New Delhi, April 11
A US official's claim over possible hacking of electronic voting systems in that country was on Friday met with a reassuring calm by the Election Commission of India (ECI) with sources highlighting the Indian EVMs' superior technology and no use of Internet or Bluetooth during voting as foolproof shields against manipulation.
The US official, in a viral video circulating on social media, made the claim about election integrity while referring to on-going probe in that country into ‘flaws’ in electronic voting systems and urged a switch to paper ballots.
Claiming that there was no reason for an alarm, sources at ECI said that the US and the Indian EVMs were not comparable due to several additional security measures incorporated into our machines.
“Some countries use Electronic Voting Systems, which are a mix of multiple systems, machines and processes including various private networks including Internet etc. India uses EVMs which work like simple, correct and accurate calculators and cannot be connected to either Internet, WiFi or Infrared," said an ECI source.
Reassuring voters and the Indian public, an election panel official said: “These machines have stood legal scrutiny by the Supreme Court of India and are invariably checked by the political parties at various stages, including the conduct of mock polls before polling starts. More than 5 crore voter verifiable paper audit trail (VVPAT) slips have been verified and matched while counting in front of political parties.”