Secure Mobile Voting - Seminar Report

ABSTRACT: 

The Foundation Of A Strong Democracy Is An Informed And Engaged Citizenry. The Better Way to Both Inform and Engage Citizens than through the Power of Today’s information And Communication Technologies. Citizens around the World Recognize and embrace The Benefits Of E-Government Services Such As E-Voting, Online Tax Filing, License Renewal, And Benefits Claims. These Services Can Be Made Available Through Mobile. The Voting System Can Be Incorporated By Using Mobile Phones. The M-voting System Is Designed by Using finger vein scanner PHP (Hypertext Processor) With MYSQL Server as Database Server Tested with Mobile Explorer Emulator(Open wave V7 Simulator). My Voting Goes Mobile. It Is The Patriotistic, Socialistic, Humanistic, Economist, Thinking Of Us That Lead To Visualize & Analyze The Election System (Voting Process) And Project A Viable Solution Of Voting Through (Mobile) CELLULAR PHONES Guarded By Finger Print Sensors By The New Mobile Language Of SMS.Motion Is The Basic Physical Property Of Anything In This Hi-Tech Info Era. Time Is A Precious Thing And Correct Information Is The Most Precious Thing. Merging All These Together We Look In For Easier, Cost Effective, Time Managing Way Of Casting My Vote Through the Cell Phone With A Finger Print Sensor.

Introduction

               Everything by Nature Moves. Mobility Is The Basic Feature Of Every Organism. So Does Man .In This High Tech Info Era and  Everyone Needs to Get Connected without Getting Wired (Chained). It’s The Free World Still Get In Touch With These Human Technologies. With The Advent Of Numerous Personal Digital Appliances (PDA), One Can Obtain And Access Information To His Needs, Of Course All These In A Society Where He Lives. Electronic Voting Machine (EVM) Can Be Replaced With a Mobile Ballot Paper. Voting At Our Finger Tips From Our Place Itself. “Cast a Vote, Without a Ballot, Got A Cell Phone With You…” Democracy Can Be Made Transparent To Citizens. The Heartbeats of Democracy (Voting) Be Made Transparent To the Laymen (Who Has a Cell Phone!) In A Big Democratic Country likes India. Information Is The Much-Valued Thing And It Needs At The Right Time By The Right Way And By The Right Approach. History Has Shown That There Are Several Malpractices In Election And Voting Procedure Such As Ballot Snatching, Fake Voting, Counting Malpractices, Voters List Name Cancellation Etc., And Huge Investment Of Money Spent On Voting Goes Waste Without Achieving The Goal Of Democracy. Our Effort Lies In Reducing The Cost, Error And Malpractices In The Process Of Voting.

M-Voting (An Alternate Of E-Voting):                    

         Mobile Technology Has Attained Heights And The Market Trend Is That Every Citizens Of India Will Possess A Mobile Handset By The Year 2010 (At Cheaper Rates Of Service.) When Such A Pad Is Available Why Not Using It For A Time Saving, Cost Effective, Secured Method Of Voting.

The Concept Is As Follows:

• Every Citizen Above The Age Of 18 Years Has Got The Right To Vote And Hence Obtaining Their Fingerprints And Storing In The Database Along With Their Birth/Death Record Becomes Necessary.
• User Sends His scanned finger vein (Secured Print Is Encrypted and Sent as Sequence of Data in Encoded Form) To the Service Provider.
• Service Provider Verifies The Fingerprint And Checks For The Validity Of Voting And Sends Voter List (A Mobile Ballot Paper) Through Sims.
• User Casts His Vote And Sends 2nd Message.

Since Mobile Phone Has Connectivity with Computer Systems It Is Easy To Store and Access at the Service Provider and Results Be Published Instantly.

Security In Voting Schemes

There Is A Set Of Voting Security Criteria. However, Depending On Different Democratic

Requirements in Different Countries, And the Different Scales of Electronic Voting Systems, Security Goals Can Vary. General Security Requirements Includes,

Democracy: All and Only the Authorized Voters Can Vote, and Each Eligible Voter Can Vote No

More Than Once. Voters Can Also Choose Not To Vote. To Achieve Democracy, Voters Need To Be Properly Registered And Authenticated.

