Finnish e-voting fiasco
The good old 'human error or bad design' debate resurfaces.
Recommended Books on Usability
write to me: sumank [at] gmail [dot] com
Today, the Ministry of Justice revealed that due to a usability issue, voting was prematurely aborted for 232 voters. The pilot system was in use in three municipalities; this amounts to about 2 per cent of the electoral roll. Seats in the municipal assemblies are often determined by margins of only a couple of votes. It seems that the system required the voter to insert a smart card to identify the voter, type in their selected candidate number, then press "ok", check the candidate details on the screen, and then press "ok" again. Some voters did not press "ok" for the second time, but instead removed their smart card from the voting terminal prematurely, causing their ballots not to be cast. [Link1] [Link2]The argument here is not 'it worked for 98% of the people'. The deal here is that seats in Finnish municipal assemblies are determined by margins of only a couple of votes. So 2% is huge and whoever designed the system should have taken that into account.
Recommended Books on Usability
write to me: sumank [at] gmail [dot] com
Labels: critique, usability, user experience
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