SC justices raise poll automation doubts

MANILA, Philippines — Supreme Court justices have expressed some doubt about the reliability of the automated election system that a foreign company would be supplying for the 2010 first-ever computerized election in the country.

In a nine-and-a-half-hour long hearing that lasted until almost midnight on Wednesday, the justices questioned the track record of Smartmatic, the foreign partner in the Smartmatic TIM consortium that won the P7.2-billion poll automation contract with the Commission on Elections.

They also questioned the reliability of the Smartmatic machines in the absence of a pilot test in actual elections and in light of an adverse comment from the Information Technology Foundation of the Philippines, which was acting as amicus curiae (friend of the court).

The court en banc was hearing a petition from the Concerned Citizens Movement to stop the implementation of the P7.2-billion contract because of the alleged lack of pilot testing, the lack of a common interest between the consortium’s two member firms and a lack of compliance with automation standards.

No TRO

Chief Justice Reynato Puno gave the parties 15 days to file their memorandums on the case after which the petition would be deemed submitted for resolution.

The high court saw no need to issue a temporary restraining order or a stay order on the payment of the contract but set CCM’s petition for oral arguments on Wednesday.

Senior Associate Justice Leonardo Quisumbing asked the Comelec’s lawyer to submit an explanation on the allegations of failure and even fraud against the Smartmatic’s election systems used in Venezuela and parts of the United States.

Quisumbing cited an article by the “Real Clear Politics” publication submitted by the ITFP that showed the role of Smartmatic’s automated election system in the recall referendum won by Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez in 2004.

He said that an exit poll conducted by the New York-based Penn, Schoen and Berland Associates survey firm showed Chavez losing 59 percent to 41 percent. Official tallies using Smartmatic machines, however, showed Chavez won, 58 percent to 42.

Venezuela experience

The Office of the Solicitor General, which is representing the Comelec, had presented Smartmatic’s experience in Venezuela as an indication that the firm could handle the Philippines’ national and local elections next year.

Deputy Solicitor General Tomas Laraga explained that the Smartmatic experience in Venezuela was brought up only to show that the firm had already undertaken at least 50 percent of a country’s electoral process at the national level.

Still citing the arguments of the ITFP, a group of computer experts that questioned and succeeded in having the Supreme Court nullify the P1.3-billion Mega Pacific deal in 2004, Quisumbing also raised alleged delays and irregularities in the elections in Chicago that used Smartmatic machines.

Smartmatic partnered with the Filipino firm Total Information Management (TIM) to form the consortium that will provide the automated system in the 2010 elections.

Aside from requiring CCM, Comelec and Smartmatic to appear, the Supreme Court also summoned IT groups like the ITFP, the University of the Philippines Computer Center and the National Computer Center to comment on the reliability and accuracy of the Smartmatic’s precinct count optical system.

Associate Justice Antonio Carpio raised the specter of the machines getting hacked because of Smartmatic’s use of loose memory cards instead of embedded data cards for the precinct data.

“What if the memory card is hacked into and is programmed [in such a way] that after a candidate receives 10 votes, the 10 votes are taken away and given to the other candidate?” Carpio said.

Smartmatic lawyer Victor Lazatin told the court the system cannot be hacked and that the cards themselves have been secured from hackers through encryption.

Carpio was unimpressed, saying it needed only better hackers to break the memory card security.

One-question referendum

Carpio also questioned Smartmatic’s experience in national electoral exercises, saying that the cases it presented involved a referendum involving one question in Venezuela and an election in Curacao whose population is smaller than Makati’s biggest barangay (village).

Smartmatic, in its written comment to the court, said its precinct count optical scan (PCOS) machines were always found to be 100-percent accurate during tests by the Comelec’s special bids and awards committee and technical working group.

It said the machines even surpassed Comelec’s minimum system capabilities criteria of 99.995-percent accuracy.

Smartmatic also denied CCM’s allegation that its machines have a failure rate of two percent to 10 percent. It said CCM based this on an alleged page from the Smartmatic website.

Smartmatic said the two percent to 10 percent failure rate was an industry observation in 2006 or earlier.

“Since then, there have been tremendous improvements in the optical mark reader technology,” Smartmatic said.

If the CCM had examined the updated website of Smartmatic, they would have seen that the PCOS’ advertised accuracy rating was over 99.99999 percent, it said. –Norman Bordadora, Philippine Daily Inquirer