Does Smartmatic currently conduct elections in Venezuela?
No. Smartmatic has had no operations in Venezuela since 2017. On August 2, 2017 (following the Constituent Assembly election, held on July 30, 2017) Smartmatic’s CEO publicly disclosed that the National Electoral Council (CNE) had announced voter turnout figures that did not match the data in Smartmatic’s system.
The company blew the whistle and ceased operations in Venezuela shortly after. In retaliation, the Venezuelan Government and the CNE illegally seized Smartmatic’s assets and contracted another company, to modify and commercially exploit the software.
The illegal expropriation of its tangible and intangible assets is the subject of an ongoing international investor-state arbitration filed by SGO Corporation Limited (UK), Smartmatic’s parent company, against Venezuela before the International Centre for Settlement of Investment Disputes (ICSID, Case Nro. ARB/(AF)/22/2).
From 2004 through the 2015 National Assembly election, Smartmatic provided technology and services for Venezuelan national elections. During that period, tally reports from every voting machine in every polling station were published to a public server, allowing political parties to independently verify the results in real time. Those elections were also subject to international election observation.
Did Smartmatic help Hugo Chávez win the 2004 recall referendum?
No. The 2004 presidential recall referendum was the first election in which Smartmatic deployed its technology, and it was the first national election in the world to use an electronic voting system with a voter-verified paper trail. After the results were announced, the Carter Center conducted an audit of the paper records, which matched the electronic vote counts with near-perfect accuracy and confirmed the outcome.
The results were validated by two of the world’s most respected election observation organizations: the Carter Center and the Organization of American States. Both institutions reviewed the process independently and concluded there was no basis to doubt the integrity of the results. Former President Jimmy Carter stated: “We have no motives for doubt over the integrity of the electoral process or the accuracy of the Referendum results.“
The results were also consistent with polling data. Every major polling firm in Venezuela, including North American Research Inc., Datanalisis, Evans/McDonough, Hinterlaces, and Alfredo Keller Asociados, had projected a lead of more than 10 percentage points for Chávez in the days leading up to the vote.
Did Chavez award a contract to Smartmatic?
No. Smartmatic won the contract through a competitive public procurement process in 2003 organized by the National Elections Council. Of 40 companies that initially expressed interest, five submitted bids: Indra, Election Systems & Software, Tecosa, Diebold, and the Smartmatic-led consortium. Smartmatic’s bid scored 80.25 out of 100, compared with 63.05 for the next closest competitor. It was the only proposal that guaranteed full auditability through a paper trail.
Claims of a political connection to Chávez have centered on two facts, both of which have been examined and refuted. First, Smartmatic’s founders were born in Venezuela. Second, Bizta, a company that was part of the consortium that won the bid, received a $150,000 loan from FONCREI, a Venezuelan industrial credit fund comparable to the U.S. Small Business Administration. Bizta repaid the loan before the referendum took place, and no politician or political group has ever held shares in Smartmatic.
Over the course of the 15 national elections conducted with Smartmatic technology in Venezuela between 2004 and 2015, candidates from both political sectors won and lost races. The 2015 parliamentary elections resulted in the opposition winning a supermajority in the National Assembly, further illustrating that the system produced results independent of government preference. The 2015 National Assembly was later described by the United States as the last internationally recognized democratically elected entity in Venezuela.
Does Smartmatic provide Brazil’s electronic voting urns?
No. Brazil’s electronic voting urns, known as urnas eletrônicas, are administered by the Tribunal Superior Eleitoral, Brazil’s supreme electoral court, which oversees the system and has worked with various technology providers over the years, including Diebold and Positivo. Smartmatic is not among them. The company has never designed, manufactured, or provided Brazil’s voting machines.
What Smartmatic has done in Brazil is provide limited support services for elections and communications infrastructure.
In 2012, Smartmatic set up election services and trained technical support staff across more than 400,000 voting centers. In 2014 and again in 2016, Smartmatic provided data and voice communications technology to support the transmission of results in 15 of Brazil’s most remote states. These services are distinct from the design and operation of the voting urns themselves.
The false claim that Smartmatic provides Brazil’s voting urns has been amplified as part of a broader xenophobic political campaign that seeks to discredit electoral technology by associating it with Venezuela. Across the region, political actors have exploited Venezuela’s prolonged crisis to invoke fear and suspicion whenever a company, individual, or technology can be linked, however tenuously, to the country. That narrative is false and discriminatory. Smartmatic is not a Venezuelan company. It is a UK-based election technology provider that has supplied technology and services in nearly 40 countries. Smartmatic did not build or program Brazil’s voting machines, and Brazil’s electronic voting system is an entirely independent national technology designed and manufactured by Diebold and Positivo.
Em português
A Smartmatic fornece as urnas eletrônicas do Brasil?
Não. As urnas eletrônicas brasileiras são administradas pelo Tribunal Superior Eleitoral (TSE), órgão máximo da Justiça Eleitoral do Brasil, responsável pela supervisão do sistema e que, ao longo dos anos, trabalhou com diferentes fornecedores de tecnologia, incluindo a Diebold e a Positivo. A Smartmatic não está entre eles. A empresa nunca projetou, fabricou ou forneceu as urnas eletrônicas utilizadas nas eleições brasileiras.
O que a Smartmatic fez no Brasil foi prestar serviços específicos de apoio às eleições e à infraestrutura de comunicações.
Em 2012, a Smartmatic implementou serviços eleitorais e treinou equipes de suporte técnico em mais de 400 mil locais de votação. Em 2014 e novamente em 2016, a Smartmatic forneceu tecnologia de comunicação de dados e voz para apoiar a transmissão dos resultados eleitorais em 15 dos estados mais remotos do Brasil. Esses serviços são distintos do desenvolvimento e da operação das próprias urnas eletrônicas.
