Related papers: Bayesian Tabulation Audits: Explained and Extended
We propose a simple common framework for Risk-Limiting and Bayesian (polling) audits for two-candidate plurality elections. Using it, we derive an expression for the general Bayesian audit; in particular, we do not restrict the prior to a…
Counting votes is complex and error-prone. Several statistical methods have been developed to assess election accuracy by manually inspecting randomly selected physical ballots. Two 'principled' methods are risk-limiting audits (RLAs) and…
Risk-limiting audits (RLAs) are techniques for verifying the outcomes of large elections. While they provide rigorous guarantees of correctness, widespread adoption has been impeded by both efficiency concerns and the fact they offer…
Risk-limiting post election audits guarantee a high probability of correcting incorrect election results, independent of why the result was incorrect. Ballot-polling audits select ballots at random and interpret those ballots as evidence…
This paper presents DiffSum, a simple post-election risk-limiting ballot-polling audit for two-candidate plurality elections. DiffSum sequentially draws ballots (without replacement) until the numbers $a$, $b$, of votes for candidates $A$,…
Risk-limiting audits (RLAs) are a significant tool in increasing confidence in the accuracy of elections. They consist of randomized algorithms which check that an election's vote tally, as reported by a vote tabulation system, corresponds…
This article * provides an overview of post-election audit sampling research and compares various approaches to calculating post-election audit sample sizes, focusing on risklimiting audits, * discusses fundamental concepts common to all…
We propose a simple risk-limiting audit for elections, ClipAudit. To determine whether candidate A (the reported winner) actually beat candidate B in a plurality election, ClipAudit draws ballots at random, without replacement, until either…
Risk-limiting audits (RLAs) offer a statistical guarantee: if a full manual tally of the paper ballots would show that the reported election outcome is wrong, an RLA has a known minimum chance of leading to a full manual tally. RLAs…
Ranked voting systems, such as instant-runoff voting (IRV) and single transferable vote (STV), are used in many places around the world. They are more complex than plurality and scoring rules, presenting a challenge for auditing their…
Randomized experiments are the gold standard for evaluating the effects of changes to real-world systems. Data in these tests may be difficult to collect and outcomes may have high variance, resulting in potentially large measurement error.…
Risk-limiting audits (RLAs) are an increasingly important method for checking that the reported outcome of an election is, in fact, correct. Indeed, their use is increasingly being legislated. While effective methods for RLAs have been…
Taiwan's auditors have suffered from processing excessive audit data, including drawing audit evidence. This study advances sampling techniques by integrating machine learning with sampling. This machine learning integration helps avoid…
Instant-runoff voting (IRV) is used in several countries around the world. It requires voters to rank candidates in order of preference, and uses a counting algorithm that is more complex than systems such as first-past-the-post or scoring…
There are many sources of error in counting votes: the apparent winner might not be the rightful winner. Hand tallies of the votes in a random sample of precincts can be used to test the hypothesis that a full manual recount would find a…
We explore the notion of uncertainty in the context of modern abstractive summarization models, using the tools of Bayesian Deep Learning. Our approach approximates Bayesian inference by first extending state-of-the-art summarization models…
Accurately determining the outcome of an election is a complex task with many potential sources of error, ranging from software glitches in voting machines to procedural lapses to outright fraud. Risk-limiting audits (RLA) are statistically…
Bayesian optimization is an approach to optimizing objective functions that take a long time (minutes or hours) to evaluate. It is best-suited for optimization over continuous domains of less than 20 dimensions, and tolerates stochastic…
Bayesian hypothesis testing is re-examined from the perspective of an a priori assessment of the test statistic distribution under the alternative. By assessing the distribution of an observable test statistic, rather than prior parameter…
Financial statement auditing is conducted under a risk-based evidence approach to obtain reasonable assurance. In practice, auditors often perform additional sampling or related procedures when an initial sample does not provide a…