Harry,

Indeed the sources are many as others have said. Do we have a data protection law (and FOI law) in place? Or the 10^th parliament left “hurriedly” without enacting it?

The scenarios of how an individual voter can be targeted are many and scary, to say the least.

Edith

From: kictanet [mailto:kictanet-bounces+eadera=idrc.ca@lists.kictanet.or.ke] On Behalf Of Harry Karanja
Sent: February 10, 2013 10:44 PM
To: Edith Adera
Cc: KICTAnet ICT Policy Discussions
Subject: [kictanet] Has IEBC Voter Register Been Compromised

Listers,

This morning I received the oddest message. Through a bulk sms provider, one of the aspirants for MP in my constituency sent me an SMS appealing me to vote for him in the upcoming elections? Now I say odd because to the best of my knowledge I have never communicated to this politician my number and my constituency. In fact the only person I have ever given this dual information is the IEBC during voter registration. 

Which begs the question, could IEBC or its registration clerks be making voter registers available to politicians for consideration or otherwise? I'm also curious if this is an isolated event or its happening elsewhere?

Now I don't need to emphasize on the very serious implications if politicians are in possession of such specific data on the electorate. I previously blogged (http://www.startupkenya.info/2010/08/chopping-up-big-green-giant-safaricom.html) on the dangers of telcos in possession of too much personal data, but it is nothing compared to politicians with this data especially in a country that has experienced deadly post election violence. 

I'm curious what measures IEBC has in place for the protection of our personal information and if my experience this morning portends the compromise of all future governmently held e-data?

Regards, 

Harry Karanja

Sent from my iPad