A alegação falsa de que a Smartmatic fornece as urnas eletrônicas do Brasil foi amplificada como parte de uma campanha política mais ampla, de caráter xenófobo, que busca desacreditar a tecnologia eleitoral ao associá-la à Venezuela. Em toda a região, atores políticos têm explorado a prolongada crise venezuelana para gerar medo e desconfiança sempre que uma empresa, pessoa ou tecnologia possa ser associada ao país, por mais tênue que seja essa ligação.
Essa narrativa é falsa e discriminatória. A Smartmatic não é uma empresa venezuelana. Trata-se de uma empresa de tecnologia eleitoral sediada no Reino Unido, que já forneceu tecnologia e serviços em quase 40 países.
A Smartmatic não fabricou nem programou as urnas eletrônicas brasileiras. O sistema de votação eletrônica do Brasil é uma tecnologia nacional totalmente independente, cujas urnas são projetadas e fabricadas pela Diebold e pela Positivo.
What role did Smartmatic play in Honduras’ 2021 general elections?
Smartmatic supported Honduras’ electoral modernization in 2021, when the country introduced nationwide biometric voter authentication for the first time in a general election. Nearly 20,000 VIU Handheld devices, which also functioned as electronic poll books, were deployed across more than 18,000 polling stations and used to authenticate more than 3 million voters.
At the time, National Electoral Council President Kelvin Aguirre described biometric identification as “a decisive factor in ensuring the integrity of this electoral process.” The OAS Electoral Observation Mission also recognized the CNE’s technological improvements and the proper functioning of the biometric devices.
What role did Smartmatic play in Honduras’ 2025 primary elections?
For the 2025 primary elections, Smartmatic supported nationwide biometric voter verification, secure preliminary results transmission, and satellite connectivity for remote voting centers.
Smartmatic’s platform enabled more than 62 percent of tally sheets to be transmitted digitally on election night, providing timely access to preliminary results for citizens, political parties, and institutions. The platform remained stable and continuously available throughout the reporting period, contributing to what was described as Honduras’ most stable preliminary results transmission to date.
Following the primaries, all three CNE commissioners, representing different political parties, publicly recognized the system’s strong technical and operational performance.
What role did Smartmatic play in Honduras’ 2025 general elections?
For the 2025 general elections, Smartmatic supported nationwide biometric voter verification only. The system was expanded to include facial validation alongside fingerprint authentication, adding another layer of voter identification.
Smartmatic’s role focused exclusively on voter authentication and did not include results transmission or tabulation. The technology strengthened voter verification, improved traceability, and helped reinforce confidence in the integrity of the electoral process.
What is Smartmatic’s history in Mexico?
Smartmatic has provided biometric identity technology, election results services, and internet voting in Mexico.
In 2009, Smartmatic’s biometric system was used to register Mexican citizens between the ages of 5 and 17 and issue national identity cards. In 2015, Smartmatic expanded into electoral services at the state level, providing technology to process and transmit preliminary vote tallies through Mexico’s Programa de Resultados Electorales Preliminares in local elections in Campeche, Tabasco, and Chiapas.
For the local elections in the states of Mexico and Coahuila in 2023, the National Electoral Institute engaged Smartmatic to provide its internet voting system for Mexicans living abroad. Using Smartmatic’s internet voting solution, eligible voters from Coahuila and the State of Mexico residing outside the country could cast their ballot remotely from any device, at any time during the voting window between May 20 and June 4, or in person using laptop computers at consulates and embassies in Chicago, Dallas, Los Angeles, and Montreal. Of the registered voters eligible to vote remotely, 40 percent used the remote voting platform.
What role has Smartmatic played in Malawi?
The Malawi Electoral Commission selected Smartmatic to support key phases of the country’s 2025 general elections, covering voter registration, biometric voter verification, candidate nomination, and results transmission.
Beginning in early 2024, the MEC deployed Smartmatic’s biometric registration platform to build a new voter roll. The system captured fingerprints, facial images, national ID scans, and biographic data from more than 7.2 million citizens in just three months. Once the register was complete, formal windows were opened for transfers and inspection, allowing citizens and political parties to review and validate voter data. The same devices later registered and verified more than 3,500 candidates across electoral levels, streamlining nominations ahead of election day.
On election day, 15,200 Smartmatic biometric verification devices were deployed at polling stations nationwide. Voters were authenticated using fingerprint matching as the primary method, with facial recognition and ID comparison also available. After the polls closed, ballot forms were digitized and transmitted through Smartmatic’s results management system. More than 40,000 official result reports were published at the MEC’s National Tally Centre, creating a fully auditable trail for independent verification.
The transparency of the process contributed to the early concession of the incumbent president and a peaceful conclusion to the election.
The European Union Election Observation Mission assessed voting as “peaceful, orderly, and transparent,” with the overall conduct of voting rated positively in 99 percent of the 359 polling stations it visited.
Has Smartmatic been involved in Kenyan elections?
Smartmatic supported Kenya's 2022 general elections by providing election technology and services for voter registration, biometric voter authentication, and the transmission and publication of tally reports. The solution enabled the Independent Electoral and Boundaries Commission to publish more than 99% of presidential tally reports within 24 hours, allowing political parties, election observers, the media, and the public to independently review the results as they became available.
The election represented a significant step forward in the transparency of Kenya's results process. Following legal challenges, the Supreme Court unanimously upheld the presidential election, concluding that the technology met the standards of integrity, verifiability, security, and transparency required to produce accurate and verifiable results. International observation missions also praised the public results portal as an important improvement in electoral transparency and accountability.
The 2022 general elections were the only elections Smartmatic has supported in Kenya.