Electronic Voting System Project

[Lawana Stuckert]

Theresearch described in this report was conducted to inform the project planning and execution of the Department of Defense's previously mandated electronic voting demonstration requirement. In the National Defense Authorization Act for Fiscal Year 2015, Congress eliminated this requirement and DoD is no longer exploring program implementation in this area. However, we believe the research and identification of outstanding questions are valuable and should be shared with the Uniformed and Overseas Citizens Absentee Voting Act (UOCAVA) stakeholder community. Much of the supporting research may hold value for any future deliberations on the merits of remote electronic voting.

FVAP Final Report on the Electronic Voting Demonstration Project

This report explains the context of the research associated with the electronic voting demonstration project, and discusses the scope and purpose of the research, its limitations, conclusions and recommendations.

The FVAP Statement on Research Reports Related to UOCAVA System Testing explains the context of the research as it relates to FVAP's previously mandated electronic voting demonstration project. It discusses the scope and purpose of the research, its limitations, conclusions and recommendations.

This compiled document (15 MB) includes the "Voting System Testing Laboratory (VSTL) Functionality and Security and Testing" and "Penetration (PEN) Test of a Simulated Election" reports and all accompanying appendices. Due to its large file size, the individual reports and appendices are provided below.

This report describes a 2010 research effort to help inform FVAP's previously mandated electronic voting demonstration project. The VSTL testing was conducted to gauge the sufficiency of the Election Assistance Commission's Uniformed and Overseas Citizens Absentee Voting Act Pilot Program Testing Requirements and evaluate the quality of testing across VSTLs.

This report describes a 2011 research effort to help inform FVAP's previously mandated electronic voting demonstration project. It describes penetration testing of three voting systems. It is important to note the tests were only intended to serve as a proof-of-concept for the establishment of a model design and methodology for future penetration testing.

The Virginia Department of Elections has remained vigilant concerning the potential threats against our election infrastructure, and continues to work with our local, state, and federal partners to ensure the safety and security of our electoral process. The Department of Homeland Security and the Virginia Information Technologies Agency continues to provide various cyber services to our department, and any identified issues will be addressed appropriately.

Pursuant to Va. Code 24.2-671.2, risk-limiting audits shall be conducted annually by the local electoral boards and general registrars under the supervision of the Department and in accordance with the procedures prescribed by the State Board of Elections. A risk-limiting audit is a type of post-election audit that utilizes statistical methods and a manual review of paper ballots to confirm that the electronic voting system accurately reported the correct outcome of an election. More information can be found here.

The Virginia Department of Elections is making investments that will provide a more sustainable approach to improving election security in the Commonwealth. Virginia is using funds from the Help America Vote Act (HAVA) grant to help strengthen its election infrastructure.

Funds have been used for initiatives such as increasing cyber security training, increasing security for elections data, and establishing more robust certification standards for voting equipment. Agencies such as the Virginia Information Technologies Agency (VITA) and the Center for Internet Security (CIS) have been assisted by providing information about best practices and security standards. The Department also secured a project team that put into place a security and continuity of operations plan, and helped to manage program costs.

We are constantly reviewing and updating our website to reflect the most up-to-date language translations and elections information. If you discover an issue with translations or the links to our website, please let us know at in...@elections.virginia.gov

UOCAVA Electronic Absentee Voting Pilot Project - In 2009, Congress passed the Military and Overseas Voters Empowerment Act (MOVE) instructing the Federal Voting Assistance Program (FVAP) that they may run pilot programs to test the ability of new or emerging technology to better serve uniformed and overseas citizens. MOVE goes on to mandate that should FVAP choose to run a pilot program, that EAC and the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) are to help support FVAP by providing best practices or standards to support the projects. In addition, MOVE reiterated the 2004 mandate from Congress requiring EAC to create guidelines to be used by FVAP for the development of a remote electronic voting system.

