How it Works

Let’s say Sally Smith and John Jones are running for U.S. Representative. You vote at the elementary school in the town of Carlton.

You arrive and check in, the same as always. Then you go to the voting booth, and nothing about it looks new. Whether you vote on a touchscreen or fill out a paper ballot and feed it into the scanner, you’re completely anonymous. The machine has no idea who you are.

You make your choices and cast your ballot. Then the screen says:

That word is your Vote Word, and nobody else at your polling place got it. Remember it or jot it down, and you’re done.

What Just Happened?

From your side, almost nothing, and that’s on purpose. Voting should stay as close as possible to what you already do. You don’t need an app, a smart card, a QR code or anything extra to carry.

Behind the scenes, the voting system stored your word, HOUSE, with your ballot. No other ballot at that school has HOUSE attached to it. Your next-door neighbor got APPLE without knowing it, and her husband got DESK.

After the election

Once official results are posted, every ballot from your polling place is published online, listed by Vote Word. You look up HOUSE and see that it voted for Sally Smith.

That tells you your vote was recorded and counted exactly as you cast it. And since every ballot is public (but anonymous), anyone can add up the totals for themselves. You don’t have to take anyone’s word for it.

Same school. Same election. Different words.

Each Vote Word is used only once at a polling location.

You You

HOUSE

Only you saw this word

Your neighbor

APPLE

Only she saw this word

Her husband

DESK

Only he saw this word

No names. No ID numbers. Just a word that only you can connect to your ballot.

The whole thing, in four steps:

  1. Check in as usualSign in at your polling place. Nothing new to bring and nothing new to learn.
  2. Vote anonymouslyMake your choices on the screen or on a paper ballot, the same way you do today.
  3. Get your wordWhen your ballot is cast, you get a word like HOUSE. It's recorded with your vote and never with your name.
  4. Check it at homeOnce results are posted, look up your word and see exactly how your ballot was counted.
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