"Three USB sticks were used, all with the correct code, but none of them worked. By the close of polling on Sunday, its e-voting system had collected 2,048 votes, but Basel-Stadt officials were not able to decrypt them with the hardware provided, despite the involvement of IT experts."
"The votes made up less than 4 percent of those cast in Basel-Stadt and would not have changed any results, but the canton is delaying confirmation of voting figures until March 21 and suspending its e-voting pilot until the end of December, while its public prosecutor's office has started criminal proceedings."
"Switzerland is running small-scale e-voting pilots in four of its 26 cantons with the aim of helping citizens living abroad to vote, given the time it takes to receive and send postal votes. A previous attempt to set up e-voting was scrapped in 2019 after researchers found security flaws in software source code."
Basel-Stadt, a Swiss canton, encountered a critical failure in its e-voting pilot program during national referendums on March 8. The system collected 2,048 votes from approximately 10,300 residents abroad and 30 people with disabilities, but officials could not decrypt them despite having correct USB stick codes and IT expert assistance. The uncounted votes represented less than 4 percent of Basel-Stadt's total votes and would not have altered any results. The canton suspended the e-voting pilot until December, commissioned external analysis, and initiated criminal proceedings. Other Swiss cantons' e-voting systems remained unaffected. Switzerland operates small-scale e-voting pilots in four cantons to assist citizens living abroad, following a previous 2019 attempt that was abandoned due to security vulnerabilities.
#e-voting-failure #election-security #swiss-referendums #digital-voting-systems #cybersecurity-vulnerabilities
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