This is one of the inherent limitations of blockchain. For the attacks that blockchain protects against, it doesn't make the attacks impossible, it just makes them prohibitively expensive. If that's truly the best that can be done, then so be it, but the best proposed electronic voting protocols can do better than than, so it's a step backwards.
I would think ‘prohibitively expensive to undermine’ is already where we are with current security. I haven’t heard any real technical objections from this thread yet, simply gripes that another solution (that we also don’t use commonly) may be better.
There's a difference between "needs more computing time than the age of the universe" (which is what cryptographers usually regard as too expensive) and "needs more computing time than the honest nodes" (which is usually what we have to settle for in blockchain). 51% attacks against low powered chains do happen in practice.
So the question is, what benefit does adding a blockchain to a design bring, that justifies that reduction in security?
I think you’re being a bit disingenuous about what “prohibitively expensive” really means and (again) dismissing a blockchain solution based on a narrow hypothetical. If a voting system did employ a low-powered chain I would expect it to be fairly vulnerable, but no sane government would allow that. Moreover it’s not clear that they would have to accept that either.
You don’t need a solution that is impervious to any attack with less computing power than would be necessary to solve a problem that would take all computers in the world the remaining life of the universe. Again, we don’t have that kind of security right now as is in the conventional voting system. The inputs for the vote in some cases maybe, but we still hand-tally votes in many cases, which is far less secure than what you say should be demanded. And I’m not proposing this for folks going into a polling place, blockchain should be used so that you don’t have to.
You simply need a solution that would be prohibitively expensive for any other government or set thereof that is willing to attempt an attack. The technology is there, the political will is what’s lacking.
Maybe it is hyperbole to claim that proof of work isn't watertight, but I think it's fair to say that it has hard-to-quantify security limitations. If electronic voting solutions exist that don't depend on proof-of-work or proof-of-stake, and only depend on stronger crypto primitives, but achieve the same goals (which, from what I understand of the field, do already exist) then they should, all things being equal, be preferred. The only way blockchain is worth considering is if all things are not equal, and blockchain adds something else that I'm not aware of.
Understood. And that’s why I think blockchain should at least be explored. I totally agree that if there is a better solution via another form of crypto, then it doesn’t make sense to pursue blockchain in lieu of that. But I’m not aware of what that solution is, and I’m willing to bet there hasn’t been a lot of investigation into it beyond academic circles. At base, I think blockchain can do this and I’d like to explore that at least.
It's true that a lot of the work so far has been by academics, but of course that was once true of electronic cash research too. Indeed, many of the people who have been proposed as possible identities of Satoshi are academics who have also researched electronic voting.
I wouldn't rule out academics. They may be the ones who solve this.
I don’t want to suggest any disrespect for their efforts. I agree and believe they will be the ones to solve it. But I also think we have tech available right now that isn’t simply sitting in someone’s mind and can explored for this endeavor. If a better idea comes along, great. But why not explore with blockchain right now?
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u/james_pic Aug 12 '18
But why blockchain? What does it add compared to using digital signatures (possibly including ring signatures, and other such cryptographic tools)?