Groundbreaking scheme
tackles postal vote fraud
Newham Council is working with
leading electoral software specialists Strand Enterprise Ltd (SEL)
in tackling postal vote fraud in the forthcoming local and mayoral
elections.
The council is possibly the first in the world to pilot
a postal voting scheme involving fully-automated signature
collection and checking processes.
The signatures are scrutinised before the votes are opened to
provide greater security to those choosing to vote by post.
Anyone who has a postal vote is asked to sign a statement that
accompanies the ballot paper. The signature is scanned in and then
compared automatically with the original sample of their signature,
which was provided by the voter when they applied for a postal
vote.
Chief executive Dave Burbage, Newham's returning officer, said:
"We want to be sure that people can be confident that their votes
are secure.
"We have worked successfully with SEL in the past and we strongly
believe that this system could lead to many new and innovative
possibilities, such as electronically registering all voters in the
borough."
Dale Gould, director of SEL, said: "In this current climate where
there are concerns about election security, we came up with this
process which we believe helps to eradicate postal vote
fraud.
"With our business partner, Florentis Ltd, we have developed
cutting edge technology, which is mostly used to prevent fraud in
the banking sector. We have adapted it to the political environment
and the feedback we have received from local authorities and
political parties have been favourable."
So far, less than two per cent of signatures that have been
checked using the software have failed to match up with the
original.
If the automated program identifies any signatures that do not
match, the signature is then checked manually. If they still do not
match, then the final decision rests with the returning
officer.