A Protocol for Anonymous and Accurate E-Polling

Abstract

E-polling systems are a fundamental component of any E-democracy system as they represent the most appropriate tool for fostering citizens participation to public debates. Contrarily to e-voting protocols, they are characterized by less stringent security requirements and they can also tolerate errors affecting a small percentage of votes, without compromising of the final result. Thus, their realization can be effectively pursued supporting the diffusion of e-democracy. In this paper we propose a simple protocol for an accurate and anonymous e-polling system. Such a protocol satisfies, among the others, the following properties: a vote cannot be altered, duplicated, or removed without being detected, votes remain anonymous. Moreover voters will be able to measure the level of trust of the process by verifying that their own votes have been correctly counted.