Switzerland unveils second blockchain voting system

Hard on the heels of Zug’s blockchain voting trial comes a new system from Lausanne’s Federal Institute of Technology (EPFL) that claims to provide a tamper-proof method for conducting e-voting. Researchers say the EPFL blockchain system guarantees both the anonymity of voters and a secure digital method of casting and counting votes. The latter processes are carried out by several separately managed machines - or nodes - rather than a central authority, thus diluting the risk of vote manipulation from hackers or other malicious actors. This is achieved by requiring a majority of nodes to agree that the data contained within the system is accurate. If anyone tries to change a vote, they would have to fool numerous independent checkers rather than one. A would-be hacker would also be confronted with having to get through the defences of several parties rather than one centralised point of entry. Blockchain generates unique codes - or private keys - for each user (in this case ...