NIST and the Help America Vote Act (HAVA)

The 2002 Help America Vote Act has given NIST a key role in helping to realize nationwide improvements in voting systems. To assist the Election Assistance Commission with the development of voluntary voting system guidelines, HAVA established the Technical Guidelines Development Committee (TGDC) and directs NIST to chair the TGDC. NIST research activities include:

• security of computers, computer networks, and computer data storage used in voting systems;
• methods to detect and prevent fraud;
• protection of voter privacy; and
• the role of human factors in the design and application of voting systems, including assistive technologies for individuals with disabilities (including blindness) and varying levels of literacy
• the recommendation for accreditation of testing labs to the U.S. Election Assistance Commission (EAC). The EAC, not NIST, certifies voting systems for use in elections.

More details of NIST's role in HAVA are available here.

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Highlights

• NIST Activities on UOCAVA Voting
  
  
• IEEE Standards Working Group P1622 on Voting Systems Electronic Data Interchange Worked Examples of EML Usage
  
  
• Announcement of IEEE Standards Working Group P1622 Meeting on March 8-9, Gaithersburg Campus of NIST 
  
  
• Announcement of IEEE Common Data Format Standard for Electronic Distribution of Blank Ballots for Voting Systems
  
  
  
• IEEE Standards Working Group P1622 on Voting Systems Electronic Data Interchange -- Current Project Status
  
  
  
• Technical Guidelines Development Committee Meeting, December 15 & 16, 2011 
  
  
  
• Final Versions of the UOCAVA Security Best Practices Documents, NISTIR 7711 and NISTIR 7682, Released 9/15/2011
  

 

• NISTIR 7770: Security Considerations for Remote Electronic UOCAVA Voting, Final Version, Released 2/23/11

• Test Suites for Revised Section of VVSG 2005
  
  

• Proposed Revisions to 2005 Voluntary Voting System Guidelines (Draft VVSG Version 1.1)