Montenegro Deploys Software to Detect Fake Voters

On Tuesday, the Montenegrin Interior Ministry signed a 2 million euro contract for an automated fingerprint identification system called  AFIS.

The AFIS system, originally developed by the US Federal Bureau of Investigation for use in criminal cases, will compare nationally issued ID cards and fingerprints with the voters registry. AFIS will be operational within three months.

The system aims to prevent multiple votes cast by a single voter or voting with a fake ID.

Interior Minister, Rasko Konjevic, said that the AFIS system will maintain the reliability of the Central Voters Register in Montenegro.

After installation, the new software will check all biometric documents, or the entire national ID database, and then we will know whether some persons have more than one personal ID," Konjevci told a press conference on Tuesday.

The ministry also announced that criminal charges will be filed and offenders will be deleted from the voters list in cases of fraud.

However, the Montenegrin opposition doubts that the new electronic system of identification of voters will eliminate election fraud.

The strongest opposition alliance, the Democratic front, on Tuesday accused the government of "still not dropping the idea to manipulate with voter identification" at the polling station.

"This AFIS system should eliminate all the false and duplicate voters. It's not clear whether the implemented software will be able to find voters who have different names but the same photos. The software, it does not matter what it is called, has to find all voters with incorrect registration number, with the same identification number, with the same fingerprints and identical photographs," the Front's official Milutin...