Suddenly, voting by computer is back on the agenda in The Netherlands. A new advice says the computers can be reintroduced at the elections in a revised setup, where voters have to print the ballot papers themselves and put these in the voting boxes. Afterwards, the votes will be counted by scanning the papers.
In 2006, during a first meeting at the Waag, the pressure group "Wij vertrouwen stemcomputers niet" ("we do not trust voting computers") was founded by Rop Gonggrijp, who opposed the use of computers, as they could not be trusted and voting behaviour could be screened from outside. His activities led to the abolishment of computers at elections in 2008, when paper and the red pencil were used once again.
Five years later and voting by computers is back. Rop Gonggrijp can start all over again. He thinks there is too little time to install the necessary computer systems. "With the red pencil you can oversee the problems. With computers the risk emerges that problems become less visible", says Gonggrijp.
And: "Voting on paper functions excellent in many countries around us".