Election Commission Responds to $2M Reward

The Philippine’s Commission on Elections (COMELEC) came out with a response to the anticipated $2 million reward for anyone who can reveal flaws in its planned automated election system. Which I don’t understand.

Comelec spokesman James Jimenez said that while they do not have any objection to hackers trying to test the security of the precinct count optical scan (PCOS) machines to be used in the 2010 polls, granting huge reward might not be beneficial for the project.

“It’s really our plan to invite ethical hackers. We have no problem on inviting ethical hackers in general,” he told The STAR.

But Jimenez warned that granting such a reward, the Comelec “might not just only be inviting ethical hackers” but even those who might only fool around with the automation system.

Fact: the only way to claim the $2 million reward—if instituted—would be to approach the COMELEC and show them the flaw right? The very nature of the reward requires any participating “hacker” or IT expert to be “ethical”, in the sense that they have to disclose their findings to get the reward.

The incentive makes sense, but I still would like to see the government use it not as an excuse to cancel the planned 2010 poll automation, but as a way to reveal flaws in the system that can be patched.

But on the other hand, it makes sense not to spend that much money after all, a great point raised by election lawyer Romulo Macalintal:

“Why should the government spend P100 million to prove that its planned poll automation is hack-free? Those who believe or have ample proof that it could be hacked should prove it and spend for it,” he said.

Macalintal said the “culture of mistrust is the one which gives a bad and dirty picture of our electoral process.”

“Speculations or imagined fear of fraud in automated polls give our people, especially the youth, that lifelong impression that all elections in this country are marred with irregularity,” he added.

Amen to that.