The use of electronic voting (e-voting) is becoming more common instead of traditional voting systems, but it still faces a big issue: trust. E-voting systems can be easily manipulated, with potential changes to election results from hacking or tampering by those who create the systems. In centralized networks, data is managed by one party, which raises trust concerns. However, this problem can be solved by using a distributed system where data is shared among all users. Blockchain technology serves this purpose well, as it keeps a shared record that cannot be changed, making it ideal for e-voting. This research introduces a Blockchain-based e-voting system using Ethereum and MetaMask, which meets six key principles of a fair election: secret ballots, one vote per person, voter eligibility, transparency, accurate recording and counting of votes, and reliability. Additionally, testing shows that using a slower gas price option results in the best value for costs. This introduces a Blockchain-based e-voting system utilizing Ethereum and MetaMask, ensuring adherence to essential electoral principles such as secret ballots, voter eligibility, and accurate vote recording. Performance evaluations indicate that using a slow gas price option offers the best cost-efficiency for this system. Overall, the proposed model not only addresses the vulnerabilities of traditional e-voting systems but also has potential applications beyond elections, including corporate governance and various voting scenarios
Introduction
The electoral process is fundamental to democracy, allowing people to make decisions and change governments through voting. Traditional voting methods—like paper ballots or show of hands—have served societies for centuries but face challenges from population growth and technological demands. Recently, electronic voting (e-voting) has gained popularity as a faster, more accessible, and cost-effective alternative that can increase voter participation, especially for those unable to vote in person.
However, e-voting raises concerns about security, transparency, and trust, as many systems are centralized and vulnerable to tampering or denial-of-service attacks. To address these issues, blockchain technology—an immutable, decentralized ledger—has been proposed to secure and transparently record votes. Blockchain-based voting offers anonymity, tamper-resistance, and real-time verifiability, improving electoral integrity and public confidence.
The proposed system uses Ethereum blockchain and smart contracts to enable secure voter registration, authentication, and voting. Each voter receives a unique public address and private key to vote anonymously. Votes are recorded on the blockchain and validated by network miners, ensuring transparency and immutability.
The development methodology includes requirement gathering, system design using Solidity smart contracts and React.js frontend, development and testing phases, and deployment on Ethereum test networks. Tools like MetaMask facilitate user interaction with the blockchain. Overall, this blockchain-based voting system aims to enhance security, transparency, and accessibility in elections, addressing the weaknesses of traditional and electronic voting methods.
Conclusion
Electronic voting (e-voting) has been in existence since the 1970s, which on paper offers some advantages over the paper-based systems in terms of higher efficiency and fewer errors. Also, along with cybersecurity, there is more and more support for a fair market-free voting system from blockchain enthusiasts. The fast headway of blockchain technology is behind numerous attempts to investigate its suitability in the context of enlarged e-voting systems. This however does not rule out the fact that some crypto-currencies have difficulties as every true technology born is not perfect. This paper details one such project that leverages the powers of a blockchain that are cryptographically secure and transparent to make e-voting systems better. The proposed system is built using Multichain, and it was observed that it fully met the requirements for a reliable e-voting system.
This work is a continuation of the one pinpointing the focus on the strengthening of blockchain\'s \"double spending\" problem resistance that arises, for example, in e-voting by fear of the \"double voting\" case which is misuse of a particular token. Mostly, users rely on this technology for the regular interpretations of transactions. If there are any deviations, they follow them. It therefore means that the secure technology works; however, when weaknesses are demonstrated, a rethink is necessary. This is the driving force to the need for studying this problem in greater depth. We hold the view that soon we are going to witness the development of a trust assured vote-tracking model (provenance) that will help us implement secure and fully verifiable e-voting systems. Adding a provenance layer to the current blockchain infrastructure is one of our ongoing projects which are intended to help in this
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