Smartmatic: 89% want us

Smartmatic, the Venezuelan voting machine vendor, brands as “malicious falsehoods” Filipino info-technologist Leo Querubin’s rants against its automated elections in the Philippines (“Smartmatic Again in Election 2019?,” Gotcha, 30 Aug. 2017).

In the balloting that Smartmatic managed from 2008 to 2016, Querubin alleged, it broke election laws by accessing election servers on Election Day. In 2008 then-Comelec chairman Jose Melo purportedly let Smartmatic access servers in Mindanao remotely from Manila. In 2013 Comelec chairman Andres Bautista and PPCRV head Henrietta de Villa authorized Smartmatic to access the servers, change scripts, and delete files. In 2016 the foreigner again accessed the servers on Election Day. Whether or not the results were affected is irrelevant, Querubin said. Republic Act 9369 prohibits and punishes “gaining or causing access to using, altering, destroying or disclosing any computer data, program, system software, network, or any computer-related devices, facilities, hardware or equipment, whether classified or declassified.”

To that, Smartmatic-Philippines general manager Elie Moreno retorts: “Smartmatic has not violated any election law or illegally accessed any election server. Cases demonstrated that we have not. Every action performed inside the system was accurately logged, which makes the AES (automated election system) tamper-evident.

“As has been explained by PPCRV, in the 2013 election Smartmatic pointed to PPCRV a flaw in their aggregation system; PPCRV rectified it. This aggregation system is not an election server.

“The Transparency Server, at the PPCRV’s Pope Pius Center, was being used by media and political parties to get results to report. The  script that was modified to substitute the ‘?’ for an ‘Ñ’ is not part of the AES. The change happened outside of the AES, in a script that merely transforms the information in a format easier for media consumption. Smartmatic was authorized by Comelec to execute such change.”

Querubin further alleged that despite the deliberate blatant disrespect by a foreign vendor for Philippine laws, Smartmatic is let to bid for the Election 2019 AES. The Venezuelan firm admitted to installing secret servers in 2016, Querubin said. Those servers collected precinct results before transmission to municipal canvassing and consolidation servers.

Moreno retorts: “Tagging Smartmatic as ‘foreign vendor’ is unfair. In the Philippines more than 90 percent of Smartmatic employees are Pinoys.

“Smartmatic has always acted with utmost respect for the laws of the Philippines, and of every country it operates in. Our commitment to the Philippines to provide election technology and services is the result of open competitive biddings and the quality of our service.

“There has never been any secret server.

“In the Pulse Asia survey of July 2016 the overwhelming majority of Filipinos gave a positive verdict on the elections: 92% of respondents thought the release of results was fast; 89% believed the results were credible; 89% would like automated voting in future elections; and 93% considered voting was easy.

“Finally, Mr. Querubin admits to being currently employed by a competitor. Maybe, and only maybe, the sentiment that motivates Mr. Querubin to write this letter is the frustration that the company he represents has repeatedly overpriced and lost the biddings for the AES in Comelec and worldwide against Smartmatic.”

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TALKBACK: Reader Manuel Cantos reacts to “Our Revolutionary Heroes Were so Young” (Gotcha, 28 Aug. 2017):

“I think it was Gen. Edilberto Evangelista, not Maestro Artemio Ricarte, who taught the Katipunan trench warfare. He studied engineering in Belgium and became famous for the trenches he designed. He rose to the rank of General, but was assassinated by a Katipunero during a battle with the Spaniards south of Manila. On whose orders? Ask Ambeth Ocampo.”

Federico Lojo, on “Philippines Losing 80% of Seas – Carpio” (Gotcha, 7 Aug. 2017):

“I was completely seriously alarmed while reading your piece. Justice Antonio Carpio’s approach on the matter, to me, is the practical, logical, and nationalistic one – than Rodrigo Duterte’s fearful avoidance of war, which to me is totally illogical with no regard for our sovereignty. I am not a lawyer but I feel the President is just banking on his feigned popularity, and might be committing an unconstitutional act of grave abuse of discretion.

Gabriela Sarmiento, of Iniciativa por Venezuela (Suiza), inquires, opines:

“I am a Venezuelan looking for information on Smartmatic around the world. I found your article of 2015: http://www.philstar.com/opinion/2015/06/17/1466775/smartmatic-discredited-eu-us-even-venezuela. Do you have by any chance, recent information about the company. Apparently everybody loves it in the Philippines. Maybe there the machines and the electronic data are not misused.

“Maybe the problem is only in Venezuela, and is not due to the IT service and goods provider, but to the regime misusing the material. We are heading to a dictatorial regime that may last more decades, and we certainly require the support and assistance of the international community. Of people abroad who might know more things about Smartmatic and the whole regime’s machinery than ourselves. Thank you very much in advance for your kind reply.”

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