mind is in limbo and exhausted. I would reachout the blockchain programmers to put in their insights. We need great minds that already are vested in this field and have them input their discoveries on this topic.
Here's my bias... The founder of Cardano, Charles Hoskinson, has a broader point of view of what blockchain technology can achieve. Personally, I love the man's philosophy, and his vision of what blockchain can do beyond just money, but in personal identity, is missed in media.
@Michael - Seek and reach out people in the "blockchain" space who care about the use of securing privacy and personal identity in the "crypto" space.
I apologize if I cannot give critical insights of how blockchain can thoroughly solve such delicate issue. Again, experimentations needs to inquired for us to have an understanding that could or may not secure voting. Not just in the USA, but around the world that practice democracy.
Lets use a case where someone did lose their private keys, how could the voter be validated by its citizens' through a public key?
In my opinion (Testing required), what if we use sociocracy or the sociocratic voting form to validate a voter's ballot choices of 100 validators using a public key? That person could be your next door neighbor, your doctor, your gym trainer, the mailman, pretty much anyone within your community (or out of your community).
Why so many people? Lets say you had 3 options to vote: A, B, C. You do not have or know your private key, so you notify a communal governance location that allows your vote to be submitted through a public key (example: public library). You submit your vote to the "library" and they call validators to submit the persons vote on their behalf on the blockchain, but the library must not notify the validators who are the other validators to avoid manipulation. If 100% of the validators agree on 1 vote, generally that means they honestly fulfilled the voters vote. However, if there is a disparity in the ballot (93 voters chose A, and 7 voters chose B), a group of people are not honoring your vote, therefore an audit by the voter would be required to validate the validators of their submission vote. The validators MUST show you which vote on the ballot they place on your behalf. Again, validators cannot be aware of other validators, for they can be randomized (it can be anyone). You the voter, will be notified of the validators. The validators who choose to tamper your vote in dishonesty (usually due to political "biases") must be penalized for honoring your vote.
This is one idea of avoiding tampering ballots on the front-end. There may be other wonderful and plausible solutions out there. I will keep this question in the post "...here's not way to actually improve the security of the system on the front end without making it super hard to get in." from a previous thread, just pick the minds of any blockchain developers in the future. Surely, I will continue to read articles and watch videos on the technical aspect of blockchain for any updates on security.
I think it's essential to reconsider how we do things. I do think there's too much value to the people in charge to not secure elections. If government can't manipulate them they don't like it.
Expanding on my thoughts even further; trying to resolve the votes submissions on the blockchain (front-end), hacker-resistant, and immune to political biases by validators (So the validators are not penalized in real-life; the humanist in me). So, here I go:
Lets say on the ballot, voters had choices (A), (B), (C) to cast their vote. Lets say on the front-end when casting ones vote, the names or issues on the ballot are already linked up with chains of "meta-data" made up of words or/and pictures. The choices must not have a copy of the same chained meta-data as the other choices in the ballot.
The validators on their ends will only see one word or image only, which is part of the meta-data connected to the vote. Validators will have equal parts of meta-data, in this case 3: (A), (B), (C). Each random validator will have random meta-data, which they cannot see what vote the word is linked to, just very what they see. (Think of the snap-captchas you match in the internet for human identification purposes).. This idea reduces the need to penalize people from altering a vote just because of their political or personal biases on a person, party, or topic-issue.
What about the "elite" hackers? The people who are one-step ahead to manipulate votes if they found out how detect the meta-data connected to the right vote?
I'll introduce another layer of security on top of what's previously mentioned :).
***First of all, I wish I could upload a picture or drawing of what's in my mind for visual understanding and the geometry of how front-end voting would look like on this thread, so I'll be as descriptive as possible.***
Moving forward, imagine a gigantic spider web. Each node has a "meta-data" of words or images. The votes in the ballots are linked with one and all meta-data as nodes in this massive spider-web and they all communicate with each other. The only thing is that each node is "vibrating" generated frequencies (changes intervals of 1-minute to broadcast the next frequencies) and only certain frequencies match within the all the chained meta-data nodes. Keep in mind the infinite possibilities of frequencies generated by the nodes, but the votes must match their meta-data with corresponding vibrations.
