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Will technology help in building confidence and trust?
Matthijs Schippers gave a presentation at the ICPS International Electoral Affairs Symposium in Nairobi, Kenya on how technology can help build confidence and trust in electoral processes. He discussed how both good technology and process improvements are needed for successful elections. As an example, he described Smartmatic's digital pen technology, which allows polling stations to securely capture, transmit, and validate election results in real-time, eliminating errors or potential manipulation compared to traditional post-election result collection methods. The digital pen maintains both physical and digital copies of results for transparency.
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Will technology help in building confidence and trust?
- 1. ICPS International ElectoralAffairs Symposium Nairobi, Kenya 25/6/2014 – 27/6/2014 “Will technology help in building confidence and trust?” Thank you for your kind introduction. Good afternoon ladies and gentlemen. It’s a privilege for Smartmatic to have received 2 speaker slots at the 8th International Electoral Affairs Symposium of 2014. In addition to this afternoon’s talk I also will try to do my very best not to bore you with another talk tomorrow morning. I like to thank the ICPS for organising this event, but also the Independent Electoral and Boundaries Commission of Kenya for co-organising and hosting this gathering of some of the finest international professionals in the field of managing elections in such a stimulating and beautiful environment, here in Kenya on the African continent, the birthplace of humanity, where so much democratic progress and electoral reform are taking place. 1
- 2. Matthijs Schippers VP salesWestern Europe Amsterdam, The Netherlands My name is Matthijs Schippers and I joined Smartmatic’s Amsterdam EMEA head office supporting customers for the Western Europe region as of the 1st of January this year. But based on my experience with another election systems company gained over a period of 10 years I regard myself as a relatively seasoned veteran in the industry. Amsterdam is the capitol of the Netherlands and for those people in the audience that know little about the Netherlands, perhaps you may have heard about Holland or you may have seen our team score a goal or 2 at the FIFA World cup in Brasil. 2
- 3. Will technology helpin building confidence and trust? Matthijs Schippers VP sales Western Europe Amsterdam, The Netherlands Today and tomorrow morning I want to talk about the question: Will technology help in building confidence and trust in the electoral processes? The answer to this question is a definitive big yes. Of course, what else could you have expected to hear from a manufacturer of election systems. But in the past and also even in the very recent past we have witnessed many projects in different countries where the use of technology has resulted in disappointing or even poor results. In order to explain and understand why in some cases technology will help or will not help in building confidence and trust I need to explain a little bit about Smartmatic and our view on elections and electoral solutions. 3
- 4. 4 Belmon63 700,000 polling stations installed Over 175,000 voting machines deployed 100% successful elections Over 160 million voter identities, incl. biometrics, processed 220,000 temporary localjobs created 2.3 billion votes cast and counted Our Achievements Our achievements as a company in the field of electoral solutions are unprecedented. 2.3 billion votes in total have been cast on and counted by over 175,000 Smartmatic voting systems, which were deployed in multiple election cycles for which some 700,000 different polling stations had to be set up and dismantled. Our systems also have processed identities of some 160 million voters, including one or more forms of biometrics. In order to achieve this we have worldwide some 700 professionals working every day building on furthering our excellence and we also created some 220,000 temporary jobs. And this is all in pursuit of the one most important common goal and that is to support 100% successful election. 4
- 5. 5 The complete industryoffers ‘Technology’ as the only answer for a successful election… But ….. Technology Voting technology providers That the industry offers Technology as the only answer for successful elections, but …… I’m afraid and also somewhat ashamed to admit that industry has not always offered the right technology. Needless to say that in these instances as a result you won’t get a successful outcome or in the best case a marginal improvement which doesn’t come near to the expectations and promises at the time the technologies were offered and procured. In all fairness to the industry, in most cases industry also offered technology with good intrinsic quality, but even then not all projects turned out to be a success. For instance good technology will improve ballot counting accuracy and integrity, but even then things can go wrong because of poor planning and bad execution of the election processes and procedures. The mirror image of this observation can be found when not introducing technology at all. 5
- 6. 6 … while NGOsand Multilaterals offer assistance for Process Improvement as the answer But ….. Process Improvement Other NGOs IFES UNDP This is the case when improvements in electoral processes are being sought by funding initiatives and projects that only aim at process or procedure improvements. These initiatives are often done with the involvement of NGO’s Process improvement are always valuable, but unintended mistakes or fraud will not always be prevented without the use of the right technology. And I don’t have to spell out what fraud will do with confidence and trust in the electoral process. 6
