1. TGDC Meeting, December 2011 2012 Common Data Format Directions John P. Wack National Institute of Standards and Technology http://vote.nist.gov

2. TGDC Meeting, December 2011 Page 2 Outline Overview of IEEE P1622 standards strategy Event logging in a common format Inputs/outputs for the voting system in a common format Input - Voter registration database export Output - Election Reporting

3. TGDC Meeting, December 2011 Page 3 P1622 Standards Strategy Former strategy was to produce a comprehensive standard However, the BBD standard may have advanced more rapidly because it was more narrow in scope P1622 now producing a family of standards

4. TGDC Meeting, December 2011 Page 4 Family of P1622 CDF Standards A family of CDF standards would include VRDB export Election results export Auditing export Event logs Cast vote record export Would mean creating additional PARs for each standard, additional IEEE-mandated structure But likely to result in faster adoption, greater success

5. TGDC Meeting, December 2011 Page 5 2012 CDF Directions EAC’s priorities are Event logging Election results reporting VRDB exports

6. TGDC Meeting, December 2011 Page 6 Event Logging CDF Voting applications logging in such a manner that the logs can be exported to a CDF Or, logging directly in the CDF Would affect the System log Election log Would not affect the Operating System log

7. TGDC Meeting, December 2011 Page 7 Items Logged System log: system powered up, user login, encryption key changed, software loaded, file deleted, etc. Election log: polls opened, zero count, vote cast, overvote/undervote reported, etc. VVSG 2.0 has a detailed list of items Additional items could be logged in a ‘test mode’ Voter interactions (but not choices) on a touchscreen device to detect unusual patterns that suggest problems with the interface

8. TGDC Meeting, December 2011 Page 8 How It Would Work Simple EML/XML schema to hold the basic categories of information Voting device exports to this format or logs natively Manufacturer-specific documentation required to interpret meaning of category values

9. TGDC Meeting, December 2011 Page 9 Proposed Scheme 6 basic fields: Event ID Event time Action (e.g., vote cast, supervisor login) Result (e.g., successful, fail) ID of producing system ID of producing product A common lexicon of actions and results is needed Could be derived from VVSG 2.0 Each manufacturer would need to provide a mapping

10. TGDC Meeting, December 2011 Page 10 Next Steps Categorize, create groupings of events Derived from VVSG 2.0 Assistance also from EAC Create strawman schema and use case Potential discussion with manufacturers around time of NASS/NASED Conference in late Jan 2012

11. TGDC Meeting, December 2011 Page 11 VRDB Export CDF Jurisdictions able to export voter registration information in a common format Would serve as common format input into the voting system Epollbooks Election Management Systems

12. TGDC Meeting, December 2011 Page 12 PEW’s VRDB Modernization Addresses the errors in VRDBs and how to reduce them Plan is to cleanse them by comparing databases across states to detect duplicates and old records Other plans to introduce methods for updated DBs electronically E.g., at MVA-DMV, no more error-prone paper records Elimination of manual updates

13. TGDC Meeting, December 2011 Page 13 Next Steps P1622 to suggest a format to use for exported information that will be sufficiently comprehensive across states P1622 and PEW to coordinate PEW not ready to sign on to a specific format just yet P1622 needs to be proactive and develop a well-documented use case

14. TGDC Meeting, December 2011 Page 14 Election Reporting CDF Jurisdictions reporting election results in a common format Affects mainly EMS exports Would facilitate state roll-ups Would permit news organizations to more rapidly digest, report on elections

15. TGDC Meeting, December 2011 Mid-Atlantic Consortium P1622 includes members of a Mid-Atlantic Election Official Consortium, focusing on election reporting in a common format Membership consists of Maryland State Board of Elections Virginia State Board of Elections West Virginia Secretary of State, Election Division District of Columbia Board of Elections and Ethics

16. TGDC Meeting, December 2011 Background and Need Request of DC officials to provide Washington Post technology staff guidance on developing an election results platform for 2012 election Opportunity for this Consortium and P1622 to address this request (and other common practice opportunities among states) P1622 to coordinate with Consortium, assist in analyzing and producing EML schemas

17. TGDC Meeting, December 2011 Deployment Plan States will develop independent plans for deployment using EML schema documentation States will host XML files locally on state resources Consortium will coordinate with media outlets for publication of results Offer other states the opportunity to benefit from results

18. TGDC Meeting, December 2011 Next Steps P1622 to assist in developing a common framework based on EML 510/530 with assistance from P1622 Security aspects need more study, digital signature infrastructure probably necessary Consortium, others parties to develop a common set of XSLT transformations for media use

19. TGDC Meeting, December 2011 Page 19 Discussion