Privacy: All Votes Remain Secret While Voting Takes Place and Each Individual Vote Cannot Be Linked By Any Individual to the Voter Who Casts It. The Privacy Issue Is Paramount.

Accuracy: The Voting Result Accurately Reflects Voters’ Choices. In This Case, No Vote Can Be Altered, Duplicated Or Eliminated Without Being Detected.

Fairness: No Partial Result Is Available Before The Final Result Comes Out.

Finger Vein Scanner:

Biometrics is automated methods of identifying a person or verifying the identity of a person based on a Physiological or behavioral characteristic. Examples of physiological characteristics include hand or finger Images, facial characteristics, and iris recognition. Behavioral characteristics are traits that are learned or acquired. Dynamic signature verification, speaker verification, and keystroke dynamics are examples of Behavioral characteristics. Biometric authentication requires comparing a registered or enrolled biometric sample (biometric template or identifier) against a newly captured biometric sample (for example, a fingerprint captured during a login).

During Enrollment, as shown in the picture below, a sample of the biometric trait is captured, processed by a computer, and stored for later comparison. Biometric recognition can be used in Identification mode, where the biometric system identifies a person from the entire enrolled population by searching a database for a match based solely on the biometric.

Example, an entire database can be searched to verify a person has not applied for entitlement benefits under two different names. This is sometimes called “one-to-many” matching. A system can also be used in Verification mode, where the biometric system authenticates a person’s claimed identity from their previously enrolled pattern. This is also called “one-to-one” matching. In most computer access or network access environments, verification mode would be used. A user enters an account, user name, or Inserts a token such as a smart card, but instead of entering a password, a simple touch with a finger or a Glance at a camera is enough to authenticate user.

Uses for Biometrics

Biometric-based authentication applications include workstation and network access, single sign-on, Application logon, data protection, remote access to resources, transaction Security and Web security. The promises of e-commerce and e-government can be achieved through the utilization of strong personal authentication procedures. Secure electronic banking, investing and other financial transactions, retail sales, Law enforcement, and health and social services are already benefiting from these Technologies. Biometric technologies are expected to play a key role in personal Authentication for large-scale enterprise network authentication environments, Point-of-Sale and for the protection of all types of digital content such as in Digital Rights Management and

Health Care applications. Utilized alone or integrated with other technologies such as smart cards,

Encryption keys and digital signatures, biometrics are anticipated to pervade nearly all aspects of the

economy and our daily lives. For example, biometrics is used in various schools such as in lunch programs

In Pennsylvania, and a school library in Minnesota. Examples of other current applications include

verification of annual pass holders in an amusement park, speaker verification for television home shopping,Internet banking, and users’ authentication in a variety of social services.

Finger vein prints: The patterns of friction ridges and valleys on an individual's fingertips are unique to that individual. For decades, law enforcement has been classifying and determining identity by matching key points of ridge endings and bifurcations. Fingerprints are unique for each finger of a person including identical twins. One of the most commercially available biometric technologies, fingerprint recognition.

Devices for desktop and laptop access are now widely available from many different vendors at a low cost.With these devices, users no longer need to type passwords – instead, only a touch provides instant access. Fingerprint systems can also be used in identification mode. Several states check fingerprints for New applicants to social services benefits to ensure recipients do not fraudulently obtain benefits under fake Names.

