Safeguarding the honour and trustworthiness of our election processes has never been more integral or challenging. Disinformation campaigns, foreign interference activities and false online narratives are on the rise in Canada. The job of protecting the integrity of our elections against attack is an increasingly complex, high-stakes responsibility.

Enter Anton Boegman.

Boegman began at Elections BC in 2004 and has served as Chief Electoral Officer since 2018. A LOT has changed in 21 years. From how elections are administered, to how people vote, where people get their news and how fast they share information.

One shocker for Boegman and his team in last fall’s election was the unprecedented scale of misinformation narratives circulating online, particularly between election day and the final count two weeks later.

Fortunately, prior to the election, Boegman did something novel – he pulled together an election integrity working group comprising RCMP, CSIS, Canadian Centre for Cyber Security, BC’s chief information officer, the province’s privacy commissioner, the lobbyists registrar and others to take “a whole of government approach” to countering potential disinformation and election interference.

Ultimately, the 2024 provincial election featured the highest voter turnout (2.1 million), the most votes cast prior to election day (about 1 million), and such terrible weather in some parts of the province on election day officials couldn’t reach polls to open them.

Modern voting alternatives saved the day, as did newly implemented electronic capabilities which reduced spoiled ballots, increased voting integrity and facilitated the fastest tabulation of votes in BC’s history.

Read Boegman’s report on the 2024 election here.

We discuss all this and more in our conversation in the press gallery recording studio at the legislature this week.

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Fran

Podcast producer: Rob Shaw

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