|
Software Independence
The term "software independence" (SI) was coined by Dr. Ron Rivest and NIST researcher John Wack. A software independent voting machine is one whose tabulation record does not rely solely on software. The goal of an SI system is to definitively determine whether all votes were recorded legitimately or in error. The technical definition of SI is: ''A voting system is software-independent if an undetected change or error in its software cannot cause an undetectable change or error in an election outcome.'' SI has been redefined as a global property for a tabulation of votes rather than of each individual vote, aiming to detect rather than prevent error and fraud through human processes. TGDC Resolution The Election Assistance Commission's Technical Guidelines Development Committee adopted an SI resolution for the next iteration of the Voluntary Voting System Guidelines (VVSG): ''Election officials and vendors have appropriately responded to the growing complexity of voting systems ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Ron Rivest
Ronald Linn Rivest (; born May 6, 1947) is a cryptographer and an Institute Professor at MIT. He is a member of MIT's Department of Electrical Engineering and Computer Science (EECS) and a member of MIT's Computer Science and Artificial Intelligence Laboratory (CSAIL). His work has spanned the fields of algorithms and combinatorics, cryptography, machine learning, and election integrity. Rivest is one of the inventors of the RSA algorithm (along with Adi Shamir and Len Adleman). He is the inventor of the symmetric key encryption algorithms RC2, RC4, RC5, and co-inventor of RC6. The "RC" stands for "Rivest Cipher", or alternatively, "Ron's Code". (RC3 was broken at RSA Security during development; similarly, RC1 was never published.) He also authored the MD2, MD4, MD5 and MD6 cryptographic hash functions. Education Rivest earned a Bachelor's degree in Mathematics from Yale University in 1969, and a Ph.D. degree in Computer Science from Stanford University in 1974 for rese ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
National Institute Of Standards And Technology
The National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) is an agency of the United States Department of Commerce whose mission is to promote American innovation and industrial competitiveness. NIST's activities are organized into physical science laboratory programs that include nanoscale science and technology, engineering, information technology, neutron research, material measurement, and physical measurement. From 1901 to 1988, the agency was named the National Bureau of Standards. History Background The Articles of Confederation, ratified by the colonies in 1781, provided: The United States in Congress assembled shall also have the sole and exclusive right and power of regulating the alloy and value of coin struck by their own authority, or by that of the respective states—fixing the standards of weights and measures throughout the United States. Article 1, section 8, of the Constitution of the United States, ratified in 1789, granted these powers to the new Congr ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
John Wack
John is a common English name and surname: * John (given name) * John (surname) John may also refer to: New Testament Works * Gospel of John, a title often shortened to John * First Epistle of John, often shortened to 1 John * Second Epistle of John, often shortened to 2 John * Third Epistle of John, often shortened to 3 John People * John the Baptist (died c. AD 30), regarded as a prophet and the forerunner of Jesus Christ * John the Apostle (lived c. AD 30), one of the twelve apostles of Jesus * John the Evangelist, assigned author of the Fourth Gospel, once identified with the Apostle * John of Patmos, also known as John the Divine or John the Revelator, the author of the Book of Revelation, once identified with the Apostle * John the Presbyter, a figure either identified with or distinguished from the Apostle, the Evangelist and John of Patmos Other people with the given name Religious figures * John, father of Andrew the Apostle and Saint Peter * Pope John ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Voting Machine
A voting machine is a machine used to record votes in an election without paper. The first voting machines were mechanical but it is increasingly more common to use ''electronic voting machines''. Traditionally, a voting machine has been defined by its mechanism, and whether the system tallies votes at each voting location, or centrally. Voting machines should not be confused with tabulating machines, which count votes done by paper ballot. Voting machines differ in usability, security, cost, speed, accuracy, and ability of the public to oversee elections. Machines may be more or less accessible to voters with different disabilities. Tallies are simplest in parliamentary systems where just one choice is on the ballot, and these are often tallied manually. In other political systems where many choices are on the same ballot, tallies are often done by machines to give faster results. Historical machines In ancient Athens (5th and 4th centuries BCE) voting was done by different ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Technical Guidelines Development Committee
The Technical Guidelines Development Committee (TGDC) of the National Institute of Standards and Technology supports the Election Assistance Commission in the United States by providing recommendations on voluntary standards and guidelines related to voting equipment and technologies. Charter and Membership The Technical Guidelines Development Committee (TGDC) assists EAC in developing the Voluntary Voting System Guidelines. The chairperson of the TGDC is the director of the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST). The TGDC is composed of 14 other members appointed jointly by EAC and the director of NIST from various standards boards and for their technical and scientific expertise related to voting systems and equipment. NIST chairs and manages the TGDC, provides technical guidance in areas such as encryption, usability engineering and testing, and performs work to improve testing and conformity assessment programs for voting systems. As part of its development of ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Election Assistance Commission
