Stylometry corroborates Christine Blasey Ford’s statements authenticity
Stylometric analyses confirm the authorship of key documents in Ford-Kavanaugh case. Results strongly suggest that Christine Blasey Ford is the genuine author of her attributed written statements, corroborating their authenticity.
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Christine Blasey Ford statements about her alleged sexual assault have been under high scrutiny by Brett Kavanaugh’s advocates. Some have dismissed her statements as fabricated or manipulated by political opponents. Following stylometric methods, the Swiss company OrphAnalytics can confirm that Christine Blasey Ford is indeed the author of both the letter to Senator Feinstein and her opening statement at the Sept. 27 hearing. The analysis clearly shows that Ford’s individual signature in both documents is consistent and correlated with the signature of her oral answers during the hearing.
“Personal use of language leaves a strong individual signature in both written and oral statements, in some sort comparable to a fingerprint. This biometric textual signature confirms the authorship of Blasey Ford’s statements”, says Claude-Alain Roten, OrphAnalytics' CEO and co-founder.
A former geneticist trained at Harvard and Lausanne University (Switzerland), Roten has derived his method from genomic analysis technique. OrphAnalytics patented technology is based on complex statistical analyses comparing frequencies of characters patterns. It has provided compelling pieces of evidence in several legal affairs in Europe and is currently being used in a collaboration with the Department of Forensic Science at the University of Lausanne.
Ford’s statements part of the same cluster
OrphAnalytics experts have compared Ford’s signature of two key written documents - the July 30 letter to Senator Feinstein and her opening statement at the Sept. 27 hearing - with the transcription of her answers given orally during the hearing. Results show a clearly correlated signature in Ford’s use of language both in written and spoken statements.
Brett Kavanaugh’s written and hearing oral statements demonstrate an equivalent consistency. By comparing his oral and written statements to Ford’s, experts were able to show that both authors were forming distinct clusters, confirming the authenticity of their authorship (See Annex 1, analysis overview).
Oral transcriptions to identify text authors
This is likely the first time that transcriptions from oral statements are being used to address the authorship of written texts. Despite expected variations, oral and written statements show a functional consistency in individual signatures.
“In Ford’s case, we can’t exclude slight modifications by third parties, but our results leave little doubt about her overall authorship in her written statements”, says Roten. “Evidence shows that these texts have not been prepared or heavily amended by some communication office.”
Annex 1: Analysis Overview
Stylometric analysis of texts and transcripts of Ford in blue and Kavanaugh in red. Texts and transcripts were normalized and fragmented (about 2.5k characters). Usage of trigrams was established and a multivariate analysis was performed to get 90% of the variance in 39 dimensions. The two first dimensions presenting a maximum of variance are shown on this figure.
While the letter of Ford (7-30), her opening statement and the transcript of her answers during the hearing (9-27) are respectively in standard and inverted triangles and in circles, the opening statements (9-4 and 9-27) of Kavanaugh and the related transcript of his answers during the hearing (9-27) are respectively in standard and inverted triangles and in circles.
About OrphAnalytics
Founded in 2014 in Switzerland, OrphAnalytics develops disruptive stylometric technology to identify text authors. It provides expertise in literature study, ghostwriting detection and legal affairs. Its patented approach derives from genomics analysis techniques. OrphAnalytics is collaborating with the Department of Forensic Science at the University of Lausanne. Some of its work, including a benchmark authorship analysis of the best sellers published under the pen name of Elena Ferrante, confirmed by analyses performed by eight different research groups, have caught media attention.
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