Was the site that supported the joint initiative referendum on the privatization of Paris airport a victim of its public success? This is what many Internet users think, unable to complete their process since the collection of signatures opened at midnight this Wednesday.
For example, some have found themselves faced with pages of errors, making the site hosted by the Ministry of the Interior inaccessible.
We also carried out the test this Thursday morning. Since we couldn’t connect, we managed to complete both forms… before losing everything during validation. After the third try it worked.
Contacted this Thursday morning, the Home Office told us that one of the servers was “misconfigured”. The site works with several internal servers at Place Beauvau, so as not to depend on an external host. The problem, identified last night, “has been resolved” this morning, we assure.
Without wanting to provide figures, the ministry confirms that traffic has been “sustained” since yesterday evening but assures that “the system can handle the load”. That doesn’t stop some Internet experts, like Science Po professor Fabrice Epelboin, from estimating that “the site was not designed for such a powerful load surge.” To reach the 4.7 million signatures required (10% of the electorate), it will be necessary to obtain an average of 17,400 signatures per day during the nine-month duration of the online procedure.
A site designed in 2014
The site was designed in 2014, on the occasion of the law establishing the shared initiative referendum (PIR). But it has not been used since then, the ADP privatization initiative being completely unprecedented. Which could explain the not very modern design and ergonomics.
Other users have reported inability to complete their process. In fact, once the user has filled out the first form with their name, surname, date of birth or even their address, the site checks whether this information “corresponds” with that contained in the single electoral register (REU) . This “electoral mega-file”, managed by INSEE to replace the municipal lists, has been in use since last January. This had already raised practical concerns during the European elections.
“Before registering support, the registration of voters in the electoral lists is automatically checked. This control is carried out by verifying the voter’s registration in the single electoral lists via teleprocedure”, it is specified a decree published Thursday morning in the Official Journal. Except that some people can write their name before the minus or plus hyphen, for example. Or don’t pay attention to the capital letter. However, it is enough for just one character to differ from the REU data for the procedure to be blocked. Place Beauvau advises you to bring your voter card with you and to write down the data with the utmost precision.
Another point: many are surprised that the postal code proposed for their municipality of residence or birth is not the one they are used to. The Interior Ministry replies that it is the Insee code of the municipality that is automatically indicated, but guarantees that this does not “block” the procedure.
#ADP #antiprivatization #referendum #bugs