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The article reports on electronic voting systems. The 2006 US elections showed why many voters have feared their votes would not be accurately counted. In addressing this, cryptographer David Chaum, developed an electronic voting system called Punchscan which directs the common problems being raised by academic critics of electronic voting system. Punchscan seems to be a complicated system but its operation can be explained to voters in a few minutes. The ballot is made out of a long sheet of paper with a perforation in the middle and printed on each half of the paper is a unique number to identify it from the rest. Chaum introduced the system a week before the 2006 elections but a world-test will follow in the spring of 2007.

The article discusses the application of open-source technology to electronic voting systems. It is said Open Voting Consortium proposed the use of open-source software due to concerns regarding electronic voting systems, such as that the machines used were buggy, easily subverted and difficult to audit accurately. OVC's system allows voters to choose candidates on a touch screen and print a ballot showing bar-code forms of the selected candidates, which will then be hand-scanned with a bar-code reader. However, according to Notable Software's Rebecca Mercury, the OVC system has its disadvantages, such as that the system is no more secure that electronically scanning paper ballots and that machines may not work properly in poorer precincts.

This article analyzes the weaknesses of electronic voting systems to be employed in the coming 2004 U.S. elections. Though the systems eliminate the problems of paper-based ballots, it gives up the ability to do an independent recount, a fundamental requirement for a well-run election. Other complications in the elections are the use of many different polling systems, the misplaced trust of state and local bureaucrats responsible for choosing and deploying equipment, and the system design challenge.