Swiss Review 5/2021

Swiss Review / October 2021 / No.5 27 Notes from the Federal Palace Federal legislation is now being re- vised in relation to e-voting, after the Federal Council conducted a consul- tation. The resumption of testing will be subject to new standards along with the implementation of measures to improve security. Academic experts have been in- volved in the reorientation as part of a broad dialogue. In future, members of the publicwill be encouraged to report cracks in the country’s e-voting sys- tems on an ongoing basis, using pub- licly accessible information for this purpose (source code; documentation; test reports; details of identified vul- nerabilities). Anyone who provides a useful tip-off may receive a cash re- ward in return. The federal govern- ment will commission independent experts to check whether security standards are being maintained. The aim is to facilitate continual improve- ments. Therewill be additional collab- oration with experts to help cement this process. Furthermore, only fully verifiable e-voting systems will be used in fu- ture. Up to 30 per cent of voters per canton and up to 10 per cent of the na- tionwide electorate will be allowed to participate in e-voting pilots. Swiss Abroad as well as voters with physical or mental impairments will be given preferential treatment, in otherwords they will be able to take part without being included in these quotas. The Confederation, cantons and the systemprovider Swiss Post are al- ready implementing the new stand- ards with a view to resuming the test- ing process as soon as possible. The revision of federal legislationwill have no effect on the distribution of pow- ers, so the cantons will still be free to E-voting – reorientation process currently ongoing Since mid-2019, Swiss voters have no longer been able to vote electronically. Swiss Abroad have been particularly affected by the suspension of e-voting. However, work to reorient the e-voting testing process is currently ongoing. Security and transparency are the watchwords in this regard. decide whether to offer e-voting as well as which e-voting system they want to use, while the federal govern- ment will set the statutory parameters and act as the authorising body. (BK) How it used to be: access card with code for the Geneva e-voting system dis- continued in 2019. Now the Confedera- tion is revising its approach to e-voting. Photo: Keystone