Telangana to test Mobile-based e-voting system

The Telangana State Election Commission has planned to conduct a dry run of a “Mobile-Based e-voting system”.

Highlights

• The development of this system is guided by the necessity of holding polls in India amid the Covid-19 pandemic.
• This system, if successful, will facilitate to vote using smartphones from home.
• The dry run will be held in Khammam district of Telangana on October 20.
• It will be India’s first smartphone-based e-voting process.

Registration procedure

Voters can register themselves for the dry run, using the smartphone application in between October 8 and 18.

Implementing Agency

The state election commission of Telangana is implementing the system in association with the emerging technologies wing of IT Electronics and Communications (ITE&C) department of Telangana government and technical development by ‘Centre for Development of Advanced Computing (CDAC)’.

Use of Artificial Intelligence

Mobile-based e-voting system will make use of Artificial Intelligence for a three-factor authentication of the valid voter. System will match the voter’s name with the Aadhaar, detect individual liveness and match image using EPIC database comprising of around 20-year-old records.

Blockchain (Distributed Ledger) technology

This technology has been used to secure de-identified and encrypted votes in order to maintain them as immutable records.

TSEC eVote App

This smartphone application follows a minimalist design approach, supporting both English and Telugu languages. It comprises of a detailed help section for tutorial videos and a helpline number to aid the citizens. It is a security-hardened mobile application that will prevent any type of tampering. System cannot be misused because it binds a device ID and phone number to a specific citizen registration process. Only that device can be used during voting.

Month: Current Affairs - October, 2021