The problems in the 2000 election in Florida focused national attention on the need for usable voting systems. As a result, the Help America Vote Act (HAVA) of 2002 provided funding for updating voting equipment and many states purchased direct recording electronic (DRE) systems. Although these electronic systems have been widely adopted, they have not been empirically proven to be more usable than their predecessors in terms of ballot completion times, error rates, or satisfaction levels for the average voter. The series of studies reported here provides usability data on DREs to compare with that of previous voting technologies (paper ballots, punch cards, and lever machines). Results indicate that there are not differences between DREs and older methods in efficiency or effectiveness. However, in terms of user satisfaction, the DREs are significantly better than the older methods. Paper ballots also perform well, but participants are much more satisfied with their experiences voting on the DREs.
These studies also go beyond usability comparisons and test whether voters notice if their final ballots on the DRE reflect choices other than what the voters selected. Results indicate that over 60% of voters do not notice if their votes as shown on the review screen are different than how they were selected. Entire races can be added or removed from ballots and voter's candidate selections can be flipped and the majority of users do not notice. Beyond discovering that most voters do not detect the changes, these studies also identify several characteristics of the voter and the voting situation that are important in whether participants will or will not notice the changes. This means that attacks could be targeted to only those people who will most likely not notice the changes. The result is that malicious software installed on a DRE could steal votes right in front of voters with a low probability of being detected.
| Identifer | oai:union.ndltd.org:RICE/oai:scholarship.rice.edu:1911/20601 |
| Date | January 2007 |
| Creators | Everett, Sarah P. |
| Contributors | Byrne, Michael |
| Source Sets | Rice University |
| Language | English |
| Detected Language | English |
| Type | Thesis, Text |
| Format | 180 p., application/pdf |
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