Australian tech innovators Comtrac and Fivecast empower election integrity and democratic resilience

In the wake of the recent Australian federal election, two leading Australian tech firms - Brisbane-based AI start-up Comtrac and Fivecast, a global provider of open-source intelligence (OSINT) solutions - have highlighted the importance of upholding and protecting democratic processes.

Recent investigations by the Australian Electoral Commission have highlighted the changing landscape of political campaigning and election integrity, and - with it - the evolving requirements of adaptive and efficient investigative processes.

Comtrac’s revolutionary technology analyses exhibits related to an offence, and extracts key evidence to substantiate findings and highlight overlooked information. The investigation management platform has the potential to play a critical role in streamlining the investigation of electoral fraud, as well as ensuring transparency in political financing, corroborating the authorship of electoral material, and enforcing general compliance with electoral laws.

Comtrac founder Craig Doran said that election-related investigations were increasing in volume and complexity.

“The rise of social media and influencers, and the challenges related to disinformation, have ushered in what we see as a new era of election integrity, ” he said. “As political campaigning evolves, so too will these critical investigations become more prevalent, so having a streamlined investigation platform that helps to accelerate resolutions is key. Comtrac’s proprietary AI maps evidence to the elements of an offence or breach, enabling investigators to build cases significantly faster than ever before, and protecting democracy.”

OSINT solutions provider Fivecast helps its global customers across national security, law enforcement, defence and the private sector to collect and risk-analyse masses of online data to uncover threats. Fivecast’s technology helps to identify the engagement and spread of disinformation by collecting information from millions of publicly and commercially available data sources, and assessing risk using the power of AI and machine learning. Fivecast VP of APAC Malcolm Purcell said that the approaching federal election had highlighted an increase in the spread of politically-motivated disinformation.

“Electoral and political campaigning processes continue to evolve, often at a rate faster than traditional manual approaches to investigations can keep up with, ” Purcell said. “The threat of disinformation is also evolving, and we are committed to helping our customers to identify the spread of disinformation as it occurs, to protect democratic processes. As an investigation management platform, Comtrac plays a critical role in disinformation investigations, and the ultimate resolution of these issues that might otherwise have severe impacts on electoral and democratic integrity.”

Learn more about Disinformation Campaigns: The Challenges & Role of OSINT

About Comtrac

Born from a firm belief that there had to be a better way to uncover truth and deliver justice, Comtrac is the digital solution to investigative frustrations and inefficiencies. A comprehensive, end-to-end investigation and digital report management solution, Comtrac’s proprietary AI platform stores and actively analyses evidence, identifying relevant information and mapping it to points of proof, in a process of “Elementising Evidence™”, that hands the laborious paperwork to technology, and releases people to focus on what matters the most.

About Fivecast

The mission of Fivecast is to enable a safer world. As a world-leading provider of open-source intelligence solutions, Fivecast helps the world’s most important public and private organisations collect and analyse masses of online data, uncovering actionable insights which are critical to protecting global communities. Purpose-built to address the highest priority use cases in the national security, law enforcement, defence, corporate security and financial crime markets, Fivecast deploys advanced data collection and AI-enabled analytics to solve the most complex intelligence challenges.