Electoral districts have difficulty evaluating all the costs associated with using electronic voting machines

Electoral districts opting to use electronic voting machines face significant costs, some hidden, according to a new report from the French Internet Rights Forum.

The machines cost an average of €4,400 ($6,300) each for a voting station serving 800 to 1000 electors, but electoral districts faced many other costs associated with their use, according to the Forum. Some districts had difficulty evaluating those costs, the French IT lobbying group wrote in "An interim report on the use of voting machines for electronic voting in the political elections of 2007."

The report, based on a questionnaire sent to election managers in districts using the machines, does not deal with other matters of public concern, including the security and usability of the machines: the Forum plans to cover those in a fuller report next year.

Use of electronic voting machines has grown in France in recent years: 15 electoral districts used them in local and European elections in 2004, 55 districts used them in a referendum in 2005, and 82 sought permission to use them for the presidential election, although four subsequently changed their minds.

Around 3.3 percent of French electors live in districts that used voting machines in the presidential election: the others used paper ballots.

MORE >>>

http://www.infoworld.com/article/07/12/19/French-e-voting-study_1.html