Difference Between JPEG, PDF Forms Discussed at Supreme Court

PDF Vs JPEG
A collage of advocate Mahat Somane and Senior Counsel Philip Murgor during the presidential petition at the Supreme Court in September 2022.
File

Questions about the actual format used to upload Forms 34 A used to tally presidential elections surfaced constantly throughout the presidential petition case at the Supreme Court. 

Both the petitioners and respondents presented conflicting submissions in regard to the format used and whether there was infiltration aimed at manipulating the content of the forms.

A debate thus ensued on the “JPEG” and “PDF” technical jargons as Kenyans strived to unravel the puzzle surrounding the transmission of Forms 34 A.

PDF stands for Portable Document Format- a file format unveiled by Adobe to create a convenient way for users to exchange documents.

 

_IEBC Advocate Mahat Somane addressing the Supreme Court during the presidential election petition on Thursday, September 1, 2022..jpg
IEBC Advocate Mahat Somane addressing the Supreme Court during the presidential election petition on Thursday, September 1, 2022.
The Judiciary

According to Adobe, files in this format cannot only be shared across various devices but are also compatible with various software, operating systems and hardware. 

On the other hand, JPEG stands for Joint Photographic Experts Group which has the capability to contain lossy and compressed image data.

As opposed to PDF which occupies large storage space, files in JPEG format are compressed hence saving on space without losing quality.

According to advocate Mahat Somane who was acting for the IEBC, the scanner embedded in the KIEMS kit captures images of the forms in PDF format and not in JPEG as alluded to by the petitioners. 

The kit takes an image, embedded in the kit is a scanner so the image is scanned as a PDF. We don’t have any other output,” Somane stated in his submission. 

The lawyers representing Raila Odinga, nonetheless, had a different perspective on the JPEG vis a vis PDF formats with respect to the uploaded Forms 34 A.

 According to Phillip Murgor, there was evidence of downloading and conversion of the forms from the system and thereafter uploading of forms with new information. Murgor alluded that the forms were converted to CSV (Comma separated values) to enable editing of the forms, before being re-uploaded with different numbers.

Murgor further argued that anyone can access free applications online where they can convert JPEG to PDF files. 

Security Features

According to Thomas Omweri, an eminent software engineer, most devices capture images in JPEG format.

As to which of the two formats is secure, Omweri notes that the PDF format is deemed more secure as compared to the JPEG. According to him, PDF documents leave a trace behind- indicating the time and particulars of any editing. It is also possible, according to Omweri, to secure a file by creating a password or sharing it as a read-only document.

 

Supreme court judge bench adjourning the hearing for a break at the supreme court on September 1, 2022
Supreme Court judges at the presidential petition hearing on September 1, 2022
Judiciary

"Although it's not absolutely impossible to bypass the following actions, you can protect a pdf file from; Unauthorised access by protecting it with a password; prevent editing by making it read-only.  Attempts to edit the pdf could still leave behind footprints," Omweri told Kenyans.co.ke.

Nonetheless, the IT expert states it is still possible to bypass the above-mentioned security features in PDF by means of more sophisticated technology.

"These security features only make it more difficult to alter the integrity of pdf documents but could still be possible (to alter) by use of more sophisticated means,"  he warns.

The apex court of the land will retreat on Friday, September 2, afternoon to prepare the final judgement and subsequently resolve the stalemate.