Vote with Confidence

To vote, a person must first be registered on Markham’s voters’ list. Elections Markham manages the voters’ list using a secure electronic database that is fully integrated across all voting channels. When a person votes online, they are struck off the voters’ list in real time the second their ballot is cast. Similarly, if a voter goes to a voting place, an election official will strike them off the voters’ list before issuing them a ballot, which automatically deactivates any online voting credentials previously assigned to the voter.

A centralized electronic list provides a reliable source of truth and prevents the same voter from being issued more than one ballot, while also making the voting process easier, more efficient, and less prone to integrity gaps.

Voter fraud is not common and is more likely to be accidental than intentional. If evidence is presented that a person has intentionally voted or attempted to vote more than once, we will refer the matter to the police for further investigation. 

Voter Information Letters (VILs) are delivered inside individually addressed security envelopes with a warning that it is a criminal offence for anyone but the named recipient to open it. To access the system, voters are required to confirm a shared secret and affirm their identity. Our system also employs cybersecurity methods such as geofencing, rate limiting, and heuristic signature checks to identify and restrict voting activity from a single device or local area network.

Canadian elections at every level (federal, provincial, and municipal) operate within a trust-based system that seeks to balance security with accessibility. Every voting method—whether supervised or unsupervised—comes with risks of procedural interference. Rules and allowances regarding voter identification, assisted voting, and chain of custody all rely on a degree of trust from participants to protect the integrity of the process. Because absolute security is impossible without completely blocking access, elections always involve balancing risk against the public’s right to a meaningful opportunity to vote.

Voter fraud is not common and is more likely to be accidental than intentional. Potential cases of intentional fraud should be reported to the police with supporting evidence.

Canada’s federal, provincial, and municipal elections operate within different legislative and logistical environments. A change to federal and provincial election voting methods requires formal amendments to those specific laws by their respective legislatures. Running nation- or province-wide elections also involves managing diverse technical infrastructure across large geographic areas where digital access may vary. As process consistency is a primary objective, this tends to complicate the introduction of new voting methods.  

Ontario’s local election law authorizes municipalities to establish alternative voting options like online voting. In addition to this authority, Markham’s online voting program is supported by factors such as a defined voting population and reliable digital infrastructure. Together, these provide a controlled and scalable environment for managing risk and applying context-appropriate safeguards.

Historically, electoral innovation often begins at the local level. Practices that have become standard across Canada’s provincial jurisdictions—such as optical scan tabulators and electronic voters’ lists—were first piloted by municipalities like Markham. Large electoral management bodies periodically adapt their service models to align with evolving public expectations and technological advancements, occasionally broadening access through methods previously considered major operational shifts and presenting unacceptable security risks (e.g., vote-by-mail). Online voting in municipal elections provides another accessible service option for voters, and has supported the establishment and refinement of technology and implementation standards which may contribute to wider adoption in the future. 

Each online ballot cast is individually encrypted and digitally signed with a key distributed amongst multiple partial keyholders. Once the legislated voting period has ended and all voters have been given a fair opportunity to finish casting their votes, the keyholders follow a structured process to reconstruct the key to start the count. First, online ballots undergo a “mixing” process where they are stripped of their digital signatures and shuffled at random. Once anonymized, the ballots are decrypted and tabulated. A higher volume of ballots cast online requires more time and computing power to mix, decrypt and tally the votes.

Before reporting unofficial election results to the public, Elections Markham combines the totals from each of its voting channels and performs a quality assurance review. The timing of each step is dependent on when all voting activity has finished.

Elections Markham understands the long-standing public expectation in Canadian elections that unofficial election results are reported as soon as possible after the close of voting, and makes every effort to publish them in a timely manner. However, our main objective with all published information is accuracy. 