Using biometrics for identifying human beings offers some unique advantages. Biometrics can be used to identify you as you. Tokens, such as smart cards, magnetic stripe cards, photo ID cards, physical keys and so forth, can be lost, stolen, duplicated, or left at home. Passwords can be forgotten, shared, or observed. Moreover, today's fast-paced electronic world means people are asked to remember a multitude of passwords and personal identification numbers (PINs) for computer accounts, bank ATMs, e-mail accounts, wireless phones, web sites and so forth. Biometrics holds the promise of fast, easy-to-use, accurate, reliable, and less expensive authentication for a variety of applications. There is no one “perfect” biometric that fits all needs. All biometric systems have their own advantages and disadvantages. There are, however, some common characteristics needed to make a biometric system usable. First, the biometric must be based upon a distinguishable trait. For example, for nearly a century, law enforcement has used fingerprints to identify people. There is a great deal of scientific data supporting the idea that “no two fingerprints are alike.” Technologies such as hand geometry have been used for many years and technologies such as face or iris recognition have come into widespread use. Some newer biometric methods may be just as accurate, but may require more research to establish their uniqueness. Another key aspect is how “user-friendly” a system is. The process should be quick and easy, such as having a picture taken by a video camera, speaking into a microphone, or touching a fingerprint scanner. Low cost is important, but most implementers understand that it is not only the initial cost of the sensor or the matching software that is involved. Often, the life-cycle support cost of providing system administration and an enrollment operator can overtake the initial cost of the biometric hardware.

The advantage biometric authentication provides is the ability to require more instances of authentication in such a quick and easy manner that users are not bothered by the additional requirements. As biometric technologies mature and come into wide-scale commercial use, dealing with multiple levels of authentication or multiple instances of authentication will become less of a burden for users.

Advantage in biometrics

Interest in biometrics is growing substantially. Evidence of the growing acceptance of biometrics is the Availability in the marketplace of biometric-based authentication solutions that are becoming more accurate, Less expensive, faster and easy to use. The Biometric Consortium, NIST and NSA are supporting this growth. While biometric authentication is not a magical solution that solves all authentication concerns, it Will make it easier and cheaper for you to use a variety of automated information systems – even if you're not a secret agent.

Certain specific biometric technologies that may have been identified to adequately describe the subject matter in no way Imply endorsement by the Biometric Consortium, the National Institute of Standards and Technology, or the National Neither Security Agency, nor does it implies that the technologies identified are the only ones available in the marketplace.

Strength of SMS:

            SMS – Short Messaging Services is a new global language that evolved in the faceless communication.15 billion character-based messages per month are sent worldwide.SMS @ 0.50 Repurchase of greeting cards slashed with SMS greetings.

OPTIONS:               

 SMS greet

 SMS Chat

 SMS Advertisement

 SMS order etc.

           

        The secrecy of data transferred can be highly strengthened by sending encrypted, cryptographic messages. With the advent of MMS

(Multimedia Messaging Services) the process becomes easier with advanced features.

Cost effective i.e. no need for dedicated voting machines, which are vulnerable and used once in five years.

• User-friendly easy access for citizens.
• Most secure voting ever.
• Fake votes easily avoided.
• Time consumption is very less.
• My vote goes mobile.

Consideration:

• Service provider needs to be governmental organization.
• Service provider must have high-speed equipments.
• Citizens should contact correct SMS number in order to avoid false voting.
• Presently non-availability of sensors in Mobile Phones.

Voting is a vital part of the democratic process. As such, the efficiency, reliability, and security of the Technologies involved are critical. Traditional voting technologies include hand-counted paper ballots.

These paper-based systems can result in a number of problems, including:

• Unacceptable percentages of lost, stolen, or miscounted ballots
• Votes lost through unclear or invalid ballot marks
• Limited accommodations for people with disabilities

Conclusion:

Today, the development and widespread use of information technologies is changing the way people view Voting processes and, ultimately, the way they vote. Recent advances in biometric technology have resulted in increased accuracy at reduced costs; biometric technologies are positioning themselves as the foundation for many highly secure identification and personal verification solutions. Today's biometric solutions provide a means to achieve fast, user-friendly authentication with a high level of accuracy and cost savings. Many areas will benefit from biometric technologies. Highly secure and trustworthy electronic commerce, for example, will be essential to the healthy growth of the global Internet economy. Many biometric technology providers are already delivering biometric authentication for a variety of web-based and client/server based applications to meet these and

Other needs. Continued improvements in technology will bring increased performance at a lower cost.