- 7. 7 The combination ofGood Technology and Process Improvement is needed for Successful elections Good Technology Process Improvement So the logic conclusion is that if you want to have successful elections you need to combine good technology with process improvement, and that's exactly what Smartmatic offers to the market. 7
- 8. 8 We create Technologyand Services to make governments more efficient and transparent… What We Do What we do comes basically down to creating Technology and services that allows governments to conduct their elections more efficient, accurate and transparent. And in doing so, we help to build the confidence and trust in the electoral processes. 8
- 9. Smartmatic covers thewhole spectrum of election processes… 9 We do not limit our selves to a single aspect, but in stead we cover the whole spectrum of election processes… and this unique perspective allows us to develop systems in a more comprehensive way and integrate that with election support services. 9
- 10. 10 Elections Process Map Thewhole spectrum stretches from the pre election, election and post election phase. And all different steps in the electoral process….. 10
- 11. 11 Elections Process Mapin Detail ….. break down in more granulated tasks or detailed sub processes. It’s beyond the scope of this presentation to run in detail through all these different processes. I like to pick 2 aspects for today’s and tomorrow’s presentations to explain the importance of combining good technology with process improvement in order to improve trust and confidence in the electoral process. These 2 areas also happen to have a decisive impact on the level of trust and confidence in elections: •Voter registration AND •Processing the votes into results I will save the voter registration for tomorrow’s presentation. 11
- 12. 12 Processing votes intoresults Counting Results collection Consolidation Proclamation Processing the votes into results encompasses starts right after the counting of the ballots and spans all the way to the proclamation of the winners. In most elections it is this phase that hides some of the most critical activities of Election Day. The whole process from opening the polls until closing the polls in the polling place is subject to public scrutiny and witnessing. But as soon as the counting is done, the count reports have to be returned at a central location and this may take any time from 15 minutes to a couple of hours or in some geographical dispersed situations a full day or even more. This introduces a great risk for fraud because a motivated attacker may take advantage of the provided window of opportunity between the moment of signing the count reports and the consolidation to the proclamation of the results. By adding the use of right technology to good procedures and best practices in the polling places we can also eliminate this risk. 12
- 13. 13 Smartmatic digital pen Theintroduction of Smartmatic’s digital pen is most certainly a very good sample for a solution to close this gap. Our digital pen allows to capture, process and transmit the results of the polling places to consolidation centers to generate the election results in a quickly and accurately manner, helping to strengthen the transparency of the electoral process. 13
- 14. 14 What is thedigital pen? A ballpoint A camera A data processor A blue tooth transmitter What is it ? Well, it’s a very intelligent pen that you can use as a normal pen. But it also has a battery operated camera, data processor with some intelligence and blue tooth transmitter on board. 14
- 15. 15 What can youdo with the digital pen? Fill out the count reports Sign the close poll statements Capture & retain data in digital format Transfer data wireless to devices 15
- 16. 16 How does itwork? POLLING STATION Preparation of count report using Digital Pen Report transmission Report unique identifier + polling location info Number of votes per candidate/party Valid votes Rejected votes Blank votes Null votes Additional comments and observations. Signature of polling officials 16
- 17. 17 How does itwork? POLLING STATION Preparation of count report using Digital Pen Report transmission Reception of reports / Validation of business rules on the report Aggregation of results Verification process /Discrepancy resolution /Final certification Proclamation RESULTS VERIFICATON & PROCESSING CENTER 17
- 18. 18 What are thebenefits? Maintains physical & digital copies Eliminates time lag result collection Reliable & accurate delivery of results Detects unintentional errors Adds ‘how’ & ‘when’ results were filled Recovers genuine results from manipulations CANDIDATE 1 020 CANDIDATE 2 010 CANDIDATE 3 015 CANDIDATE 4 015 CANDIDATE 5 040 CANDIDATE 6 090 VALID VOTES 190 BLANK VOTES 040 NULL VOTES 050 TOTAL VOTES 280 CANDIDATE 1 020 CANDIDATE 2 010 CANDIDATE 3 015 CANDIDATE 4 015 CANDIDATE 5 040 CANDIDATE 6 010 VALID VOTES 110 BLANK VOTES 040 NULL VOTES 050 TOTAL VOTES 200 18
- 19. 19 In summary Maintains physical& digital copies Eliminates time lag result collection Reliable & accurate delivery of results Detects unintentional errors Adds ‘how’ & ‘when’ results were filled Recovers genuine results from manipulations 19 This brings me to the end of the presentation. With this example I have demonstrated that the improvement of processes and procedures is not enough to fully guarantee that an accurate and transparent counted result in a polling place is processed in the tallied results. The use of Smartmatic’s digital pen technology can really boost the confidence in the proclaimed tallied results. The tallied results can be announced fast, free from errors and free from potential manipulations. And in this way technology in combination with process improvements can really help you in building confidence and trust in your electoral process. When you like to see how this pen actually works, please visit our stand for a life demo. Thank you for your attention.