in Vladivostok they are preparing to launch electronic voting in the future – Vladivostok News on VL.ru

Posting in CHAT: Russia

From November 15 to 17, Vladivostok will host a training on electronic voting through the State Services portal. As the mayor’s office emphasized, regions in whose territory 15% of residents take part in the training will receive the right to use electronic voting at a distance in elections. Experts believe that in Primorye the new form may come into force by the presidential elections in March 2024. DEG is convenient for citizens and allows them to reduce the costs of organizing voting, but the mechanism for monitoring such elections is not entirely clear. There is also a risk of pressure from management when voting in the workplace. According to the Vladivostok administration, those wishing to take part in the training should go to their personal account on the State Services from November 1 to 13, write “Elections” in the search bar, and then in the text of the automatic response that “The Central Election Commission is conducting training …”, You need will click on the interactive inscription “SEND APPLICATION” and, using pop-up windows, confirm your data and desire to take part in the training. The training itself will take place from November 15 to 17, then you will have to vote. A message with added instructions was published on the Vladivostok administration website. During a trip to Primorsky Krai in April 2023, Ella Pamfilova stated that the region was not ready to introduce and conduct remote electronic voting. This happened based on a number of criteria: Internet coverage and the number of people using the single portal of State Services. But, apparently, the situation has now changed. Political scientist Marina Pershina, in a conversation with a Novosti VL.ru correspondent, noted that election commissions most likely will not have time to launch electronic voting before the by-elections to the Vladivostok City Duma, which are scheduled for December 24. . In addition, COIB has already been announced in some key areas of the city. But they can make it in time for the presidential elections in March 2024.”[Использование ДЭГ на президентских выборах] perhaps, but unlike some regions, Primorye has not yet activated this mechanism. The situation will probably change by March. To be honest, I don’t have a clear and defined position on DEG. On the one hand, in the 21st century, many developed countries use remote voting. This is convenient from the point of view of minimizing the financial costs of organizing the expression of the will of citizens. At the same time, it is still not entirely clear how the institution of observers at the State Geographical Group works. I remember that the Public Chamber announced the creation of a technical group of experts that will carry out monitoring; promised to include representatives of parliamentary and non-parliamentary parties, as well as various IT specialists. If the monitoring mechanism becomes clear, then I don’t see a problem in using remote electronic voting,” said political scientist Marina Pershina. The former chairman of the Primorsky branch of the Party of Growth, Kirill Batanov, also expresses some skepticism about this. the issue of voting transparency. But, at the same time, as a politician who was suspended four times from elections at various levels due to formal errors in voter registration sheets, Batanov advocates the transition of election commissions to the electronic level, where errors can no longer be made. “With the correct implementation of the State Expedition, which will take into account the real expression of the will of citizens, this is a very excellent topic. At the beginning of 2021, the Primorye Election Commission gathered us all together to present changes that are related to the electronic services of the Russian electoral system. And I was very much in favor of this being implemented in Primorye, so that it would be possible to collect electronic signatures. After all, such a signature You can’t cancel it, you can’t find fault with it. At the same time, one of the main problems is the opacity of electronic services. No one can tell what’s going on inside. Here, it would probably be correct to follow the blockchain principle so that online voting data is recorded on the servers of different parties. It would be impossible to change data on one computer without changing data on others. Here’s how it might work. Another concern is that people may actually be forced to vote in the workplace. Roughly speaking, the leader gathered his subordinates in some government structure and told everyone – they took out their phones, turned on State Services and it began. This is possible because this does not happen at the polling station,” says Kirill Batanov, ex-president of the Primorsky branch of the Party of Growth. Batanov, who moved from Vladivostok to Moscow, said that this year he tried to vote electronically in the capital’s mayoral elections, but it was unsuccessful – the commission never included him in the lists. In general, the activist supports the idea of ​​DEG.