Swiss Post’s e-voting system pulled for May votes
The e-voting system operated by Swiss Post will not be available for nationwide votes on May 19. This is the consequence of “critical errors” found during a public intrusion test, the Federal Chancellery and Swiss Post announced on Friday.
The Federal Chancellery said in a statementExternal link it would review the licensing and certification procedures for e-voting systems. It added that it had no indication that these flaws had resulted in votes being manipulated in previous ballots.
Swiss Post’s e-voting system had been in use in four cantons: Basel City, Fribourg, Neuchâtel and Thurgau.
The Organisation of the Swiss Abroad said on FridayExternal link it was deeply disappointed by the news, describing it as a blow against online voting “and thus a denial of the democratic rights of the Swiss Abroad”.
The verified defect concerns individual verifiability, described by the Federal Chancellery as a “key component” of Swiss Post’s existing e-voting system. Individual verifiability allows the voter to verify that the system has correctly registered their vote.
The e-voting system developed and used by canton Geneva is not affected by this flaw. The six cantons using that system – Aargau, Bern, Geneva, Lucerne, St Gallen and Vaud – have therefore been authorised to use it for the votes on May 19External link.

In compliance with the JTI standards
More: SWI swissinfo.ch certified by the Journalism Trust Initiative
Contributions under this article have been turned off. You can find an overview of ongoing debates with our journalists here. Please join us!
If you want to start a conversation about a topic raised in this article or want to report factual errors, email us at english@swissinfo.ch.