Iraq introduces facial recognition for voter verification in November election

The Independent High Electoral Commission of Iraq (IHEC) says it has added a facial recognition option to voter verification for the country’s upcoming parliamentary election.

Iraq is preparing to hold legislative elections next month to choose members of its 329-seat parliament, and there are nearly 30 million eligible voters.

An IHEC official, Khalid Abbas, quoted by Rudaw said the move will be an alternative in case of fingerprint scanning failures during verification.

According to Abbas, about 400,000 individuals faced fingerprint verification issues during parliamentary elections in the Kurdistan Region in October last year, and that’s something they are working to avoid. That figure, he said, represented about 20 percent of the total voting number.

In the November vote, the official explained that “those voters who may have problems with fingerprint identification can vote using cameras to be set up for facial recognition.”

Going by the country’s election rules, up to five percent of registered voters in each polling station can vote using only face biometric verification.

Per a contract that was signed in May following approval by the Council of Ministers, South Korean firm Miru will supply the facial recognition system, according to Iraq Business News.

Last year, the company also supplied voting machines that were used for a provincial election in Iraq, but there were concerns that many of the devices suffered glitches.

Election equipment supplied by the Miru for Congo also suffered malfunctions in about 45 percent of polling stations, as reported by Politico. At the time, Miru defended itself against the allegations.

Miru also supplied its election technology for mid-term elections in Philippines this year, when the election agency switched from Smartmatic.

Iraq announced in July that biometric cards will be used for the upcoming election and biometric voter verification will replace a system where manual fingerprinting was done using indelible ink.

The election agency started distributing printed cards this month, and more than one million have already been given out, Channel18 reports. In September, officials said three million registered voters were expecting their cards.

Article Topics

biometrics  |  elections  |  facial recognition  |  identity verification  |  Iraq