By: Mason Mattu, News Writer and Petra Chase, Editor-in-Chief
From February 27 to 28, SFU undergraduate students voted in the Simon Fraser Student Society (SFSS) election. On the ballot were SFSS executive position candidates and fee increase motions. The results were finalized on March 5. However, students have questioned the election procedure’s integrity, particularly on the subreddit r/simonfraser.
During the campaign period, one Reddit user claimed they could vote multiple times using the same SFU computing ID in different browsers. “I do not trust the SFSS-run [Independent Electoral Commission] (IEC) to remove duplicate votes. I do not understand why they could not use SFU’s more secure polling/voting system,” they posted, calling for a re-election. “Typical SFSS.” Others agreed, saying they could access the ballot a second time using a VPN or incognito mode.
According to SFSS bylaws, the electoral process during SFSS elections is overseen by the IEC, which is composed of a chief commissioner and “no less than four other commissioners.” These positions are paid and elected by Council on a yearly basis. While direct members of the SFSS are unable to run for the IEC, the IEC is recommended by a committee “composed of the SFSS Administrative Services Department Liaison” and “the Policy, Research, Community Affairs Coordinator.”
This year, the SFSS election was conducted over the platform SurveyMonkey. In July 2024, SFU decommissioned the use of the survey platform WebSurvey and officially made the switch to SurveyMonkey, citing “cybersecurity” and “data protection.” SFSS bylaw 13.20 states the IEC must use the platform the university uses at the time of the election which explains why the election was conducted on SurveyMonkey. This chapter of the by-laws also gives power to the IEC to decide whether the election is held using paper ballots or an electronic form.
On March 1, a Reddit user made a post titled “SFSS Referendum is Illegitimate — Proof They’re Probably Rigging Your Vote.” In screenshots of the backend of the form, the user analyzed session cookies, which they said did not include “persistent user tracking,” meaning it allegedly treated two submissions from the same voter as separate votes. Alongside this, they claimed the form itself did not embed student IDs or emails in the submissions, thus leaving identity unchecked.
The Peak reached out to SFSS media relations, the IEC, and vice president internal to respond. The SFSS responded with a joint statement with the IEC. They wrote, “While it did appear that multiple votes were submitted, the election system has safeguards in place to ensure each student gets only one counted vote.”
The SFSS and IEC stated while they had the anonymous setting on, this “does not mean that the software does not collect your data.” They explained that “to the user, the survey is anonymous because it did not ask for any personal information.
“While it did appear that multiple votes were submitted, the election system has safeguards in place to ensure each student gets only one counted vote.” — SFSS and IEC joint statement
“When one casts their votes, the software creates a unique collector ID, records when you started the vote and when you ended it, your IP address, and your email address. Since the authentication for voting was through your SFU email address, this made it easy to track and discard users who voted more than once. According to SurveyMonkey, “When someone takes your survey, their IP address is recorded as metadata with your survey results by default.” Additionally, SurveyMonkey said that “The Anonymous Responses collector option lets you choose whether or not to track and store identifiable respondent information in survey results. SurveyMonkey records respondent IP addresses in backend logs.”
The joint statement further explained the verification process after voting closed: the email addresses of all the voters were cross-checked with the SFSS’ “list of registered SFSS members that is updated through SFU on a monthly basis” to ensure only current SFSS members’ votes were counted. “Since the software already records email addresses, start and end time of vote; it became fairly easy to check how many times a verified voter had cast a ballot using their email address.” They said this process was done by the SFSS’ privacy officer, who is “the only person with clearance to protect the privacy and confidentiality” of SFSS members. “This ensured that the data was filtered without bias as the department does not have any vested interest in the outcome of the elections,” according to the SFSS and IEC.
The SFSS and IEC stated inauthentic student IDs, including those who were “not current students” were filtered out.
The statement added, “The original voting data was stored separately before any cleaning of the data was done. Once the invalid votes were removed, the final data and results were verified and published by the IEC. A copy of the original data was stored separately to ensure that at any time, if the results were being contested, anyone could retrace the steps taken to reproduce the same outcome thereby ensuring the accuracy and reliability of the election results.” The Peak could not verify this process as we could not access confidential data to confirm this.
The IEC also addressed formal complaints “related to candidate misconduct.” While they didn’t share the details due to confidentiality, “decisions were made impartially based on the evidence available.”
Currently, there is a petition circulating to prohibit SFSS executives from receiving a salary. The writer of the petition said this would “lower the SFSS’ deficit without raising the membership fee, and be budgeted toward initiatives that benefit the majority of students.” In order to make this a referendum question, 5% of SFSS members would need to sign. It is unclear how many signatures the petition has.
The petition cited the fact that SFSS executive and Council members “earned a combined $386,627 in fiscal year 2023.” To break this down, this includes 62 Council members and seven executives. The average yearly stipend for Council members in 2023 was $2,962 for ten hours biweekly, and for executives, who work full time, $28,900.
“I do not trust the SFSS-run IEC to remove duplicate votes. I do not understand why they could not use SFU’s more secure polling/voting system.” — Reddit user
In response, the SFSS and IEC stated, “The SFSS executives understand and appreciate the circumstances that might have prompted such a petition. Subject to good governance, these stipends remain a core accountability mechanism as all stipends are dependent on executives and Councillors carrying out their duties effectively.” They also acknowledged that having stipends in place helps address “the barriers to participation that currently exist for qualified students who want to contribute to the management of our institutions. These positions should not be limited to a privileged few and these stipends are an essential mechanism to reduce barriers to accessing these roles.”
One Reddit user argued against the petition, saying “removing stipends won’t suddenly inspire Councillors and executives to spend hours writing reports.”
“There are always opportunities for improvement and for greater transparency,” the SFSS and IEC’s statement read. “Whether this petition leads to a future referendum or not, we acknowledge the calls for greater accountability and will continue working on addressing this.”
This is a story that The Peak will continue to cover. To submit a tip on the SFSS elections or any student-related matter that you’d like The Peak to investigate in the summer semester, email news@the-peak.ca.
Read the full statement by the SFSS and IEC on our website.
To see the results of the 2025 SFSS election, visit sfss.ca/2025-sfss-general-election-and-referenda-results.
