Voatz
| Company type | Private |
|---|---|
| Industry | Electronic voting, Election technology |
| Founded | 2016 |
| Founder | Nimit Sawhney, Simer Sawhney |
| Headquarters | Boston , United States |
Area served | United States, Philippines (trial) |
| Products | Internet-based electronic voting solutions, mobile voting application |
Voatz is a privately held, profit-driven enterprise focused on developing Internet-based electronic voting solutions, with its main office located in Boston, Massachusetts. Established by Nimit Sawhney and Simer Sawhney, Voatz has enabled voters in states such as Utah, Colorado, and West Virginia to participate in statewide elections through its mobile application. A significant milestone occurred during a 2018 pilot in West Virginia, where overseas voters cast ballots from 29 different countries.
Although Voatz asserts that it undergoes independent security evaluations, the company has not disclosed the audit outcomes publicly and mandates that auditors sign confidentiality agreements. In 2020, researchers from MIT identified critical security flaws within Voatz’s platform, which the company initially contested. A later security review sponsored by Voatz confirmed these vulnerabilities and uncovered further issues, some of which were subsequently addressed.
The idea for Voatz originated at a hackathon during SXSW in 2014. By August 2025, the company had supported more than 150 elections, including pilot initiatives, and secured close to $12 million in venture capital investments.
Technology
Voatz utilizes blockchain technology combined with biometrics to authenticate voter identities while avoiding the storage of sensitive personal information in centralized databases. Its blockchain system operates through 32 identical validating servers hosted on Amazon AWS and Microsoft Azure platforms, each running Hyperledger, an open-source blockchain framework.
Voters confirm their phone number and upload a photo ID along with a "selfie" using the Voatz application. The system employs facial recognition technology and cross-references voter rolls to verify identity matches. Once a secure token is issued—activated by fingerprint authentication for qualified elections—the biometric data is deleted from the system. Subsequently, votes are printed onto paper ballots and processed via standard tabulation machines.
The Voatz platform grants election officials capabilities to monitor ballots, add eligible voters, and publish election outcomes. Voters do not engage directly with blockchain operations; instead, they authenticate using either a six-digit code or biometric verification serving as their private key.
2018 West Virginia
Between March and May 2018, West Virginia conducted a pilot program utilizing Voatz’s mobile voting technology aimed at military personnel stationed abroad. The system included functionalities such as ballot cancellation, post-election audits, and automatically tabulatable audit reports. Eligible devices required were iPhone 5s or newer running iOS 10 or higher, or Android devices with OS version 6 or above supporting Samsung KNOX.
2016 Massachusetts Democratic State Convention
In June 2016, Voatz was employed to authenticate delegate credentials at the Massachusetts Democratic State Convention held in Lowell, attended by over 2,000 party leaders and officials. The platform generated a unique QR for each delegate based on lists provided by the Massachusetts Democratic Party. Delegates verified their identities through the app’s facial recognition feature before casting votes alongside traditional paper ballots. Veronica Martinez, executive director of the Massachusetts Democratic Party, expressed intentions to continue utilizing Voatz for future events. Additional security protocols included photo verification: voters took a selfie during voting sessions and were required to retake and confirm their photo if switching devices.
2017 Tufts Community Union (TCU) Senate Election
During the 2017 Tufts Community Union Senate election, Voatz supported the process by creating QR codes for students using a roster provided by the registrar. On election day, these codes were distributed via email, allowing students to confirm their identity by scanning their Tufts Student ID with a smartphone.
Starting in 2017, TCU Senate elections have presented voters with two methods: online participation through the Voatz app, which requires downloading via an official Tufts email address, and voting through the Voatz Lite Web Portal using a security key sent by email. Additionally, students have the option to cast ballots in person at designated campus locations using Voatz tablets, with assistance from company staff.
2020 Utah U.S. Presidential Election
In October 2020, a voter from Utah became the first individual to submit a presidential ballot in a U.S. general election utilizing a blockchain-enabled voting application on a personal mobile device. This vote was cast in Utah County via the Voatz platform, which has been trialed in states such as West Virginia, Colorado, and Oregon. Utah pioneered demonstrating the auditability of Voatz ballots. Since 2019, Utah County has employed Voatz to offer military personnel a more secure alternative than email voting and subsequently expanded access to voters with disabilities during local elections.
Philippines Trial Election
According to CNN Philippines, during a two-day pilot event, 348 out of 669 volunteers participated by voting through mobile devices, websites, and assisted kiosks, resulting in a turnout of 52.01%. Bea Wee-Lozada, Comelec Director for Overseas Voting, highlighted that this figure surpassed typical overseas voting participation rates, which seldom exceed 50%.
Business Model
Voatz's revenue model is based on conducting elections utilizing its proprietary technology. In 2018, Overstock.com invested $2.2 million to promote Voatz's integration during electoral cycles and to reposition Overstock as a financial technology enterprise. Overstock’s blockchain division, Medici Ventures, invests in various industries including Payments & Banking, Capital Markets, Identity Verification, Property Management, Supply Chain Management, and Voting Systems. To date, Medici Ventures has funded 19 blockchain startups, among them Voatz.
Security assessments
Security professionals have expressed skepticism regarding Voatz’s platform. Josh Benaloh, senior cryptographer at Microsoft Research, criticized the system as insecure and unnecessarily complicated, asserting that "blockchains just don't help." MIT professor Ron Rivest also voiced apprehensions about privacy in mobile voting systems, cautioning that software might covertly transmit voter data. In contrast, Ricardo Almeida from Universitá di Camerino argued that employing a semi-private blockchain improves transparency and verifiability while maintaining low complexity.
In 2020, cybersecurity firm Trail of Bits identified 48 technical vulnerabilities and 31 threat model concerns (totaling 79), with roughly one-third classified as 'high severity.' Voatz responded by resolving 20 issues and contesting 25 others as false positives. The findings supported earlier MIT research that revealed security weaknesses despite Voatz’s denials.
FBI Investigation
An attempted breach of West Virginia’s military voting system in 2018 triggered an FBI investigation involving students from the University of Michigan enrolled in EECS 498–009—a course focused on election cybersecurity. The Secretary of State of West Virginia confirmed that IP addresses linked to these intrusion attempts were shared with the FBI for potential criminal investigation. CNN reported that these IPs corresponded to those from the University of Michigan.
By October 2019, the FBI had initiated an official probe into the attempted hacking of Voatz during the 2018 midterm elections. Authorities speculated that the motivation was academic—likely related to coursework—rather than an effort to manipulate election results.