Over the next two weeks, election officials will test Maricopa County’s electronic ballots as part of a pilot program that will inform the further development of guidelines for ballot systems across the country.
That means the county is trying to see if its electronic pollbook, known as Sitebook, can serve as a model for other jurisdictions and if there is room for improvement.
An electronic ballot is a polling place’s computer system that contains information about registered voters and is used by poll workers to check in voters.
Maricopa County Election Commissioner Scott Jarrett said, “We’re very confident in the security we’ve put in place around the sitebook, and we’re confident in its ease of use based on feedback we’ve received from poll workers and others. there are,” he said. . “But can we do better? It’s possible, and participating in a pilot program like this might give us part of the answer.”
County regulators approved their participation in the program last month, and testing is expected to begin in July, according to an agreement between local and federal officials. A report with findings and recommendations could be ready as early as August, federal officials said.
The trial comes amid increased scrutiny of election campaigns across the country. While there are federal and state standards for testing accessible voting machines and tallying machines used to tally votes, there are currently no national guidelines for secondary election technologies such as electronic ballots.
U.S. Election Aid Commissioner Donald Palmer, who previously served as Virginia’s election aid commissioner and was nominated to the commission by former President Donald Trump in 2019, said the goal of the pilot program is security checks on the jurisdiction’s electronic ballots. He said the goal is to develop guidelines to standardize Improve national security posture across the country and increase confidence in elections.
“States and local governments can continue their own tests or be confident that they have EAC approval for these systems,” he said. “We are really trying to model it based on successful test programs with voting systems.”
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Extending the Scope of Election Security Beyond Voting and Tallying
Numerous government reports have proven that voting and counting machines are accurate and secure across the country and in Maricopa County.
At the national level, however, some lawmakers and election administrators have expressed concerns about the security of electronic ballots and other secondary election technologies that connect to the Internet.
In 2018, U.S. Senate Intelligence Committee Report A researcher investigating Russian attacks on election infrastructure during the 2016 presidential election warned that some electronic ballots could be susceptible to interference.U.S. Election Assistance Commission official said he believed in such attacks may increase in future elections..
Maricopa County’s sitebook and on-demand voting printers are tested for security vulnerabilities by county cybersecurity and information technology experts before each election cycle, Jarrett said. Over the years, election officials have hardened sitebooks to prevent unauthorized access, he said.
This includes physically blocking ports on the machine so nothing can be inserted, or programming the machine to shut down completely if tampering occurs.
For similar security features that control access, see List of draft guidelines National officials hope to test and refine the pilot program. The draft guidelines also detail accessibility requirements, such as enabling ballots to display information in different languages, and network security best practices, such as encrypting data and configuring software firewalls.
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Maricopa County’s Unique Electronic Ballot System
About 2,000 voting districts nationwide use electronic ballots, election officials said.
Most use software and equipment purchased from election equipment vendors. ES&S, KNOWiNK, Tenex Software Solutions, Robis Elections and VOTEC Corporation are five major companies participating in his EAC pilot program.
Two jurisdictions participating in the pilot program, Maricopa County and North Carolina, run electronic ballots with home-developed software.
Nationally, eight states have developed their own ballot software. His five states of Arizona, Florida, Hawaii, Tennessee and Texas have at least one county that has developed in-house software.
Jarrett said Maricopa County developed the sitebook in 2018. Until then, local election administrators used separate software that required manual uploading of ballots. The result was an “extensive and labor-intensive process” ahead of Election Day, Jarrett said.
The county’s SiteBook is now connected to the Internet and the roster is updated in real time. The software also has some unique features that allow the device to be used beyond voter check-in, Jarrett said.
These features will allow election administrators to remotely monitor what is happening at polling stations, including waiting time reports, while technicians are on site and sitebooks are being installed, he said. said.
“This allows us to meet operational needs beyond just a static check-in system,” says Jarrett.
Jarrett said these features could also be useful in other jurisdictions and hoped the EAC would consider them when developing its guidelines.
“If we implement something really cool here that they haven’t seen based on other vendors, we can build that into those minimum standards, and we can make the whole election better.” He said. “We want to make sure they consider some of the unique things we’ve been doing.”
Sasha Hapka covers regional issues in Maricopa County, Pinal County, and the Republic of Arizona.Do you have any tips to share regarding her election or voting? sasha.hupka@arizonarepublic.com. Follow her on Twitter: @SashaHupka.
