The VeriCount™ apps are built upon ​a software engine known as the VOTABIT ​VOTING RECORDATION SYSTEM​. Votabit powers both the VeriCount apps and ​​the ​SolidVote Electronic Voting System. ​Votabit provides functions for voting, recording, counting and end-to-end verification. All data is stored transparently: It is uploaded onto a public ledger system called a blockchain, where anyone with the open-source software can examine it. And it is permanent: Once recorded, all data, including user-verified photographs and screen shots of ballots, tallies and other evidence, cannot be deleted or lost because it is stored on thousands of servers around the world. And it is extremely resistant to fraud: The system’s detection protocols provide the ability to quickly detect and respond to hacks, which cannot be hidden because of the public nature of the blockchain technology.

All digital and photographic data are time and location stamped and cryptographically secured using NSA-strength algorithms. Voter identities and their votes are anonymized. After the polls close, the private key to the citizen-generated data is transmitted, allowing instantaneous display of the detailed data collected. Because the data is time- and location-stamped, pre- and post-election alterations are impossible to hide.

The VeriCount™ system is absolutely neutral and impartial. It can be deployed by nonpartisan organizations, electoral authorities, independent observer missions, and activists of any persuasion.

We have finished the prototype of the voter app and the cryptographically secure and transparent real-time accounting and storage components. Our goal is to roll out the Exit Voting and Poll Watcher apps in time for use in the American presidential election on November 1, 2016, followed in 2017 by the other apps and later the full e-voting system, which we will submit for certification and adoption by electoral officials.

These are ambitious but not impossible goals: Because so many software-literate people care about the direction democracies are going, we will use crowdsourcing to test and validate the final code. This will save several hundred thousand dollars and take many months off the process. We will release the code under a standard such as Creative Commons for free use by democracy activists and make licenses very cheap for nonprofit organizations and developing country governments. We will charge corporate prices to businesses and rich governments, which will help underwrite the free and cheap licenses for civil society

We want to make this system available to the world as quickly as possible and with maximum impact. With your help we will be able to. Share this project in your network and especially with anyone you believe can help in any significant way. And please consider making a donation, to forward the apps’ development – every little bit helps. This is an opportunity to produce lasting positive change in democracies around the world. Please consider playing a role, however small, in making it happen.