U. S. ELECTION ASSISTANCE COMMISSION VOTING SYSTEM TESTING AND CERTIFICATION PROGRAM

 1225 New York Avenue, NW, Suite 1100 

 Washington, DC. 20005 

March 4, 2008 

GENERAL NOTICE TO EAC ACCREDITED VSTLs 

After reviewing the first months of operation of our testing and certification program, the 

EAC is looking for ways to assure a timelier and more accurate review of work products 

received from the VSTLs. In order to allow EAC staff and technical reviewers to more 

efficiently and thoroughly provide responses to both draft Test Plans and Test Reports, 

the EAC is asking all VSTLs to forward their complete test methods to the Director of 

Certification by March 12, 2008. Failure to provide the test methods will likely result in 

prolonging the Test Plan/Test Report review process during a time when election officials 

are eagerly awaiting EAC certification of products to be deployed. 

To clarify terminology and what information we are seeking, we note that “test method” 

is a broad term with several component parts. For each requirement of the VSS or 

VVSG, the VSTL is required to provide test methods. Often general test methods are 

provided in national and international standards. General test methods must be 

implemented through more detailed functional specific test procedures. These test 

procedures provide more specificity on how the test will be performed and applied to a 

specific voting system and what will be used as the exact pass/fail criteria. The Test Plan 

is the vehicle describing the exact application of the test procedure and how the pass/fail 

criteria are applied to the specific voting system. Test cases define what the system will 

be asked to perform. Multiple test cases are required to fully explore the functionality of 

a voting system. These test cases might, for example, include a Primary, General and 

Special election. 

The Test Plan should reference the test methods to be used, including the function 

specific test procedures and test cases. The 2005 VVSG requires step-by-step procedures 

to be provided for each test case to be conducted (VVSG Volume 2 A.6.4). 

In addition to the VVSG requirement noted above, NIST Handbook 150-22: Voting 

System Testing, states in Section 5.4.2 that: 

“For each test in the Test Plan, the laboratory shall document all aspects of the 

test including the test method,(emphasis added). The level of detail shall be such 

that the laboratory can repeat the test or another laboratory can reproduce the test 

and the results of the test will be equivalent to the original test. Where the 

laboratory has developed test methods the meet the requirements of the VSS 2002 
(or, presumably, VVSG 2005), validation of the test methods shall be included in 

the documentation.” 

I am confident that submission of your test methods will serve to educate ourselves and 

our technical review teams so that we can more rapidly respond to laboratory work 

products to the benefit of yourselves, to voting system manufacturers, and ultimately, to 

election officials and to the voters of the United States. 

If you have any questions or need to discuss this matter further, please do not hesitate to 

contact me. 

Sincerely, 

Brian J. Hancock 

Director, Voting System Testing and Certification 

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