Design of E-Voting System in Malaysia Essay Example

Improve the election system.

On this paper also, we designed the prototypes of a part from e-Voting system. In the name of Allah the Almighty Lord, the Most Gracious and Most Merciful. Praise be to Allah for the strength and blessing that He has given to us to complete this Mini Project. Peace be upon His Messenger Muhammad and his honorable family. Throughout our academic endeavourer, we owe much of the success of this Mini Project to the following people who have given us precious knowledge and guidance that we will forever be grateful and indebted.

First and foremost, a special appreciation goes to our supervisor, Dry Maven Teaser for his inspiring guidance, whole hearted encouragement and constant support during his supervision. His invaluable help of constructive comments and suggestions throughout the sessions of this module have contributed a lot to the success of this research. We are also indebted to our beloved family members for their patience, understanding, encouragement prayers and faith that they have put upon us all this while. Without their support we will not be able to go this far towards our Journey in implementing the Master's Degree.

We also would like to extend our thanks to all of our friends and colleagues for their constant encouragement and sincere gratitude in sharing ideas and knowledge during the course of this module. What we have experienced together has made us a better person today. Finally, our thanks go to all the people who have supported us towards completing this research work either directly or indirectly. May the Almighty Lord bless us all. -? The Writers TABLE OF CONTENTS Abstracts Prefacer Acknowledgement Table

of Contents List of Figures List of Graphs List of Tablet . Introductions 1. 1 Research Questions 1. 2 Backgrounds 1. 4 Statement of Ethics 1 2. 0 E-voting 2. 1 Malaysian Electoral System's 2. 2 Qualification of Voter 2. 3 Electoral Process in Malaysia's 2. 4 Benefits of e-Voting 3. 0 Research Instruments 16 3. 1 Questionnaire's 3. 1. 1 Purpose of Questionnaire's 3. 1. 2 Selection of Questionnaire's 3. 1. 3 Study Instruments 3. 1. 4 Questionnaire's 3. 2 Result and Analysis 3. 3 Literatures Studies 4. 0 Finding and Recommendation 4. 1 Finding 4. 2 Recommendation 4. 2. 1 Designing Prototypes 26 5. Critical Evaluation 6. Conclusions 7. 0 References Appendix 133 LIST OF FIGURES Figures 4. 2. 1 . 1: Registration of Voters Page of Election System 26 Figures 4. 2. 1. 2: Password Sent Notification Page of Election System 26 Figures 4. 2. 1. 3: Selection Language Page of Election System's Figures 4. 2. 1. 4: Login Page of Election System's Figures 4. 2. 1. 5: List of candidates for parliament Figures 4. 2. 1. 6: List of candidates for state assembly Figures 4. 2. 1. 7: Submission of Vote page LIST OF GRAPH Graph 1. 2. 1. Malaysia's overall population and registered voters (1955 Graph 1. 2. 2. Number of registered voters (1959 - 2013)8 Graph 1. 2. 3. ; Percentage of turnout rate (1959 - 2013)10 Graph 4. 1 . 1: Respondents by age arrange Graph 4. 1. 2: Respondents by gender 19 Graph 4. 1. 3: Respondents by statute Graph 4. 1. 4: Registered voters vs. non-registered voters Graph 4. 1. 5: E-Voting awareness Graph 4. 1.

6: Agreed and disagreed with e-voting benefits Graph 4. 1. 7: E-Voting increase turnout rate resulted - 2013)8 LIST OF TABLE Table 1. 2. 1: Total voters by age group (EDGE)9 1. Introduction According to Objectifications. Com, election is the act of an individual casting a tote to elect a representative of a party for some type of position. It may involve a public or private vote depending on the position. Most positions in the local, state, and federal governments are voting on in some type of election. Democracy is a form of government that all citizens have equal rights in decision-making that can change their lives such as election of representatives. All modern democracies like Malaysia for example, hold elections.

Election allows the citizen of a country to be an electorate or participant to decide who can lead the country for another term of period. The people choose their leaders by voting for them. The processes that take place before the real election are normally quite lengthy and some people don't even bother to register because of the cumbersome and lengthy process. Another issue that a country like Malaysia is facing is the turnout rate during the Election Day. Millions of people who have already registered as voters failed to turn out during the Election Day due to various reasons.

In this paper, we will discuss the reasons by focusing on the current election system in Malaysia and the performance issues that were encountered during the previous elections. We will also propose an alternative to the conventional way of manually conducting the election to a much more efficient and faster approach like an online

voting (e-voting) system in order to solve the problems. 1 . 1 Research Question In this mini project paper, we try to find the answer of the following question: Is an e-Voting system a better replacement for the conventional (manual) election system in Malaysia? . 2 Background In Malaysia, there are 3 types of elections involved; The General Election which is held once in 5 years' time, The State Election which was held in the State of Saba ND Karakas and also the By-Election which is held as an when it is required. The General Election has been held for thirteen times since 1959 and the last election was held on 5th of May 2013. Previously that was before 2011, people who wanted to register as a voter will need to fill up a form because there was no link between the National Registration Department (NERD) and the Election Commission (SEC).

