Like in Estonia: at the next presidential elections in Ukraine you will be able to vote in the mobile application

The next presidential elections in Ukraine will be available for voting through a special mobile

application.This (among other things) was reported by the press service of the Central Election Commission of Ukraine. Technologically, the world is already ready to hold elections not just via the Internet, but using a mobile application. 3G and 4G have already been launched in Ukraine, more than half of the phones in operator networks are smartphones (and by the next presidential elections this share will increase further). There is an electronic digital signature and BankID and MobileID technologies, enshrined in law. There is blockchain technology that eliminates any manipulation of the voting register. Finally, there is the successful experience of Estonia, which already held parliamentary elections in 2019, in which 43.8% of voters voted electronically.

How does electronic voting work in Estonia?

For authorization and implementation of the “oneone person - one vote” users use the Estonian ID-kaart. It is an identity document and has been issued since 2002. In total, with a population of 1.32 million people in Estonia, 1.04 million of these cards have been issued. The ID card uses an electronic chip and supports data encryption using a public key infrastructure. Voting by card via the Internet is available in Estonia during a limited period of early voting (which ranges from 4 to 6 days before the election). At the same time, voters can change their minds an unlimited number of times by choosing another candidate. On election day, it is no longer possible to change your decision - the vote goes to the candidate who is finally assigned last.

How electronic voting will work in Ukraine

Electronic voting will, of course,optional - every citizen of Ukraine who has an electronic digital signature, MobileID (supported by Kyivstar and Vodafone Ukraine) or BankID can use it. The corresponding bill legitimizing electronic voting and amending the law “On the election of the President of Ukraine” and the law “On the election of people’s deputies of Ukraine” has already been submitted to the Verkhovna Rada, and will be adopted long before the start of the next presidential campaign. In addition to the opportunity to vote on the secure CEC website, mobile applications will be developed for Android and iOS, which can be downloaded from the CEC website. In the application, after authorization, the full names of the candidates, their election programs, as well as the full texts of income declarations and an extract from the state register on sources of financing for the election campaign will be available. Voting data will be protected by a hack-resistant 1024-bit cryptographic key, which will preserve the secrecy of voting and make it impossible to identify the voter who cast his vote.

The CEC is confident that the transition to electronic andmobile voting will save budget funds (we are talking about amounts up to 100 million hryvnia per election campaign), as well as significantly reduce the risks associated with the rigging of election results. In addition, it will make unnecessary absentee ballots and the entire infrastructure related to them unnecessary - it will be possible to vote, regardless of where the voter will be on the day (or rather, on the eve) of the elections. Another advantage of e-voting is called instant tallying of the results - the winner’s name will be known immediately after the closure of offline polling stations, and all 100% of the votes cast via the Internet will be counted.

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