Nov 6 2012
Massachusetts-based Clear Ballot, the world’s first automated, independent vote-verification system, in alliance with Fujitsu Computer Products of America, Inc., the market leader in document imaging scanners, will carry out the largest ever independent verification of an election cast on paper ballots. Following tomorrow’s highly anticipated presidential election, Clear Ballot will head to Florida and then to New York State to verify over 1.3 million ballots from seven counties across Florida and three counties in New York.
“Clear Ballot, by developing and piloting an independent, automated election verification system, has taken an important step to help election supervisors build trust in the voting system. The early results have demonstrated a highly accurate, powerful visual tool that is fast enough that election officials can use it to show candidates, interest groups, citizens and the media the accuracy of election results before certification,” said Mark Andersen, Bay County (FL) Supervisor of Elections and past president of the Florida State Association of Supervisors of Elections.
Clear Ballot CEO Larry Moore knows how critical restoring trust in our elections is to the American people: “According to a recent Rasmussen poll, nearly 50 percent of American voters believe that their votes aren’t fairly counted. That’s unacceptable, but it also doesn’t reflect the realities we have seen. Having an independent audit will help bridge that gap between perception and reality, restoring Americans’ faith in our voting system.”
“Fujitsu scanners are known for their fast scanning speeds, excellent image quality and high capacity throughput,” said Scott Francis, vice president of marketing, Fujitsu Computer Products of America, Inc. “The feedback from Clear Ballot’s previous test audits have been very positive and we’re looking forward to seeing the results of the upcoming presidential independent verification audit.”
Since the August 2011 launch of the Clear Ballot Florida Election Verification Project, Clear Ballot has worked closely with the state of Florida to verify votes cast on paper ballots over multiple elections in seven counties. In October 2012, Clear Ballot, working with the New York State Board of Elections via a grant from the U.S. Election Assistance Commission, demonstrated its verification process on ballots from the primary election for two counties in New York, and will conduct another demonstration after the election in three counties. When the upcoming project is complete, over 2.1 million ballots will have been scanned and 31 elections verified.
Verification ensures that voting systems are working as intended. The process detects issues of error or fraud and eliminates the need for manual recounts, which are slow and costly. Clear Ballot, utilizing document imaging market-leading scanners from Fujitsu, can process up to 6,000 ballots an hour per scanner, with visual results available immediately after the ballots are scanned, significantly reducing verification time.
Source: http://www.clearballot.com/