With security, transparency and measures to combat disinformation, the Chilean Electoral Service (Servel) is preparing for one of the biggest challenges in its history with the organization of four simultaneous elections. This is an effort that seeks to ensure confidence in the country's democratic process.
Servel is democracy". Andrés Tagle, president of the board of directors of Servel.
On the eve of one of the most challenging elections in the last decade, Chile's Electoral System has been running its machines for months to ensure transparent and secure elections.
This October 26 and 27, Chile faces the challenge of holding four simultaneous elections (Mayors, Councilors, Regional Governors and Regional Councilors), with a participation of 15 million effective voters, and the objective of avoiding overcrowding and the collapse of the system. In addition, this is the first election with compulsory voting with sanction.
For this reason, Congress made amendments to the law that improves the electoral system and that will represent several logistical, operational and communicational challenges.
As was the case in May 2021 (pandemic period), for these elections to be held in two days, a complete protocol will be implemented for the custody of votes, ballot boxes and electoral supplies, with special seals for ballot boxes and rooms, under the supervision of the Armed Forces or Carabineros during the night.
The president of Servel's board of directors, Andrés Tagle, spoke to the international press about all this, a few days before the elections. "The Servel is democracy," he said.
Transparency and triple verification of results
Transparency throughout the election process is key and one of the main strengths of Chile's Electoral System. As a way to reinforce it, Servel will make available on the results website a digitalized copy of the tally sheet of each of the polling stations.
Also, there will be a triple verification of scrutinies, in charge of three different entities. First, Servel delivers preliminary results, which are merely informative. In the case of polling stations that present discrepancies or inconsistencies between the Minutes of Canvasses and the Minutes of Results, this will be reviewed on the Monday following each election by the Counting Boards, which verify or correct the results of the polling stations, giving rise to the provisional results. Subsequently, the electoral justice, Tribunal Calificador de Elecciones (Tricel), qualifies the election and delivers the official and definitive results.
Fighting fake news
Attempts to install messages about possible fraud and weaken the image of the agency, based on biased, manipulated and false information, is an increasingly recurrent phenomenon. In this context, the Servel developed a work plan to prevent, detect and combat disinformation. "Globally, the greatest effort to undermine democracy is the democracy to undermine democracy is to undermine confidence in electoral bodies. In Chile this has not been achieved and Servel, in the most demanding period of its history, continues to be among the most trusted institutions and with the best evaluation by the citizens. Therefore, it can be foreseen that the completely unfounded attacks -as the election dates approach- will be stronger, more articulated and with a greater technological component, integrating the use of artificial intelligence", the electoral body indicates.
To address this, Servel uses big data analysis tools and a digital risk assessment system that allows it to quickly assess and react to communication risks that arise in social networks.
In addition, one of the latest initiatives launched is the Governance Roundtable for Information Integrity in Electoral Processes, coordinated by Servel and the United Nations Development Program (UNDP). Different actors representing the media, data verifiers, digital platforms and civil society participate in this instance.
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