6.02

Risk Assessment

Principle 6 - Define Objectives and Risk Tolerances

Attribute 6.02 - Management defines objectives, and related subobjectives, in specific and measurable terms to enable the design of internal control for related risks. Specific terms are fully and clearly set forth so they can be easily understood. Measurable terms allow for the assessment of performance toward achieving objectives. Objectives are initially set as part of the objective-setting process and then refined as they are incorporated into the internal control system when management uses them to establish the control environment.

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Jamie's Story

No examples are available to illustrate governance gaps for this attribute.

Election Anomalies

Maricopa County Signature Verification (2020)

Governance issues identified from Arizona Attorney General's Office 2020 General Election Investigation of Arizona Senate allegations of Maricopa County - Signature Verification Process issues.

The Signature Verifier's role is risk significant with respect to detecting potentially fraudulent early ballots from a mismatch between the voter's signature on the envelop and their original voter registration signature.

• There are three opportunities to ensure a valid vote is counted
  • The Signature Verifier may let it be tabulated if no mismatch is identified.
  • A separate board will examine the ballot to determine if it is a valid ballot.
  • The citizen may access the a MC website to confirm that their ballot has been tabulated.
• There is only one opportunity to prevent a fraudulent ballot from being tabulated.
  • A fraudulent ballot will be tabulated if the Signature Verifier does not detect a mismatched signature and there are no subsequent checks to determine the authenticity of the ballot.

The early voting process appears to have place more risk significance on ensure valid early ballots are tabulated than preventing the tabulation of fraudulent ballots. The unequal degree of attention place on the potential exclusion of valid ballots and possible inclusion of fraudulent ballots seems to represent a distorted understanding of risks from the election integrity perspective.