GUELPH, Ont. -- The owner of the company that was hired to conduct thousands of misleading robocalls during the 2011 federal election says he knew little about the person who placed the order.

Nonetheless, Matt Meier, who operates the Edmonton-based company RackNine Inc., acknowledges that his high-tech system is capable of doing "serious damage."

Meier is testifying for the Crown at the trial in Guelph, Ont., for Michael Sona, 25, who is charged with "wilfully preventing or endeavouring to prevent an elector from voting." If convicted, he faces up to five years in prison.

On election day in 2011, automated calls were made to more than 6,700 telephone numbers, mostly in Guelph, informing residents their polling station for the 2011 federal election had been relocated.

The Crown alleges that it was Sona that planned the deception to help the local Conservative candidate, Marty Burke, defeat the Liberal incumbent.

Meier says the customer who ordered the calls identified himself as Pierre Jones -- a university student from Joliette, Que., who wanted to use the service for a school project. Investigators would later learn the identity was fake.

The cellphone used to call Meier was registered under another fake name, Pierre Poutine, and the order was paid for with untraceable prepaid credit cards.

In a followup email to the customer, Meier said he typically only worked with political campaigns, and not members of the public, and asked for some more information.

"The system is capable of making millions of phone calls so it's good to know who's using it," Meier said, adding it could "do serious damage."

On Tuesday, Meier was grilled by Sona's lawyer, Norm Boxall, about why he didn't do more digging into the customer's identity. He also wondered why Meier would be taking calls and sending emails late on a Saturday night for what amounted to a very small amount of money.

"It seems like high-level service, late at night, for a $50 account," Boxall said.

RackNine was built on providing exceptional customer service, Meier replied. The customer wasn't given access to calling abilities until an online payment was authorized by PayPal, which gave no sign a fraud was being perpetrated, he added.

Meier also said the majority of his business was connected to the Conservative party and came through word of mouth. The customer told Meier that the party referred him to the service and although he specified it was for school, he did not question him for further details.

The court proceedings grew increasingly tense as Boxall asked Meier why he contacted a colleague of Sona's after an Elections Canada investigator turned up seeking information about the calls.

Meier said he emailed Andrew Prescott, who was Burke's deputy campaign manager, a few days after speaking with Elections Canada because he was "curious" if he'd been contacted too.

Prescott, who told Meier he knew nothing about the calls, agreed to be a Crown witness in exchange for immunity. He is expected to testify as early as Tuesday afternoon.