Blockchain + Voting
Monday, 11/9/2020
Joe Biden is heading to the Oval Office. It was a bizarre presidential race (which evidently won't be conceded for a while) that came to a conclusion over the weekend. I'm wrapping up political talk for a while because, if you're like me, you're sick of consuming it. In the long run, it doesn't matter who is sitting in that chair, the onus is still on you to go make stuff happen. Have a good start to the week >>
Weekend Recap
Trauma and triumph: the 10 moments that made Joe Biden: The election season lasted a few more days than most would have liked, but it has finally come to a close with Joe Biden winning the presidency. Read more about the next man in the White House.
Blockchain Voting System
Can't say we didn't know we would be in this scenario. Voter fraud will be the political storyline for the indefinite future, and we have nobody to blame but ourselves. It's not a partisan thing either. If Donald Trump was the winner then Democrats would be in the same protocol that Republicans are going through right now. Actually, they did it for years after the 2016 election. A blockchain voting system would put this recurring issue to bed.
I'm usually an optimist on a variety of issues, and this is no different. I trust the thousands of election volunteers who have sacrificed, not only their time but their health during a pandemic, but I'm also not stupid enough to know that there are some bad actors out there. If you think this is the first and only time there has been "alleged" conspiracy/corruption around an election, it's not, and it won't be the last with our current voting system.
Whenever you go to cast a vote, there is a fairly robust system of registering and then validating that registry upon voting. There are very few scenarios where anyone would want to steal your identity to go vote as you. It could happen, but seems like more of a headache than the one vote is worth. Where all the crying of voter fraud happens is on the back end. You've seen on TV the past week that there are humans (people, men, women, homo sapiens) physically sitting there and tallying votes. While I think it's a patriotic image and displays our democracy, it just doesn't make sense anymore.
For one thing, I get distracted all the time. Whenever I'm asked to score something, I'm probably going to have to do it a few times for losing count or just mindlessly doing it. Again, we're human. Then, you add in the fact that there are potential bad actors at play. Similar to the alleged Russian interference in 2016, there is no evidence of voter fraud this year, but the conspiracies will never end and this is about eliminating all doubt of who the president of the United States is.
I've written in Brainstorm before about how our government is widely behind on technology. Not the federal government, but local governments and even a lot of cities. I get there are a lot of forces keeping governments from adopting new processes like revenue and security, but when we're talking about the president of the United States, the American people deserve to know that this election is emphatically correct.
Recently, blockchain is a technology that I have really learned and written about. Check out this piece I wrote previously about how it's already disrupting the private sector. Not only does it have advantages for companies, but it could end up being more important in the public sector. Basically, it is an immutable ledger of transactions and records that is decentralized for everyone within a network to see.
The exemplary implementation I like to use for the public sector is if a county implemented blockchain for housing purchases. Picture you've made the big step to purchase a home and you're in the final closing process. When presented with a deed, there will be you (buyer), seller, and then a 3rd party notary on hand to authenticate the transaction. After it is completed, you keep all documentation saying you own your new house.
Now, say your county implements a blockchain for the purchase of homes. Since you live in the county, you have access to the blockchain network for residential real estate. Every time somebody buys a home in your county, the transaction gets pushed out to the network and added to your blockchain. This is where it gets tricky because the concept of making transactions public is worrisome. Luckily, blockchains are encrypted by the SHA-256 hash function meaning that a block has a 2^256 chance to be hacked. Blockchain also follows the byzantine principle meaning the longest chain in a network wins. Even if someone were to hack a block, they would have to hack all of the other subsequent blocks in a network to make a change to the blockchain. This is why blockchain is coined the term "immutable ledger".
Above is an example of a Bitcoin transaction that happens on the blockchain every day. You have the inputs (for our example it would be the person selling the home) and the outputs (you, the buyer). Notice how it is a public transaction record, but the identifier is the public key address that you would receive upon creating a wallet on the blockchain. This is no different than being able to access public county records, but it adds immense security capabilities.
You apply this same example but to a robust blockchain voting system. There would be no difference for the voter on the front end. They would register to vote, find their precinct, cast a ballot in person or by mail, and then wait in the Starbucks while knowing their vote for president will be valid. As votes get put on the blockchain, anyone who tries to interfere would be met with cataclysmic failure.
It's a disservice to the American public who have to jump through hoops in order to vote. Long waits coupled with preconceived notions of how the outcome will go already disincentives citizens enough. If we let the problem of "voter fraud" spiral into every election issue, it will harm our democratic reputation where it can't afford to lose much more ground.
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