Through field research and coalition building, the RR/CC has pioneered a voter-centered approach to voting system design and development. Voting.REIMAGINED.An innovative voter-centered approach to voting for Los Angeles CountyThe Voting Solutions for All People (VSAP) was developed by the Registrar-Recorder/County Clerk (RR/CC) in 2009 to address an aging voting system and an increasingly large and complex electorate. The project seeks a collaborative approach to voting system design that will put voters at the center and maximize stakeholder participation.

The SLI ICE Team verified that all components of the system were functional according to the specifications determined by COMELEC; provided a review of all documentation, software, firmware, and hardware components; and developed the certification test report.

SLI Compliance performed a follow-on certification process on a custom voting system for COMELEC. The SLI Compliance VSTL team conducted manual and automated voting system source code reviews to verify that the software complied with stated standards. This included systems from both Smartmatic and Dominion Voting Systems. The reviewed software was intended for use in the Autonomous Region of Muslim Mindanao (ARMM) until the election was postponed into 2012.

The UCLA Voting Rights Project is the flagship project of the UCLA Latino Policy & Politics Institute aimed at creating an accessible and equitable system of voting for all Americans through impact litigation, research, and clinical education to expand access to the ballot box.

This notice letter follows a similar WVRA lawsuit settled by Franklin County in 2022, which acknowledged the existence of polarized voting under the same electoral system and switched to district-based elections under the settlement. Recently, a federal court has recognized polarized voting within Franklin County, underscoring the need for electoral reform.

Once the notice is filed, the Franklin County PUD will have 90 days to respond. Should the response be unsatisfactory, the UCLA Voting Rights Project is prepared to take further legal action to ensure equitable representation for all residents of Franklin County.

The UCLA Voting Rights Project is the marquee advocacy project of the UCLA Latino Policy and Politics Institute at the University of California, Los Angeles, and is focused on voting rights litigation, research, policy, and training. The UCLA Voting Rights Project addresses overlooked yet monumental gaps in the field of voting rights. The UCLA Voting Rights Project tackles questions of how to train young lawyers and researchers, support the development of new legal and methodological theories for voting rights cases, and advance policy work, to ensure that there will be a new generation of leaders who are pursuing efforts to guarantee all citizens have equal and fair access to our democracy. The project was founded by Chad W. Dunn, J.D., and Matt Barreto, Ph.D. The UCLA Voting Rights Project is located within the Luskin School of Public Affairs.

Innovations in electronic voting could streamline the voting process and boost civic engagement, but pose substantial security hurdles. Students at Heinz College have recently worked to understand this important and complex issue.

A team of Heinz students in the Master of Science in Information Security Policy and Management (MSISPM) program recently collaborated with Oregon-based R&D firm Galois and the U.S. Vote Foundation on a report on Internet voting.

While millennials (roughly defined as people currently ages 18-35) have the lowest voter turnout of any age group domestically, representation is far worse for overseas voters. The Federal Voting Assistance Program (FVAP) reported that only 4 percent of eligible overseas voters cast ballots in 2014, a shockingly low figure.

While technology would help overseas voters stay more informed about (and possibly feel more connected to) American elections, this has clear upsides for domestic voters as well. The student deliverables to Overseas Vote included a polling location widget that uses Google Maps to guide the voter to his or her polling place, and the capability to communicate via social media features to maximize voter engagement, particularly among millennials.

The students took steps to ensure confidence that the information being transmitted via the widgets were correct for the user, such as multi-factor authentication and other security validations that would mitigate the risk of attacks that could deliberately misinform voters.

A: One major problem is that you never know that the system that is running is actually the system that was tested. There are procedures in place that are supposed to ensure that, but a common way to attack a system is to attack the supply chain, so that the voting system somebody installs is not what they think it is.

All-electronic voting systems are therefore next-to-impossible to secure. A voting system founded instead on voter-verifiable paper ballots (preferably hand-marked paper ballots) provides a basis for checking that election outcomes are correctly derived from expressed voter intentions, instead of from some computer bug.

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