The Election Assistance Commission (EAC) is an independent agency of the United States government created by the Help America Vote Act of 2002 (HAVA). The Commission serves as a national clearinghouse and resource of information regarding election administration. It is charged with administering payments to states and developing guidance to meet HAVA requirements, adopting voluntary voting system guidelines, and accrediting voting system test laboratories and certifying voting equipment. It is also charged with developing and maintaining a national mail voter registration form. Responsibilities The EAC is tasked with performing a number of election-related duties including: * creating and maintaining the Voluntary Voting System Guidelines * creating a national program for the testing, certification, and decertification of voting systems * maintaining the National Mail Voter Registration Form required by the National Voter Registration Act of 1993 (NVRA) * reporting to Congress ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Voluntary Voting System Guidelines
The Voluntary Voting System Guidelines (VVSG) are guidelines adopted by the United States Election Assistance Commission (EAC) for the certification of voting systems. The National Institute of Standards and Technology's Technical Guidelines Development Committee (TGDC) drafts the VVSG and gives them to the EAC in draft form for their adoption. Guidelines (2021) "The Guidelines allow for an improved and consistent voter experience, enabling all voters to vote privately and independently, ensuring votes are marked, verified and cast as intended, and that the final count represents the true will of the voters." The voting system "Equipment (including hardware, firmware, and software), materials, and documentation used to enact the following functions of an election: # define elections and ballot styles, # configure voting equipment, # identify and validate voting equipment configurations, # perform logic and accuracy tests, # activate ballots for voters, # record votes cast by ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Optical Scan Voting System
An optical scan voting system is an electronic voting system and uses an optical scanner to read marked paper ballots and tally the results. History Marksense systems While mark sense technology dates back to the 1930s and optical mark recognition dates to the 1950s, these technologies were first explored in the context of standardized tests such as college entrance exams. The first suggestion to use mark sense technology to count ballots came in 1953, but practical optical scanners did not emerge until the 1960s. The Norden Electronic Vote Tallying System was the first to be deployed, but it required the use of special ink to mark the ballot. The Votronic, from 1965, was the first optical mark vote tabulator able to sense marks made with a graphite pencil. The oldest optical-scan voting systems scan ballots using optical mark recognition scanners. Voters mark their choice in a voting response location, usually filling a rectangle, circle or oval, or by completing an arrow ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
DRE Voting Machine
A DRE voting machine, or direct-recording electronic voting machine, records votes by means of a ballot display provided with mechanical or electro-optical components that can be activated by the voter. These are typically buttons or a touchscreen; and they process data using a computer program to record voting data and ballot images in memory components. After the election, it produces a tabulation of the voting data stored in a removable memory component and as printed copy. The system may also provide a means for transmitting individual ballots or vote totals to a central location for consolidating and reporting results from precincts at the central location. The device started to be massively used in 1996 in Brazil where 100% of the elections voting system is carried out using machines. In 2004, 28.9% of the registered voters in the United States used some type of direct recording electronic voting system, up from 7.7% in 1996. History The idea of voting by push button wi ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Voter Verified Paper Audit Trail
Voter verifiable paper audit trail (VVPAT) or verified paper record (VPR) is a method of providing feedback to voters using a ballotless voting system. A VVPAT is intended as an independent verification system for voting machines designed to allow voters to verify that their vote was cast correctly, to detect possible election fraud or malfunction, and to provide a means to audit the stored electronic results. It contains the name of the candidate (for whom vote has been cast) and symbol of the party/individual candidate. While it has gained in use in the United States compared with ballotless voting systems without it, it looks unlikely to overtake hand-marked ballots. The VVPAT offers some fundamental differences as a paper, rather than electronic recording medium when storing votes. A paper VVPAT is readable by the human eye and voters can directly interpret their vote. Computer memory requires a device and software which potentially is proprietary. Insecure voting machine recor ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Independent Verification Systems
Independent verification (IV) systems or Independent Dual Verification (IDV) are voting machines that produce at least two independent auditable records of votes where the second record is used to check the first. To be considered "independent" at least one of the records must not be editable by the voting machine and be directly verifiable by the voter. These systems must allow for the multiple records to be able to be cross-checked. EAC'Voluntary Voting System Guidelines Volume 1 §7.8 The goal of an IV system is to increase the security, and maintain the integrity of the voting tally. The theory is that any corruption would need to corrupt two separate records to be undetected by an audit. IV systems can include some Voter Verified Paper Audit Trail (VVPAT) systems, End-to-end auditable voting systems, witness systems, and some optical scan voting systems. EAC'Voluntary Voting System Guidelines Volume 1 §C.1.2.4 See also Software independence The term "software independence" ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Certification Of Voting Machines
Various governments require a certification of voting machines. In the United States there is only a voluntary federal certification for voting machines and each state has ultimate jurisdiction over certification, though most states currently require national certification for the voting systems. Germany In Germany the Physikalisch-Technische Bundesanstalt was responsible for certification of the voting machines for federal and European elections till 2009. Since the respective law, the ''Bundeswahlgeräteverordnung'' ("Federal Voting Machine Ordinance") is considered to be in contradiction to Germany's Constitution, this responsibility is suspended. The only machines certified so far are the Nedap ESD1 and ESD2. United States See also * Election Assistance Commission * Electronic voting * Help America Vote Act * Independent verification systems * National Institute of Standards and Technology * National Software Reference Library * Preventing Election fraud: Testing and ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
