Analysis: How easy is it to rig the outcome of an Electonic Election?

Question need to be asked "Just how easy is it to rig the NSW Legislative Council election?

The reality is its quite easy if you have access to the data file and no one else has copies of the data so a comparison cannot be made.

The NSW "Below-the-line" preference data fiels that habve just been released exclude preferences recorded as being informal. Votes where a preference has been omitted or duplicated. This could be as a result of a data-entry or voter error.

Without access to the missing data it is impossible to verify the quality of the data recorded.

What’s even more scary is that if a person had access to the original data file they could easily run a simple query against the data set, removing preferences for a given candidate where that candidate has a higher preference than another candidate. The number of primary votes would still be the same but the ballot paper would exhaust during the count if the preference order had been altered in any way.

Unless you are able to undertake a comprehensive audit or a random check it would be impossible to verify the correctness of the data recorded. The only means if validating the integrity of the election is to rely on the overall data network security and any log files that might provide a forensic trail to any wrong doing. Problem is this that access oog files are not available to scrutineers.

The risk of data being altered is increased if copies of the data files are denied or only made available after the conclusion of the count. All that would be distributed after the count is the altered data file with no means of checking that the data is infact correct

The preferred option and best means of protecting the integrity of the data file is to make copies of the file available, showing all preferences (Including informal and mismatched data-entry preference,) progressively throughout the data-entry process.

Publication of progressive compilation of the data limits the time and opportunity available to alter the data records, Scrutineers would have access to a copies and can monitor and perform random or structured data quality checks as the count progresses. Any close calls would signal warning and alert scruineers and analysts to pay closer attention in the review.

The fact that the data files have not been readily available during the count leaves the system wide open to potential misuse and abuse.

The Electoral Commissionm of course, prefers that no one has access to this information in which case there would be no means of challenge the accuracy and validity of the count. What they do not know can not be questioned.

One thing is clear, If we are to maintain confidence in the electronic counting of our votes the system needs to be designed as such that it is much more open and transparent. The current procedures and practices are far from open and transparent.

In the absence of Electoral Commission's implementing procedures that ensure that data is more readily available and subject to proper and fill scrutiny, Parliaments will have to review the detailed procedures and legislate to protect the system from possible corruption and abuse.

What’s needed is a comprehensive independent Parliamentary review of the processes and procedures in the conduct of electronic elections.

We certainly should not be complacent or lulled into a false sense of security thinking that the system is protected by itself, the fact is it is not.

They said the Titanic was unsinkable. History has proven otherwise. We only need to look at the mistakes made in the 2006 Victorian State Election to realise the extent of errors that can and do occur in an electonic counted election .

Assessing Electoral Fraud in New Democracies

Steve Tully's refusal to provide copies of the below-the-line preference data files to scrutineers and his failure to publish this information had prevented scrutineers from properly scrutinising the Victorian Legilsative Council election.  

There is no excuse or reason why this information was not made available. Similar complaints and concerns had been made about the Victoria's previous state and municipal elections.  

In 2006 The Victorian Electoral Commission refused to publish copies of the preference data-files. When the commission was asked for copies of the data-files by the Victorian Parliamentary Electoral Matters Commission, Steve Tully said that the data files pertaining to the primary count A for Western Metropolitan had been deleted. overwritten and that there were no backup copies available. The Commission failed to ensure that this data was protected and copies available in spite the fact that this information had been requested prior to the conduct of the count. 

The Chief Electoral Commissioner has demonstrated for a second election in a row that he is incapable of self regulating or ensuring that our electoral process in Victoria is open and transparent. 

Parliament must now act to ensure the integrity of the electronic counting system is maintained and that scrutineers have access to this crucial data in real time. 

There are no technical or procedural reasons why this data cannot be made available and published on line as and when it is recorded.  In the same way that polling place results are published on line as the count progresses. 

The International Foundation for Electoral Systems (IFES) has just published a white paper on which it addresses some of the growing concerns about about fraud in electronic elections.  One of the issues raised is the need to ensure that the election process is open and transparent and that the tallies of electronic counting systems are subject to proper scrutiny and audit by political parties and the need for publication of elections results to be progressively made available during the count.

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Assessing Electoral Fraud in New Democracies:
A Basic Conceptual Framework

By Rafael López-Pintor
December 2010
As the topic of electoral fraud has gained prominence in the media and the international discourse, IFES is releasing a series of three white papers introducing a groundbreaking framework for deterring this corrosive practice.
Assessing Electoral Fraud in New Democracies: A Basic Conceptual Framework, the first paper in the series:

• discusses the importance of focusing on fraud in new democracies;
• provides a definition for fraud (as opposed to corruption or malpractice);
• sheds light on the different agents who can perpetrate fraud and why it can be difficult to identify them; and
• assesses how international democratic standards intersect with the prevention of electoral fraud

A PDF of the White Paper can be accessed here.

Scrutineers denied access to preference data during count

Victoria's Chief Electoral Commissioner, Mr Steve Tully, has refused to provide copies of the below-the-line preference data-files to scrutineers during the conduct of the count. As a result scrutineers have been denied the opportunity to review and verify the integrity of the recorded data-files.Copies of the preference data-files will only be provided after the count has concluded.

Copies of preference data-files were available progressively though-out the data-entry process for the 2008 City of Melbourne Municipal Election.

It is impossible to properly scrutinise an electronic count without access to the preference data-file.  Elections in Victoria are no longer open and transparent.  There is no reason or justification in refusing to make this data available on request. in fact it should be available on line in real time.

In another extraordinary revelation the VEC does not tabulated the number of ballot papers printed, issued and returned for each voting centre. Steve Tully has indicated that a number of ballot papers have gone missing from the count.


Without access to the voting centre returns it is impossible to determine how many ballot papers were not included or may have been omitted from the count


The VEC has spent Millions of dollars developing software duplicating resources that are provided by the Australian Electoral Commission and they have not provided a means of recordeding voting centre declarations electronically.  Each district has a number of computer resources and it would not be difficult or costly to have the returning officers transcribe and record the polling place returns into a central database.

The VECs reconciliation report does not include the number of ballot papers printed, issued and  receive but only the number counted.  Ballot Papers that go missing are not reported to scrutineers.

Midday VEC Tally Summary

The below table is a summary of data published by the VEC for the lower-house and the upper-house.  Then information is a tabulation of the total vote (Formal + informal) counted by the VEC as of noon December 7, 2010.  It is not the a trabuation of the voting center declaration returns which the VEC has failed to provide.  There are a number of ballot papers that are still to be counted and some have gone missing,  Without access to the polling place returns and the reconciliation report the full extent of the number of ballots waiting to be counted and or missing can not be ascertained.

Comparison Summary Table		Council	Assembly
Region	Difference	Total	Total
Eastern Metropolitan Region	5373	392675	398048
Eastern Victoria Region	4781	423974	428755
Northern Metropolitan Region	75835	325025	400860
Northern Victoria Region	3931	396737	400668
South Eastern Metropolitan Region	62466	348323	410789
Southern Metropolitan Region	14268	372845	387113
Western Metropolitan Region	8118	434916	443034
Western Victoria Region	2254	435830	438084