Posted on 11/08/2020 5:07:23 PM PST by SeekAndFind
Thank you. Data always tells a story.
In what court did Benford’s Law prove fraud?
What are the x and y axes in these plots? I assume the x-axis is time.
Ok what are we looking at here?
Looks like the City of Detroit data has been taken down... I wonder why? Amazing that when folks start poking around data, the data disappears....
In what court did Benfords Law prove fraud?
Thats my question as well..is there case law referenced?
Amid allegations of electoral fraud in the 2016 Russian elections, an article co-written by Kirill Kalinin and Mebane in The Washington Post observed that the mean of the second digit of the number of voters in each of the country's 96,869 electoral precincts, to four significant figures, was equal to the expected mean (4.187) per Benford's law. In addition, the mean of the last digit of the votes in each precinct for the triumphant party, United Russia, was equal to the expected mean (4.5) per Benford's law. On the basis of other indicators of electoral fraud, Kalinin and Mebane suggest that these "perfect" statistics show that those responsible had deliberately rigged the votes to conform to the expectations of Benford's law.[45]
Amid allegations of electoral fraud in the 2016 Russian elections, an article co-written by Kirill Kalinin and Mebane in The Washington Post observed that the mean of the second digit of the number of voters in each of the country's 96,869 electoral precincts, to four significant figures, was equal to the expected mean (4.187) per Benford's law. In addition, the mean of the last digit of the votes in each precinct for the triumphant party, United Russia, was equal to the expected mean (4.5) per Benford's law. On the basis of other indicators of electoral fraud, Kalinin and Mebane suggest that these "perfect" statistics show that those responsible had deliberately rigged the votes to conform to the expectations of Benford's law.[45]
So, did someone copy the City of Detroit data BEFORE it was taken down?
https://nypost.com/2020/05/21/ex-philly-election-official-pleads-guilty-to-voter-fraud/
Bump
Is Benfords Law admissible in Court? The answer is yes. If applied correctly, it should be admissible under Daubert and Rule 702. See United States v. Channon (Matthew), No. 16-2254 (10th Cir. 2018).
If you are so inclined, you can convince yourself the law works. Pick up a random book or magazine and sort the numbers – about 30% of the numbers collected will start with the number 1. The result is always the same: 30% start with the number 1. Using this fact, a fraud auditor has a simple tool to examine large sets of numbers for irregular results.
The answer to the above question, could Benfords Law have been used to detect the Theranos fabricated blood test results early on and saved investors billions, is yes. A fraud investigator could have used Benfords Law to detect the occurrence of fraudulent lab results at Theranos. The Law is not proof of fraud, but it will highlight irregularities for further investigation.
Safe bet the dataset has been downloaded by many. Maybe the server just crashed due to excessive load?
good now what about other battleground states and normal states for comparison
One of the most common arguments is that in some localities, vote counts for Biden violate Benford’s Law.
In simple terms, the law states that in many real-world data sets, such as demographic data, geographical data, or even sports statistics, the first digit of the numbers will more likely be 1 than 2, and 2 more likely than 3, etc. following logarithmic scale. If the first-digit distribution significantly diverges from this rule, it could be evidence of artificial manipulation of the data.
The law has been used to identify fraudulent financial records and other illegal activities. Walter Mebane, a political science professor at the University of Michigan, used the law to back ballot-stuffing allegations in the 2009 Iran election (pdf). Some researchers also used the law to check for irregularities in the 2016 election in Wisconsin (pdf).
One GitHub user posted an analysis of the 2020 election results in Fulton County, Georgia; Miami-Dade, Florida; Milwaukee; Chicago; and Allegheny County, Pennsylvania.
While the result in Georgia and Florida generally adhered to Benfords Law, there were significant deviations in votes for Biden in Wisconsin, Illinois, and Pennsylvania.
One Twitter user went deeper on the Milwaukee analysis and found that in many city wards, votes counted after 3 a.m. on Nov. 4 went to Biden by a much larger margin than those counted before. Sometimes, the difference was as high as 40 percentage points.
Milwaukee’s county clerk didnt immediately respond to a request by The Epoch Times for comment regarding the discrepancy. Wisconsin is headed for a recount, showing Biden slightly ahead.
Another internet sleuth noticed that in Pennsylvania, nearly 10,000 votes were removed from President Donald Trumps count at around 9 p.m. on Nov. 4. He said the losses came from three counties: Allegheny (-1,063 votes), Bucks (-2,972 votes), and Chester (-7,135 votes).
Then, around 9 a.m. on Nov. 6, more than 27,000 votes were added to the count, nearly all of them to Biden, he said.
The office of Pennsylvania Secretary of State didnt immediately respond to questions about the anomalies. While Biden is ahead in the state, Trump has challenged the results in court.
The tally in Michigan, where Biden is ahead by a small margin, also seems to be statistically peculiar.
Around 5 a.m. on Nov. 4, data firm Decision Desk HQ updated the vote count for Michigan, adding 138,339 votes to Biden, but zero to Trump. The statistical impossibility of such a scenario prompted people to speculate that votes were illegally injected into the tally.
Within 40 minutes, Decision Desk HQ posted another update that subtracted 110,796 votes from Bidens total and added 16,638 to Trumps. It later said a “clerical error” in Shiawassee County caused the distribution of incorrect data and has since been fixed.
At 5:54 a.m. and 6:05 a.m., the firm posted two more updates for the Michigan race that didnt appear to show anything unusual.
Then, at 6:18 a.m., the firm posted another update, which added 158,902 votes to the Biden tally and 29,295 votes to Trumps. Those votes split roughly 85 percent for Bidenan exceptionally high ratio.
One explanation could be that those votes came from a deep-blue county and only included absentee ballots, which were expected to heavily favor Democrats.
However, even absentee ballots in Washtenaw County, which went for Biden by the largest margin, split in his favor by less than 82 percent. In addition, the candidate only picked up 125,927 absentee votes there, so many would have had to have come from another county less favorable to Biden.
I dont think Bentords Law proves fraud.
But it sure as heck tells you to dig deeper. And maybe even WHERE to look.
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