Karnataka cabinet expansion only after Yediyurappa’s Davos visit

New Delhi, Feb 20: Microsoft has begun testing its free open-source software called "ElectionGuard" in a small Wisconsin town in the US that aims to make voting more secure, verifiable and efficient.

"ElectionGuard" will enable end-to-end verification of elections, open results to third-party organisations for secure validation, and allow individual voters to confirm their votes were correctly counted.

It enables government entities, news outlets, human rights organisations or anyone else to build additional verifiers that independently can certify election results have been accurately counted and have not been altered, according to the company.

The software would create a paper trail and assure voters their votes were properly tallied.

"On Tuesday, Fulton residents are using the technology while choosing who will join the local school board and hold a seat on Wisconsin's state Supreme Court," reports CNBC.

With the test, the company aims to see if voters like the experience and make sure everything works fine.

In May last year, Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella announced "ElectionGuard".

According to Tom Burt, Corporate Vice President, Customer Security and Trust, voting system manufacturers will be free to build ElectionGuard into their systems in a variety of ways.

"These are exciting steps that enable individual voters to confirm their vote was properly counted, and assures those voters using an ElectionGuard system of the most secure and trustworthy vote in the history of the US," Burt said in a recent blog post.

"ElectionGuard" is not intended to replace paper ballots but rather to supplement and improve systems that rely on them, and it is not designed to support internet voting.

The software provides each voter a tracker with a unique code that can be used to follow an encrypted version of the vote through the entire election process via a web portal provided by election authorities.

During the process of vote-casting, voters have an optional step that allows them to confirm that their trackers and encrypted votes accurately reflect their selections.

But once a vote is cast, neither the tracker nor any data provided through the web portal can be used to reveal the contents of the vote.

After the election is complete, the tracker codes can be used by voters to confirm that their votes were not altered or tampered with and that they were properly counted, said Microsoft.

On the security front, "ElectionGuard" uses something called homomorphic encryption - which enables mathematical procedures "like counting - to be done with fully encrypted data".

Bengaluru, July 17: A 60-year-old woman who tested positive for Covid-19 allegedly ended her life in the Covid ward at KC General Hospital in the early hours of Friday.

The woman, the fourth Covid positive patient to end her life since April, was a resident of Mariyappanapalya near Jnanabharathi in West Bengaluru. She was found hanging from a window grille in the passage of the Covid ward around 5 am. She had used her sari to hang herself.

The police said that the woman was admitted to the hospital on July 1. She was responding well to the treatment and was almost cured. Her son was infected first and admitted to the same hospital. As she later tested positive and got admitted, her son was discharged on July 11. The police suspect that the woman may have resorted to the extreme step due to depression.

An investigating officer quoted doctors telling the police that they were about to inform the woman about her discharge date on Friday. Doctors were waiting for the report on her latest test before discharging her.

The woman’s body will be subjected to an autopsy as per the Covid standard procedure. The Malleswaram police have taken up a case of unnatural death. Investigations are on. 

On July 11, a 70-year-old man ended his life in the toilet of the Covid ward in Victoria Hospital, while a suicide was reported in the same ward on June 26. A 60-year-old woman also hanged herself in the toilet. Her son, daughter-in-law, and grandson were also admitted to hospital for Covid-19.

Bengaluru, May 30: Bengaluru City civic body Bruhat Bengaluru Mahanagara Palike (BBMP) has slapped a fine of Rs 50,000 on the food delivery startup Swiggy for irresponsible disposal of waste, an official said on Friday.

"Thinking of food is great - Swiggy. Hope you also think of segregating waste and disposing of it responsibly," tweeted BBMP Solid Waste Management Special Commissioner D. Randeep.

Randeep said a penalty of Rs 50,000 was imposed on Swiggy Kitchen at Katriguppe in the city for the violation.

"The incident with respect to waste segregation has been brought to our notice and happened at one of our kitchens in Bengaluru," confirmed a Swiggy spokesperson to IANS without revealing the exact details.

He said the startup is aware of its civic responsibility and has stringent processes to ensure high standards of compliance.

"While we investigate and rectify the root cause of the matter, we are reinforcing necessary awareness on the best practices to be followed amongst our teams and partner network to ensure complete compliance with waste management," the spokesperson added.

Swiggy has been penalised earlier as well for its irresponsible disposal of waste.

Recently, the BBMP’s solid waste management department has also fined an apartment complex Rs 15,000 for not segregating waste into dry, wet and reject categories.

Waste disposal norms for apartments

"Segregation of waste is mandatory in apartments. Onus of enforcing segregation rules lies on the (apartment) association and waste should be segregated as dry, wet and reject," said Randeep.

InClover Grand Apartments at Baiyappanhalli was penalised for the offence of improper waste disposal. Similarly, BBMP marshals also caught and fined some people openly discarding waste in public spaces.

"Dear citizens, please change your old habits. Our marshals are watching and will fine those who throw garbage in public spaces," BBMP Special Commissioner Randeep said.

He shared the photographs of two scooter-borne individuals being caught in the act and penalised at Kuvempunagar in Bengaluru.