Only in 2012 that the NERD and the SEC linked up and the registration only require a person to present his/her Identification Card (NRC) at the SEC offices or any assigned voter castration counters throughout the country. The system that linked them is called Agency Link-Up System (ALL'S). It was introduced in December 2011 and it allows the personal details of applicants to be shared among the Immigration Department, Department and of course The Election Committee. The link-up had given a positive impact in terms of increase in the registration of new voters from the 12th General Election in 2008 which was 0. 4 million new voters (before ALL'S) as compared to the increase after the implementation of the link-up system which was 2.

4 million new voters during the 13th General Election. The detail is shown on Graph 1 and Graph 2 below: Graph 1. 2. 1: Malaysia's overall population and registered voters (1955 - 2013) Graph 1. 2. 2: Number of registered voters (1959 - 2013) Based on the graph on the previous page, it is proven that the use of technology had played a part in the increased number of voters during the last General Election in 2013.

Although some might argue that the internal issues within the ruling party had actually contributed towards the rise in the registrations because the people wanted change, but then again it was a typical statement which is quite common during any General Election. The awareness of the people on how important to register as a voter had increased and it was also helped by the quick process of registration and submission to the SEC without having to sign any forms or documents anymore. Based on the last General Election or EDGE in Malaysia, many problems were reported especially on the social media and also in the newspaper or TV.

Among the common and most popular arguments were the slow the processes of voting and the long period of time taken for the counting of votes after it has finished. By using the rent manual system, people will have to queue and wait for quite a long time and some people might not have the luxury of doing so due to unforeseen circumstances even though it happens only once in 5 years' time. The elderly are among those who suffer the most if they were required to stand and wait

for a long period of time. As for the total registered voters for the EDGE, they were 13. Million. From that figure, 5. 9 million or 44. 4% are young people aged 40 and below who mostly are quite familiar with the Internet especially the Social Networking regardless of whether they re living in urban or the rural areas (See table 1 below for the detail statistics). Table 1. 2. 1: Total voters by age group (EDGE) Internet users in this country as of July 2012 reached 25. 3 million. Out of that figure, there are 5 million broadband users, 2. 5 million wireless broadband users and 10 million 36 subscribers (All Salaam et al. 2013). Malaysia ranked 10th in Asia among the Top Internet Countries by users as at June 30th 2012 (internationalist's). The last General Election (EDGE) produced a new record in voter turnout whereas 1 1. 06 million voters or over 83% of the registered voters cast their vote. The previous highest turnout was 49 years ago during the 2nd General Election in 1964 (77. 8%). Anyhow, there are about 2. 24 million abstainers who failed to perform their duty participation in the EDGE would have changed the course of the results of this election.

Registered Voters vs. Turnout during the General Election (1959 - 2013) Graph 1. 2. 3: Percentage of Turnout Rate (1959 - 2013) Hence, it is high time to embrace into a new form of modern voting by building an online automated election system which is expected to solve the problems and should cater for the following generic requirements: 1. Performance: The voter is able to vote faster

without need to stand and wait for a long time in a long queue and also the final result of voting can be produced faster. 2. Accuracy: All valid voters have to be counted and all invalid voters should be counted or discarded. . Accessibility: Each voter should be able to access the election system easily, and only eligible voters can cast their votes. 1. 3 Objectives The aim of the study is to identify and analyze the current manual election system in Malaysia and suggest an alternative way to improve or solve the problems facing the conventional system. An online voting system or also known as e-voting is capable of solving all performance related problems raised by the public and can expedite the process of election and increase voters and all parties' satisfaction. 1. Statement of Ethics There are some statements of ethic that have to be applied for this research paper: 1 . There must be no manipulation of data is involved. The results and method used are totally genuine and not fabricated. 2. The Writers must consider and respect people's privacy especially the survey respondents that might be affected by this case study. 3. The Writers will avoid bias in collection of requirement, experimental of design and also analysis all data, result and method. 4. The Writers must give ample time for the respondents to reply to the questionnaire and must not force them to expedite and acted against their will. . The Writers will not require or attempt to influence any respondents to take any decision which would change the final outcome. 6. The Writers will endeavor to preserve the confidentiality

of the input or information of respondents. 7. The Writers will place the interests of all respondents or other people involved above those of personal or individual interests. . The writers cannot be influenced by any political parties or organization involved directly or indirectly with the election and the approach taken must be a neutral one. 9. The writers are open to all criticism and new ideas by the public in order make this paper a better one. 0. The writers are responsible for any citation and references included in this research paper. 2. 0 E-vowing An electronic voting system or also known as e-voting is a voting method in which the voting data is recorded, stored and processed as an output in digital form. There are using a voting machine or an electronic polling booth. League ; Navel, 2013). In this paper, the focus will be on On-line or voting through the internet using any devices that connect to the internet such as Computers, tablets, mobile phones, pod.. Etc.

