Blind to Lead Way in E-Voting
From: Australian IT - 07/25/2006
By: Chris Jenkins

The Australian government is considering a trial of electronic voting systems
that could lead to the use of e-voting for next year's federal election. The
government will decide on the e-voting system recommendations of an electoral
committee within six weeks, and the proposal also suggests that the trial
involve people who are blind and visually impaired. Last week, the Australian
state of Victoria announced that visually impaired people will be able to use
e-voting systems to vote in its November elections. The e-voting systems used
in Victoria will not tally votes, according to Michael Simpson, public policy
manager of Vision Australia. Voters will receive smart cards in order to use
the e-voting system, which will read the ballot options to voters via
headphones, print their votes, and then return them to the ballot box.
E-voting will allow voters to cast their ballots privately and independently,
but there are concerns that the technology or results could be used to
classify voters. "We are prepared to live with that downside because it is a
huge step forward," says Simpson. 

Read the entire article at:
http://australianit.news.com.au/articles/0,7204,19899956^15306^^nbv^,00.html

Link:
Vision Australia
http://www.visionaustralia.org.au/