In a public hearing before the State, Civic, Military and Veterans Affairs Committee of the Colorado General Assembly, Free Speech For People’s Senior Advisor on Election Security, submitted testimony in opposition to SB 21-188, a bill which would offer insecure, unauditable, online voting to voters with disabilities. 

“Proponents of this bill suggest, erroneously, that secure online return of voted ballots is possible with today’s computer security tools. This is incorrect,” Greenhalgh asserts in her testimony. “The Department of Homeland Security recommends states should continue to rely on paper ballots because serious and significant security risks remain that cannot be adequately mitigated with the security tools and controls available, and ballots returned online are at high risk of tampering or manipulation.”

Greenhalgh references several studies done by federal and state agencies that have all come to the same conclusion: online voting is not secure, and we lack the tools necessary to address increasingly sophisticated cybersecurity threats that could impact ballots submitted electronically. 

“Twenty years ago, secure Internet voting seemed an attainable goal but today, computer security experts and national security agencies have come to the consensus that the secure online return of voted ballots is a much more difficult problem to solve, and that the likelihood of a malicious attack is all too real,” Greenhalgh concludes. “Now is the time to follow the guidance of our national security experts and not expand the electronic return of voted ballots.”

Last June, Greenhalgh co-authored a report with Dr. Steve Newell of the American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS) that offered solutions to election officials for secure, trustworthy, remote accessible voting options for disabled voters. The report is entitled “Leveraging Electronic Balloting Options Safely and Securely During the COVID-19 Pandemic.” You can read that report here.

Free Speech For People is dedicated to ensuring that every American can vote safely and securely, which requires the use of voter-verifiable paper ballots. Whether completed in person or by mail, paper ballots are the only voting method that provides secure and accurate representation in our elections.

Read Greehalgh’s full written testimony against SB 21-188 here, which was covered by ColoradoPolitics.