Our online voting system has been designed, tested, and deployed according to independent, nationally-recognized professional standards and best practices to protect the integrity of the voting process. This includes bank-grade data encryption protocols, robust third-party auditing and access controls, proactive system-wide and endpoint threat monitoring, and individual voter verification tools. Through this multi-layered approach to online voting security, Markham voters can be confident that their votes will be cast as intended, recorded as cast, and counted as recorded.

While academic studies have previously identified potential configuration weaknesses in specific online voting systems used in other jurisdictions, these have described vulnerabilities and risks dependent on a highly-specific and coordinated set of conditions being met, not proven cases where actual votes were changed. 

The term foreign interference in elections almost always refers to foreign influence. Foreign influence involves coordinated attempts to shape public opinion about candidates and issues, and diminish trust in our institutions, through the intentional spread of false or misleading information and manipulation of the platforms through which we consume news, such as social media. It may also include attempts to influence and/or intimidate candidates and diaspora communities.  

While security and intelligence agencies agree that foreign influence is a serious and ongoing threat to Canada’s elections, there is no evidence that a direct attack on voting equipment, ballots, or vote counts has ever been successfully executed.

False and misleading information is sometimes shared strategically to manufacture doubt and undermine public trust in the integrity of the voting process. Fabricated claims may be used as a pre-emptive and ready-made excuse if the final results do not match an individual or group’s preferred outcome.

Remember to always verify your information sources, and that Elections Markham is your most trusted source of accurate and up-to-date information about Markham municipal and school board elections. 

Peer-reviewed studies of online voting and vote-by-mail indicate that these services may, in the right circumstances, contribute up to a few percentage points to overall turnout. These findings are supported by direct post-vote surveys of Markham voters, in which respondents have confirmed that the availability of an online voting option made an important difference in their decision to vote.  

While remote voting options can make voting easier, there are many factors that influence whether a person chooses to vote at all. These include perceptions about the importance of the election—such as the candidates running, the specific issues on the ballot, and how competitive the contests appear to be—to a wide range of personal and practical reasons. The manner in which ballots are cast cannot alone make up for motivational barriers or disengagement with the political process, but they can help address some of the everyday life issues that stop people from voting.

Elections Markham has an important role in making sure people know when and how they can participate, and can do so with full confidence in the election’s integrity. However, voter turnout is a shared responsibility between all members of a free and democratic society, including candidates, policymakers, media, schools, and voters themselves. Voting is a right that comes with the responsibility to seek out reliable information, contribute to a healthy civil discourse, and make a meaningful effort to participate in our elections. 

Canada’s federal, provincial, and municipal elections operate within different legislative and logistical environments. A change to federal and provincial election voting methods requires formal amendments to those specific laws by their respective legislatures. Running nation- and province-wide elections also involves managing diverse technical infrastructure across large geographic areas where digital access may vary. As process consistency is a primary objective, this tends to complicate the introduction of new voting methods.  

Ontario’s local election law authorizes municipalities to establish alternative voting options like online voting. In addition to this authority, Markham’s online voting program is supported by factors such as a defined voting population and reliable digital infrastructure. Together, these provide a controlled and scalable environment for managing risk and applying context-appropriate safeguards.

Historically, electoral innovation often begins at the local level. Practices that have become standard across Canada’s provincial jurisdictions—such as optical scan tabulators and electronic voters’ lists—were first piloted by municipalities like Markham. Large electoral management bodies periodically adapt their service models to align with evolving public expectations and technological advancements, occasionally broadening access through methods previously considered major operational shifts and presenting unacceptable security risks (e.g., vote-by-mail). Online voting in municipal elections provides another accessible service option for voters, and has supported the establishment and refinement of technology and implementation standards which may contribute to wider adoption in the future. 

Since introducing online voting in 2003, Elections Markham has continued to offer a multi-platform service model that includes in-person voting options.

While online voting has become the preferred method for many voters, professional research and direct feedback from voters and community partners indicates that maintaining multiple voting options remains an important component of the City’s overall election accessibility strategy.