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The Estonian Ministry of Justice plans to make the rules of e-voting clearer and more transparent and bring them into line with the guidelines of the Supreme Court.
E-voting rules to be made clearer
The change will bring important e-voting documentation to a higher decision-making level. Until now, the legislator has largely left this within the competence of the Estonian National Electoral Committee and the State Electoral Office. Thus, counting of electronic votes is currently carried out according to the rules established in the decisions of the National Electoral Committee, several issues are regulated by documents approved by the orders of the State Electoral Office. The change will eliminate the formal shortcomings of the e-voting regulation, which the Supreme Court has also pointed out.
The drafted development intention deals with technical and formal changes in the e-voting process aimed at making the regulation more transparent.
"The Supreme Court has drawn attention to formal deficiencies in relation to the regulation of e-elections both after the 2019 and 2023 elections," Justice Minister Kalle Laanet said.
Compared to so-called regular voting, e-voting is regulated in less detail in election laws. The lack of more detailed regulation in the law allows e-voting, as an increasingly used voting method, to be attacked with arguments of low transparency and low verifiability.
"The integrity and clarity of the rules of e-voting ensures better comprehensibility for all social groups and thus the continued reliability of the public service," the minister added.
Since the rulebook for e-voting is fragmented, it is not clear enough what the role of the Information System Authority (RIA) is in the organization of elections. According to the Supreme Court, the involvement of other parties in the organization of elections is legitimate if the management, control and responsibility of the organization of elections remains with the State Electoral Office. The roles between RIA and the State Electoral Office should be agreed on more clearly.