Diligence Needed, Not a Panacaea

The Swiss government has demonstrated the same appalling incompetence regarding voting security as the United States: Swiss votes to use 'unbreakable' code

A new "unbreakable" encryption method will be keep votes safe for citizens in the Swiss canton (state) of Geneva in the country's upcoming national elections, officials said Thursday.

The city-state will use quantum technology to encrypt election results as they are sent to the capital on Oct. 21...

What good will a very secure network be, when the physical system itself isn't awarded the same protections? How are the votes protected before transmission, while they are stored on the machine?

Maybe they have taken measures to keep the systems physically secure, but the quantum-encryption panacaea won't get them any security that a very large key in OpenSSL can't get them. By the time the key is cracked, another election cycle will be rolling around.

Posted on Oct 12, 2007 at 2:05:12 PM EDT.