Good day nairalanders, this post would delve into the blockchain technology and how it can affect the electoral process of a nation. The post would be split into two parts as this would make up for a better understanding and also not bore you with long write-ups. Here are things to expect.
• Introduction
• What the blockchain is?
• WhatBlockchain Technology offers?
• How the Blockchain voting would work?
• Like problems and solutions
• Conclusion

For the first part of this post, we would be looking at the first three subtopics, and the next three will be addressed in the second part of the post.




Introduction
Voting has been categorized with long hours of waiting before one can cast his or her vote, and this sort of stress is one of the many reasons why there are usually low turnouts of voters, as statistics have shown that only a little above 40% of the total population of a country participate in elections. Other factors that have also plagued elections in recent times are, but not limited to; voters fraud, multiple voting, vote buying, rigging and even external influences. In the African scene, particularly in the just concluded Presidential election in Nigeria, there were numerous complaints, from late arrivals of electioneering materials to irregularities of some of these materials. There were also issues regarding votes buying, threats to life and properties. These problems are not peculiar to Nigeria only, as it's a global problem. There were also claims of Russians hacking voting systems in 21 states in the US during the 2016 elections.
In a time of technological advancement, that includes Artificial Intelligence, sex dolls, self-driven cars, and other technological innovations, there must be a better way to voting, than what we have in our world today most especially in the developing and third world countries. The introduction of an online voting platform would definitely help eliminate these threats as online voting would not only boost the number of voters, but it will also address the issues of election security and integrity, as free and fair elections are the evidence of a truly democratic nation. If we want to achieve this, then the blockchain technology is a considerable option.

What the Blockchain is?
According to @pangoli at the recent Blockchain Saturday meet-up at Ibadan, not in his exact words - Blockchain can be likened to a book and all the transactions are recorded on that book, such that it's not possible to change or alter whatever has been recorded on each block.

In more simpler terms, blockchain is a technology that allows people to make a transaction without the involvement of a third party, these transactions are recorded on a block and distributed across all participating computers.....read more


source

What Blockchain Technology offers?
Blockchain technology would bring about transparency, efficiency and fairness in the electoral process. This would also make voting more convenient for all citizens of a nation, as even those abroad would be eligible to vote since it's an online process.

Other ways the Blockchain would affect voting are;

• Security: The blockchain would help address the current security issues that are plaguing our electoral process. There will be a secured voting system and it would also prevent votes from been tampered with after individuals have cast their votes, as it has records that can easily be traced.

• Trusted and Transparent voting transactions: The blockchain technology will enhance voting integrity and voters confidence, as a large percentage of the non-voting population, feels the system is corrupt, hence there should be no need to vote. With Blockchain voting, we can be assured that votes can be traced and this help builds trust between the voters and the electoral system in the long run.
Hence, a huge percentage of the populace would be enthusiast to express their civic right as citizens and this can only happen if trust and transparency is no longer an issue.

• No third Party Involvement: The blockchain eliminates central bodies, since it is a decentralized system of a network, there will be no need for a central body overseeing the results. The votes would be verified to have come from a trusted source before it can be recorded as been valid on a block.

• Real-time tracking and unalterable votes: With the blockchain, votes would be verified after the voting has finished at record time, as most transactions on the blockchain are currently carried out at record time. There would also be certain of votes been counted correctly since it's a decentralized system, almost everyone can calculate the outcome of each vote.

• Reduced Cost: The current budget each nation puts asides for elections are often times enough to invest in other sectors of the nation's economy. Blockchain voting would cut down the enormous amount currently been spent on elections worldwide.

With these advantages listed, do you think the blockchain stands a chance in changing the future of our voting process? Let's talk about it in the comments section. The concluding part to this post will be out soon. Give your thoughts



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beatcoins:
https://www.nairaland.com/4618845/blockchain-application-electoral-process

Nice one.But the northerners will not support this since majority of them are not educated.How will this technology check under age voting?

The blockchain is pretty useless for election purposes.

ivolt:
The blockchain is pretty useless for election purposes.

I'm pretty sure you know nothing about blockchain

This blockchain technology has being used in some western country during their election, try read more about blockchain buddy

Lampert505:



I'm pretty sure you know nothing about blockchain

This blockchain technology has being used in some western country during their election, try read more about blockchain buddy

On the contrary, I know a lot about blockchain.
It is being hyped to fleece the tech-ignorant populace in the west and elsewhere.
These merchants of misinformation have successfully conned many people including
supposedly smart bureaucrats into buying the hype.

Before you talk about security, remember that blockchain is merely hiding behind cryptography which is
an independent field on its own. Of course, it added a "decentralized" peers confirmation layers but this is mostly cosmetic
when applied to elections since humans can always change the rules when the stakes are high, all that is needed is the cooperation
of majority peers to tweak the system irrespective of the underlying result.

Like other people, you mistake the adoption of technology for its superiority and efficiency.
Even if most western countries hold an election by counting people on the line, the process will still
largely retain its integrity.

What will make blockchain worse in a flawed electoral system like ours is that most electorate cannot even tell
when things go wrong, they will have to rely on some "experts" to decide on the system's integrity.
At least, the people can tell when a ballot lacks thumbprint, not so with the technology.

The blockchain is no better for any election than the counting of heads.