New Voting System Vendors Enter the Certification Fray

Here are a couple interesting news tidbits to ponder today, showing the breadth and depth of openness to changes to current U.S. voting methods.

First, some news from the EAC, the part of the Federal government that runs the program for Federal certification of voting systems — certification that in many states is effectively a pre-requesite for legal use of a voting system in the state. The EAC announced that there are 2 new vendors who have joined the certification program — both of them vendors of products that are often called “Internet voting systems”.

It’s very much worth noting that this does not mean that Scytl and EveryoneCounts have certified products! Far from it, though no doubt some approximate language might be misleading on that point. It just means that the companies have qualified with EAC, and may at some point choose to engage with an EAC-certified test lab to evaluate their products. But it is still interesting that this announcement gives the appearance that Internet voting systems might someday be legal for use in the U.S.

Second, some news from Wisconsin about that state’s 5-year mission to figure out what would be a better way to run voting in WI, with pretty much all options on the table to investigate, including a switch to paper ballots solely like MN, all vote by mail like OR, even Internet voting as in a few local election organizations in WA and HI.

It’s gratifying to see how serious people are about the fact that current election approaches need serious improvement, and the improvements have to be undertaken carefully and thoughtfully.

EJS