Oregon Counties Jackson and Umatilla to Conduct Mobile Voting Backed by Blockchain Technology

Tusk Philanthropies, a nonprofit organization, has broadcasted the news about its collaboration with Jackson and Umatilla Counties in Oregon to facilitate blockchain-oriented mobile voting in elections. The pilot project will allow people to take advantage of the benefits of mobile voting in the forthcoming special elections of the two regions slated to be organized in November.

According to the announcement made on October 18, 2019, the newly-launched platform will render the voters to cast their votes through their smartphones with the help of blockchain and facial recognition technology. With the use of the decentralized mechanism, the platform will ensure the highest standards of security and trust during the voting process.

The Voatz pilot project will be accessible only by a limited and selected group of voters specifically the servicemembers settled overseas, their dependents as well as other overseas voters who are eligible for casting their votes. The concerned people will be able to give their valuable votes through the revolutionary mobile app created by Tusk Philanthropies.

The respectable Director of Umatilla County Administrative Services, Dan Lonai, said that the pilot program is designed to give a boost to the voter participation rate in the elections. It also aims to render citizens with an easy mechanism to exercise their voting rights. The e-voting program will be a strategic partnership between the Oregon counties-Jackson and Umatilla, Voatz- the mobile election solution, Tusk Philanthropies, and the National Cybersecurity Center.

Bradley Tusk, the founder and CEO of Tusk Philanthropies, stated that

Jackson and Umatilla Counties just made history as the first in Oregon to give voters the ability to vote in the same way they conduct most of their other business – on their phones. Ultimately, giving everyone the opportunity to use mobile voting means we can dramatically expand turnout and loosen the grip on power by special interests and extreme ideologues on both sides.

Earlier, Voatz platform was employed by West Virginia to initiate blockchain-channelized e-voting in a federal election. Tusk Philanthropies has also partnered with the City of Denver, Colorado, and Utah County, Utah, for the e-voting pilots in the past.