Albania: Nationwide voter authentication platform increases transparency

Albania’s Central Election Commission (CEC) selected Smartmatic to provide biometric voter authentication devices and electronic voting machines, including hardware, software and support services, for the country’s 2021 Parliamentary election. Smartmatic was the only company that could complete a four-month implementation for the voter authentication deployment and a six-week installation for the electronic voting. Voters cast ballots to elect 140 lawmakers from 1,841 candidates.

The operation was executed in compliance with the following standards:

  • ISO 9001:2015 - Quality Management.
  • ISO 27001:2013 - Information Security.
  • ISO 14001:2015 - Environmental Management.
  • GDPR - Collection, storage, processing and management of personal data throughout the mission’s lifecycle.

Following this successful deployment, six Albanian municipalities used same solutions for local elections in March 2022. To ensure both the biometric authentication and electronic voting ran smoothly, Smartmatic provided training and onsite support. The company also provided oversight during the readiness process and software enhancements to both solutions.

Technology

VIU-818 biometric voter authentication kit

The portable VIU biometric device is a fingerprint reader that was equipped with ABIS frontend & backend software. The device utilized a single-slap fingerprint scanner but can be customized to accommodate a four-slap. It has a high-definition, 10-inch screen and prints confirmation slips from a built-in thermoprinter. The device confirms transactions, has redundant data storage, employs encryption, digital certificates and manages the data through digital signatures. VIU is fully integrated, tamper proof and lightweight.

A4-517 electronic voting machine

The A4-517 tabletop touchscreen voting machine is activated via a smartcard. The 17-inch capacitive LCD touchscreen delivers 1280x1024 resolution. It has an integrated 3-inch thermal printer for ballot receipts. The device confirms transactions, has redundant data storage, employs encryption, digital certificates and manages the data through digital signatures.

Scope

Services

In addition to technology, Smartmatic provided a complete suite of services to help authorities to successfully conduct the election.

  • Warehousing services, equipment-configuration services, onsite technical support.
  • Setup of primary and secondary data centers.
  • Logistics and field services.
  • Help Desk service for the national support center.
  • Recruitment and training of 460 field support technicians to support the voter authentication units and 32 poll workers for the electronic voting.
  • Assisting CEC with a public voter-education campaign.