Comelec and the mysterious IP 192.168.0.2

The issue is not about who won or who lost in the 2022 presidential elections but about the credibility of the process as administered by the Commission on Elections (Comelec) and the results, baffling as they are. But does anybody care? I miss the grit and spunk of church women and men (of the church women especially) during the dark years of martial rule.

What is being referred to as the “smoking gun” by those who had been monitoring how election results were transmitted from the voting precincts to the end recipients is—techies, hold your breath—IP 192.168.0.2, an unknown, private internet protocol (IP) address through which millions of votes passed for the initial tallying during the first crucial minutes and not through the designated telcos—Globe, Smart, and Dito. In techie parlance, the mysterious IP 192.168.0.2 is called “man in the middle.” In my mind, something like an interloper that, perhaps, came in “preloaded.” Remember the word.

The members of the group called TNTrio, composed of veterans in the communications field and therefore were not born yesterday, are the voices in the wilderness that call for Comelec to get to the bottom of it all. To say it briefly, how did one candidate garner an avalanche of votes transmitted in the first few minutes after 7 p.m.—I call it the witching hour—even while the voting precincts were just closing and precinct personnel—the school teachers, bless them—have not even found time to go to the restroom or grab a drink before transmitting what’s inside the voting machines and do other chores besides, like printing, etc.?

This puzzling occurrence is among the issues raised in the writ of mandamus petition filed with the Supreme Court (I have a copy) by several individuals, namely, Augusto Cedelina Lagman, Eliseo Mijares Rio Jr., and Franklin Fayloga Ysaac. Lagman is former chair of election watchdog National Citizens’ Movement for Free Elections and former president of the Philippine Computer Society. Rio is former Department of Information and Communications Technology undersecretary. Ysaac is former president of the Financial Executives Institute of the Philippines. They are called TNTrio on social media. In discussion groups, they are often joined by retired Col. Leonardo Odoño and Mel Magdamo, former senior lawyer in the Comelec.

I have written about this matter a few months ago (“Via crucis: SC petition with smoking gun,” 3/31/23) but once is not enough. Last Sunday, professor Randy David wrote in this section “Lingering doubts about the 2022 elections.” Elsewhere, columnist Jarius Bondoc wrote explosively on the matter. Today, I write about it again, back-riding on David, sort of. There is safety in numbers, if you know what I mean.

Last July 26, the Global Transparency and Transformation Advocates Network based in North America held a forum via Zoom (not their first) to again discuss the matter. A Catholic bishop was present and explained the Catholic Bishops’ Conference of the Philippines’ seeming obduracy (my word). Rio and Bondoc made presentations. TNTrio will not stop while there are listeners. They have nothing to lose. What baffles me is that Filipinos based abroad are more insistent than their Philippines-based counterparts in getting at the truth. There are a number of reasons as presented in the forum. Among them, the survey results. Not the mammoth crowds.

Now going the rounds on social media is an animated meme with suspenseful sound effects that says “Comelec must explain the mysterious IP 192.168.0.2*” with the footnote “*the unknown private IP address that transmitted election returns during the 2022 national elections,” (https://fb.watch/m9uWsRz_Oz/). IP address means “internet protocol address.” It is a numerical label that “identifies a network or device on the internet” and “uniquely identifies the locations of each computer or device connected to the internet or any other network.”

IP 192.168.0.2 came from out of the mist, so to speak, and no one has given a satisfying explanation on how it got into the picture. Rio said that Comelec chair George Garcia has admitted (oh, he admitted!) that 20,300 vote counting machine (VCM) modems had exactly the same IP address—192.168.0.2—something that “is technically impossible.” Unless.

Rio challenged Garcia’s press statement that “ … we can always refer to the actual paper ballot as well as its digitally captured image” to check the accuracy, integrity, and legitimacy of the 2022 elections, by a random manual audit of even just 1 percent of all the 20,300 VCMs (or 203 VCMs publicly selected at random) that has an IP address of 192.168.0.2. Get on with it!

The discrepancies in time stamps are another matter. First, let us solve the mystery that is IP 192.168.0.2. By the way, do you know the IP address of your gadget?

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