As competition heats up, the Geneva cantonal government has launched an e-voting promotional campaign in a bid to win additional partners and clients for its system of electronic voting. Currently, only six of Switzerland’s 26 cantons offer remote online voting to a limited number of their citizens. The long-term trials with e-voting suffered a severe setback last year after the Swiss government stopped the use of an American system on security grounds. Since then, there has been a head-to-head contest between two technologies licensed by the national authorities: a home-grown e-voting system, developed by the authorities of canton Geneva, and Swiss Post, which cooperates with the private Spanish company Scytl.
For the time being, Geneva shares its software technology with three other cantons, while Swiss Post has at least two cantons on board. It is also known that at least three additional cantons have declared an interest in introducing e-voting.
Pierre Maudet, head of the Geneva cantonal security and economics department, made no secret that he was on a “charm offensive” in the Swiss capital, Bern, on Monday.
Boosted by a CHF4.7 million ($4.8 million) credit from the cantonal parliament to develop an additional security level for the system, the Geneva authorities invited Swiss parliamentarians, representatives from other cantons and the media for a presentation.
Full Article: Geneva mounts e-voting charm offensive – SWI swissinfo.ch.