Malaysia has never tried e-voting before in any of their election be it the State Election, By-Election and also the General Election. There are a few countries in the world that have experimented this internet based voting in their national election like Ireland and Canada. Estonia is the only country in the world that have adopted e- voting in a big way. They have started experimenting e-voting since 2000 and in 2005 hey adopted it for the local office election whilst in 2007 they implemented it at the national level through the Parliamentary Election in March 2007 (Olivarez, Hall ; Trenches, 2009).

Malaysia could look

at Estonia as a role model in implementing e- democracy and study the model because there is a lot of benefit in terms of performance as compared to the conventional way of voting. Before the benefits are discussed, it is better to understand how the Malaysian Electoral System works. 2. 1 Malaysian Electoral System To begin with, the King of the Country or also known as Series Pads Bagging Yang did- Perturb Aging is elected to a five year term by and from among the nine rulers of Malaysia's states.

The nine rulers are the Yang did-Perturb Baser Niger Assemblies, the Sultan Clangor, the Raja of Perils, the Sultan of Threatening, the Sultan of Keyed, the Sultan of Skeletal, the Sultan of Pang, the Sultan of Juror, and the Sultan of Perk. Senate members are appointed by Yang did-Perturb Aging directly for 44 members, and other 26 members are elected by State Legislative Assembly to represent 13 states of Malaysia as each state need to represent 2 candidates. Senate members are elected for a term of three years.

House or Parliament Representatives are elected by Malaysian citizen through an election or in Malaysia known as General Election (GE). The election is held after every five years with each Political Party needs to represent one Prime Minister Candidate to compete and at the same time, house of representative members are elected by Malaysian citizen also for each city of all state in Malaysia. If the final result determined that one of the parties win many seats in the Parliament means the Prime Minister Candidate that won would be the next Prime Minister. 2. 2 Qualification of

Voter

To be eligible as a voter in Malaysia, one needs to be:- A Malaysian citizen Age is 21 years old and above not disqualified in accordance with the laws of Malaysia From 2012 onwards, the people of Malaysia could easily register as a voter at the Election Commission state offices and also nationwide computerized post offices. They can also register at any of the registration counters set up around the countries. They are normally located at places of attractions like Shopping Malls, political party's service centre, restaurants and even night markets or popularly known as Papas Male in Malaysia.

The process of registration used to be a lengthy one because of the Election Commission and the National Registration Department, the process takes only 5 minutes. People Just need to bring along their Identification Card or in Malaysia it is called McKay and the card will go through a scanner and the registration will then be completed. 2. 3 Electoral Process in Malaysia Elections at both the national and state levels in Malaysia are conducted by a neutral Election Commission (SEC) appointed by the king on the advice of the prime minister (Crisis Group Asia Report, 2012).. According to the Election Commission of

Malaysia, There are 6 steps to conduct any elections in Malaysia. They are first; the issuance of writ, second; candidate nomination, third; campaigning for the election, fourth; voting, fifth; counting of votes and finally the sixth; announcement of the winners and official results. For the purpose of this case study, the focus will be from the fourth stage onwards because the implementation of e-voting starts at this stage. During the voting day,

eligible voters who have their names listed on the electoral records will go out to cast their votes at the predetermined polling centers.

They could check the information on the SEC website on the whereabouts and other important details with regards to the election. Normally the SEC will open the voting booths from 8 am to 5 pm throughout Malaysia. Anyhow, there are places like in Saba and Karakas whereas the polling centers might be closed earlier due to safety reasons and transportation difficulties if it were to wait until the evening. A Presiding Officer will be in charge of each polling station and will be assisted with 2 to 4 polling clerks.

As for the voters from the Armed Forces, The Police Field Force and the Royal Malaysian Police together with their spouses, they are going to vote three days before the real election day. If they are unable to do this advance voting on the day, they need to apply for the postal votes. Their votes will be counted if they successfully reach the Office of the Returning Officer at 5. 00 pm on Election Day. After the voting has ended, the Presiding Officer, assisted by the assistants will then manually count the ballot papers.

