Pavlo Merzlykin

In 2015, the changes to the Law of Ukraine “On Citizens’ Appeals” were introduced, according to which Internet-based petitions acquired legal status. An e-petition allows, with negligible limitations, for making an online appeal to the Ukrainian authorities, e.g., the president, parliament, local governments, etc. However, this relatively new tool may be illegally mishandled on behalf of influential individuals and groups in virtual warfare.
The issue of voting falsification detection is rarely considered in e-petition analysis reports. One of the reasons is the absence of efficient evidence-collecting tools. I am working on creating software that will detect possible falsifications. The proposed software does not give a final verdict but may be used by journalists, NGOs and independent researchers as a tool for detecting evidence of possible falsifications and personal data misuses. This approach might be later extended to other e-petition services or social media voting.