A scalable decentralized privacy-preserving e-voting system based on zero-knowledge off-chain computations

Abstract

Electronic voting has the potential to revolutionize democratic participation; however, conventional systems face challenges in ensuring transparency and bear risks associated with centralization. Blockchain technology presents a novel approach that mitigates many of these issues, yet scalability remains an obstacle for blockchain-based e-voting systems. This paper introduces a unique, decentralized e-voting scheme that employs zero-knowledge off-chain computations to efficiently handle large-scale elections while maintaining a constant on-chain storage requirement. This scheme promotes transparency, privacy, universal verifiability, and weak receipt-freeness. We introduce the innovative concept of ’ballot boxes’ to offset voters’ transaction costs. The scheme’s key feature is its capacity to manage large-scale elections, leveraging the positive attributes of blockchain technology. A proof-of-concept has been implemented on the Ethereum test network to validate the scheme’s viability, thus paving a promising path toward scalable, secure, and privacy-preserving e-voting systems.