Here's the fun part: Every node is vibrating at a different frequency at the same time, and after 1-minute interval, they'll vibrate to a completely distinct frequencies. Imagine the headache a hacker has to go through to tamper the vote, even if the hacker had advanced mathematical programming skills, the vibrations are endless.
The 3rd layer will play the role to validate the frequencies of the votes in of the ballots to their respective "color" code corresponding to the ballot.
Sounds very complex, but in theory it would make sense with illustrations... Maybe?
What other problems could be out there to solve this problem? Everything, must be carefully analyzed in all angles.
I wish this essay could of expanded the ideological use of Blockchain in the form of voting, since in the mainstream, blockchain is cluttered through talks of transacting digital "money". Please hear me out (or give a care to read this)...
Bitcoin is considered immutable... Meaning, nobody can hack Bitcoin and make any changes. How does this solve a voting "issue"?
I live in the United States, and there's been accusations between political parties in previous elections of being "stolen" by adding "dead people" votes or fraudulent votes that should not have been counted. If the American people were informed to solve this issue to use the blockchain and switch the voting system to the blockchain, where its immutable, how could fraudulent votes can get passed through, if the votes will be verified on the blockchain by its citizen?
The real threat in blockchain is not only money, but a revolution to lead a nation through direct democracy. That's right! We don't need representatives to represent us! If you are an American reading this, when were you allowed to vote for social programs, help small businesses grow, grow the "middle" class, involve in international affairs (like war in Ukraine)? I believe a direct democracy needs to be amended where every citizen (speaking to Americans) participates in how our nation should run... By the people! For the people! If corporations had to buy the people's vote, think about how much money it would take to influence a large amount of votes to go their way? That's why having a representative democracy is a lot easier, since its only made up of 535 voting members, when it should of been in the millions (the entire nation)?
Think about the phone and internet infrastructure that we have, and lets not take it for granted! Anybody with a cellphone with internet access can send their votes ANYWHERE around the world! Think about it?! We can be thousands of miles away from our country and still participate where our votes will be immutable, thanks to... Yes! The blockchain.
Please counter this argument of the limitations of blockchain in democracy!
For those who are not Americans reading this post, your opinions, ideas, beliefs and your being matter too! Every human being are part of history. Its the population of people that defines a nation, not the political leaders!
I totally agree that voting is a great use-case. The challenge I think would be that you'd almost have the same problem with securing it as you do the voting because no-one is going to remember their private keys. You could run a blockchain on the backend, but there's not way to actually improve the security of the system on the front end without making it super hard to get in.
Hell, we can't even get politicians to agree that we need voter ID right now.
I think it could fix a lot but I think a lot of what it could fix could happen without blockchain too.
What do you think?
I think an experiment is needed. Inquire a survey of lets say 1,000 to 10,000 people to vote an issue that matters to them... On the blockchain? It could be a simple question like: Should clean water be accessible to everyone by law? Generally, this answer is a resounding "yes", but we will need professional hackers to try to turn the votes into "No".
Nobody can't remember their private keys? Have the person voluntarily post link their keys on their government issued IDs. Just a thought.
To play the devil's advocate on this matter, I think certain parts of the blockchain needs to be public, where everyone can verify a public key to identify anyone. However, a single person's vote would be submitted through a private key submission ideally. Yet... We can have citizens' with no 'bias' of political affiliation report the voters confirmation (For those who can't remember their private keys).
My mind is in limbo and exhausted. I would reachout the blockchain programmers to put in their insights. We need great minds that already are vested in this field and have them input their discoveries on this topic.
Here's my bias... The founder of Cardano, Charles Hoskinson, has a broader point of view of what blockchain technology can achieve. Personally, I love the man's philosophy, and his vision of what blockchain can do beyond just money, but in personal identity, is missed in media.
@Michael - Seek and reach out people in the "blockchain" space who care about the use of securing privacy and personal identity in the "crypto" space.
I apologize if I cannot give critical insights of how blockchain can thoroughly solve such delicate issue. Again, experimentations needs to inquired for us to have an understanding that could or may not secure voting. Not just in the USA, but around the world that practice democracy.
In addition to these thoughts of mine:
Lets use a case where someone did lose their private keys, how could the voter be validated by its citizens' through a public key?
In my opinion (Testing required), what if we use sociocracy or the sociocratic voting form to validate a voter's ballot choices of 100 validators using a public key? That person could be your next door neighbor, your doctor, your gym trainer, the mailman, pretty much anyone within your community (or out of your community).
Why so many people? Lets say you had 3 options to vote: A, B, C. You do not have or know your private key, so you notify a communal governance location that allows your vote to be submitted through a public key (example: public library). You submit your vote to the "library" and they call validators to submit the persons vote on their behalf on the blockchain, but the library must not notify the validators who are the other validators to avoid manipulation. If 100% of the validators agree on 1 vote, generally that means they honestly fulfilled the voters vote. However, if there is a disparity in the ballot (93 voters chose A, and 7 voters chose B), a group of people are not honoring your vote, therefore an audit by the voter would be required to validate the validators of their submission vote. The validators MUST show you which vote on the ballot they place on your behalf. Again, validators cannot be aware of other validators, for they can be randomized (it can be anyone). You the voter, will be notified of the validators. The validators who choose to tamper your vote in dishonesty (usually due to political "biases") must be penalized for honoring your vote.
This is one idea of avoiding tampering ballots on the front-end. There may be other wonderful and plausible solutions out there. I will keep this question in the post "...here's not way to actually improve the security of the system on the front end without making it super hard to get in." from a previous thread, just pick the minds of any blockchain developers in the future. Surely, I will continue to read articles and watch videos on the technical aspect of blockchain for any updates on security.
I think it's essential to reconsider how we do things. I do think there's too much value to the people in charge to not secure elections. If government can't manipulate them they don't like it.
> I’m naturally a cynical optimist
Love it!
Expanding on my thoughts even further; trying to resolve the votes submissions on the blockchain (front-end), hacker-resistant, and immune to political biases by validators (So the validators are not penalized in real-life; the humanist in me). So, here I go:
Lets say on the ballot, voters had choices (A), (B), (C) to cast their vote. Lets say on the front-end when casting ones vote, the names or issues on the ballot are already linked up with chains of "meta-data" made up of words or/and pictures. The choices must not have a copy of the same chained meta-data as the other choices in the ballot.
The validators on their ends will only see one word or image only, which is part of the meta-data connected to the vote. Validators will have equal parts of meta-data, in this case 3: (A), (B), (C). Each random validator will have random meta-data, which they cannot see what vote the word is linked to, just very what they see. (Think of the snap-captchas you match in the internet for human identification purposes).. This idea reduces the need to penalize people from altering a vote just because of their political or personal biases on a person, party, or topic-issue.
What about the "elite" hackers? The people who are one-step ahead to manipulate votes if they found out how detect the meta-data connected to the right vote?
I'll introduce another layer of security on top of what's previously mentioned :).
***First of all, I wish I could upload a picture or drawing of what's in my mind for visual understanding and the geometry of how front-end voting would look like on this thread, so I'll be as descriptive as possible.***
Moving forward, imagine a gigantic spider web. Each node has a "meta-data" of words or images. The votes in the ballots are linked with one and all meta-data as nodes in this massive spider-web and they all communicate with each other. The only thing is that each node is "vibrating" generated frequencies (changes intervals of 1-minute to broadcast the next frequencies) and only certain frequencies match within the all the chained meta-data nodes. Keep in mind the infinite possibilities of frequencies generated by the nodes, but the votes must match their meta-data with corresponding vibrations.
Here's the fun part: Every node is vibrating at a different frequency at the same time, and after 1-minute interval, they'll vibrate to a completely distinct frequencies. Imagine the headache a hacker has to go through to tamper the vote, even if the hacker had advanced mathematical programming skills, the vibrations are endless.
The 3rd layer will play the role to validate the frequencies of the votes in of the ballots to their respective "color" code corresponding to the ballot.
Sounds very complex, but in theory it would make sense with illustrations... Maybe?
What other problems could be out there to solve this problem? Everything, must be carefully analyzed in all angles.
Wonderful article. I am frightened of how authoritarian regimes use this to give people "obedient behavior scores." How scary.
Thanks, and that's exactly what worries me the most. Will it go that way? Maybe not, but it certainly is already leading to that conversation!