Miriam calls for amendments to automated election law

Manila, Philippines - Sen. Miriam Defensor -Santiago has called for amendments to the Automated Election System (AES) law in order to address the problems reported during the May 2010 elections.

Santiago cited numerous issues that arose during last year’s national elections, which was the first time that the country used an automated system of casting and counting of votes.

Among the issues raised by groups such as the Center for People Empowerment and Governance to the Joint Congressional Committee on the AES was the absence of a feature that allows for the verification of the software installed in the precinct count optical scan (PCOS) and the consolidated/canvassing system (CCS) and all other components of the AES.

It was also reported that the hash code extracted by the forensic team from the PCOS machines used in Antipolo is not the same as the one published on the Commission on Elections’ website.

Santiago explained that the hash code in the software of the PCOS machine is there to ensure that the same copy of the reviewed software and stored in escrow at the Bangko Sentral ng Pilipinas is the same as those installed in the more than 76,000 PCOS machines used for the polls.

“The May 2010 presidential elections cannot be considered a perfectly executed implementation of the automated election law. Critics point to the lapses in the way the Commission on Elections (Comelec) carried out the last national elections, such as the absence of digital signatures and a weak verification system of the installed software,” Santiago said.

“There is therefore a need to amend the automated election law to safeguard the integrity of the electoral process,” she added.

Santiago has filed Senate Bill 2816 to amend Section 7 of Republic Act 9369 or the amended AES law in an attempt to address the issues that came out during the May 2010 elections.

The section of the law refers to the minimum system capabilities and based on Santiago’s bill, instead of just providing a voter verified paper audit trail, the Comelec would be required to provide the voter a system of verification to find out whether or not the machine has registered his choice.

The following voter verification procedures were included in the bill: voter verified paper, video, audio and Braille audit trails.

Santiago also specified in her bill that differently abled voters should have access alongside the illiterates.

There should also be a feature that will allow the verification if the software installed in any component of the AES is one and the same as that held in escrow with the BSP.

The verification code would be printed out and copies of the printout would be posted on the door and wall of the precinct/canvassing centers.

This verification should be part of the initialization procedure executed by the board of election inspectors or the board of canvassers.

The bill also calls for the provision of the capability of digital signing of all soft copy documents using computer industry-standard secure private-public key cryptosystem that utilizes established certificate authorities or Department of Trade and Industry-accredited certificate authority.

The digital signing hardware to be used should not compromise the private key of the signer such as by employing processor smart cards for each signer and processor smart card readers for each computer equipment.

Under the bill, the Comelec would be required to procure computer hardware and software systems that include all the capabilities enumerated under the law.

“While the last election may have been considered acceptable, there is still large room for improvement,” Santiago said.