An experiment on the blockchain-assisted voting has been initiated in Ukraine, according to the state’s Central Election Commission Head of Service, Alexander Stelmakh’s Facebook announcement.
Blockchain-assisted voting is tamper-proof and transparent, it protects voters’ information and several decentralized nodes store the data.
Stelmakh said that they are using NEM blockchain and 28 nodes for this experiment. NEM Ukraine provided test coins for this purpose. According to his calculations, If real voting is conducted with NEM blockchain, each polling station would generate a $1,227 cost. Stelmakh states: “As for me, this is a small fee for the lifetime preservation of such socially important data”
WHY IS IT IMPORTANT?
1. Earlier, famous Ukrainian Politician Yulia Tymoshenko said that blockchain needs to be implemented in the state management system. According to her, this would help to lower the level of corruption in the governmental sector and assist Ukraine in becoming the “new Singapore”.
2. Many countries are showing their interest in blockchain-based voting as the method will guarantee the transparency of elections. In May, West Virginia’s primary election utilized the blockchain-assisted voting platform by a group of selected voters together with the regular ballots. The system found a very viable option for the secure voting.
3. Presidential candidate from the New Party (Partido Novo) of Brazil, João Amoêdo is also interested in the integration of blockchain into the voting system.