First the Officer will fill up a form of statement on the number papers issued and the numbers of remaining ballot papers to ensure that the totals are tally. Then the Officer will need to complete another form to record the number of votes obtained by each candidate and the number of spoilt votes. They will also count the missing ballot papers by comparing the difference between the

ones in the box and the ones counted and recorded in the first form. Another form will need to be filled up before the counting finish.

The counting of ballot papers from advance voting will also need to complete the same processes. Finally, The Returning Officer for each constituency will confirm the candidate who wins and secures a simple majority and announce the person as the elected preventative for the respective constituency. The decision is absolutely final and any complaints on discrepancy or dissatisfaction with the outcome of the election 2. 4 Benefits of e-Voting As described on the previous section, the processes during and after the election is a lengthy and cumbersome ones.

This is where e-voting comes to the rescue. E- voting has a lot of advantages over the conventional voting Among the advantages or benefits are reduced costs, increase turnout and voting options, greater speed and accuracy in casting votes, greater accessibility for the disabled and language legibility (support multiple languages) (Mannish Kumar et al. , 2008). Most of the advantages mentioned above are related to performance issues. E- voting offers increased convenience to the voter, allow the voters to cast their votes at their own location and this surely is good news for the busy people.

E-voting can potentially increase voters' turnout as many of the people nowadays own mobile phones or electronic devices that can directly have access to the Internet. It provides high accuracy and also reduces the amount of time spent counting and recounting the votes and producing the results. It also produces highly accurate results as human error is excluded and efficient handling as there is not

laborious counting procedures required. Spoilt votes could also be reduced significantly because of the mechanism that prevented the voters from choosing more than what they are supposed to choose.

In terms of accessibility, it provides convenient access for housebound voters and voters from abroad to cast their vote without the need to do a postal vote that will take longer to arrive at the polling station and is certainly susceptible to fraud and mishandling. As for the disabled ones, e-voting is certainly good news for them because it could supports a variety of interfaces that will enable the visually- impaired people to finally cast their vote independently at their own convenience. As for the languages, it could also come in multilingual audio format to help the elderly and the disabled people cast their vote easier. . 0 Research Instruments Research instrument that we did to complete this study was gathering all information from a few sources like the Malaysia government website and election commission of Malaysia. Besides that, a few information resources were questionnaire result from a few Malaysian citizens as voter which is summarized on this section below. The questionnaire given to them is attached in Appendix 1 . 3. 1 Questionnaire Questionnaire is one of research instruments consisting series of question to fulfill survey activities and gathering all information from the respondents.

The questionnaire is given to fifty five respondents and all respondents come from various city of Malaysia state. 3. 1. 1 Purpose of Questionnaire Questionnaire were purposed to know how the respondent respond if the e- voting system is available for Malaysia and do they agree that the e-voting system reference.

3. 1. 2 Selection of Questionnaire The series of question for questionnaire, it was necessary to determined subject who were best to know what the respondent expect is same as the purpose of e- voting system itself and also from that question is expected to provide the required information.

The respondent also should be chosen based various kinds of people and city of Malaysia state. 3. 1. 3 Study Instruments Study Instruments is needed to get information which is formulated to cover all issue regarding the performance of election system as bellows: * The performance n registration of a voter * The performance during election process * The performance on counting of votes 3. 1. 4 Questionnaire The questionnaire consists of only 10 questions and it took 1 - 2 minutes only.

The total of respondents has been set to 52 respondents of Malaysian citizen only and the expired time is 12 June 2013 at 6 PM. The questionnaire is uploaded and provided at http://www. Surveying. Com so that all respondent only need to answer online. Email notification was sent to them with a link that will direct them automatically to the questionnaire page. Result and Analysis 3. 2 In this result and analysis section is to display the final result of the questionnaire and analyze all data based on the final result with related to literature review.

Finding from that questionnaire and the literature will be discussed based on possible solution on the next section. In this section, it discussed about the weakness that was found on the current manual e-voting system as follows: * The performance on registration of a voter: During the

registration of voters, the election commission of Malaysia filled up their data by handwriting on a registration form. The employee might do a underwriting mistake that make the voter might lose the vote number to cast their votes or the employee needs to re-fall up the registration form so that it will take a time again.

Also, the registration queue will be long. Therefore the registration usually held on seven months before the election. * The performance during election process: On that Election Day, all people need to wait their number in a long queue. The problem come when oldest people also have to wait their number so make some of them prefer to be out from that queue line because they cannot be able to stand and wait for a long time. The performance on counting of votes: The counting of votes was done manually, so the final result will be slow.

Currently in Malaysia, they do not have an online system for the election. Therefore, in this discussion, new e-voting system is expected to improve the election system in Malaysia with cover all problems which has been on that above section. Based on that our questionnaire, the e-voting system should fulfill the following requirement: