FYI,
-----
Paul DeGregorio, former Chair of the US Election Assistance Commission and COO of IFES, joins Everyone Counts as COO
DeGregorio continues to lead the industry in expanding opportunities for greater access to the ballot box with open, transparent election technology
-----------------
Lorrie Cranor, a professor of computer science at Carnegie Mellon University and an electronic voting expert,
said people's perceptions about Internet voting's potential pitfalls are the biggest stumbling blocks in its
adoption.
While there have been important advances in encryption, most people don't understand how that complex
technology works, Cranor said.
"You just have to trust it, and there is a question whether the general public will," she said.
..............................
At Carnegie Mellon, the student government elections, which are conducted online, continually have problems,
Cranor said. This year, the students used encryption software that they could not decrypt, so they were unable to
tabulate the results.
A new election is scheduled for September, Cranor said, adding that the students wrote their own code and did
not hire a professional firm such as Everyone Counts.
But DeGregorio said it is younger people's interest in alternate forms of voting that will eventually push the use
of the Internet into the mainstream. He pointed to what he calls the "American Idol" generation, who vote in the
tens of millions for their favorite singing contestant each week.
"In the not-too-distant future, they will demand the choice of voting online," he said.