VVSG & The Innovation Class 

US Election Assistance Commission 

Technical Guidelines Development Committee 

Chris Backert 

e-Government Consulting 

The TGDC and members of NIST deserve to be commended for their extensive work that 

will no doubt lead to the most accurate, secure and reliable voting systems to date. 

In the spirit of continuing this great work, it is of paramount importance that NIST, the 

TGDC, and the EAC continue to understand the importance of innovation in the field of 

election administration. The goal of the Voluntary Voting Systems Guidelines (VVSG) 

should be to improve voting systems while understanding that current requirements might 

eventually prove inadequate, constraining, or irrelevant to a specific new technology. 

Without express direction or guidance relating to innovation, the next iteration of the 

VVSG has the potential to severely impede the development of new, improved election 

technology. Moreover, it is imperative for these organizations to understand that any new 

technologies that are developed will be used, regardless of whether there is a path for 

certification, as the evolution of innovative technology has shown. The possibility of 

pending federal legislation making federal voting system guidelines required rather than 

voluntary further increases the importance of protecting innovation.1

 Already 

approximately 40 states have required that voting systems used in their jurisdictions have 

a national certification.2

At the December 2006 TGDC plenary meeting, resolution #03-06, “The Innovation Class 

in VVSG 2007,”3 was introduced by Dr. Rivest and passed by the full TGDC. The 

resolution stated: 

To spur development of new and innovative secure voting systems, the 

Technical Guidelines Development Committee (TGDC) directs the 

Security and Transparency Subcommittee (STS) to include in the next 

iteration VVSG a new class of voting systems, referred to here as the 

“Innovation Class.” The TGDC directs STS to investigate high-level, 

guiding requirements for systems in this class for the purpose of providing 

system implementers with a path towards achieving certification to the 

next iteration of the VVSG. STS should also investigate approaches for 

reviewing, testing, and certifying systems in this class. These approaches 

could include convening a review board to review submissions and 

performing expanded open-ended vulnerability testing on systems 

submitted for certification. 

 

1

 U.S. House. 110th Congress, 1st Session. H.R. 2360 Voting Enhancement and Security Act of 2007. 

ONLINE. Available: http://thomas.loc.gov/cgi-bin/query/z?c110:H.R.2360:: 2

 (US Election Assistance Commission) EAC’s Testing and Certification Program for Voting Systems

http://www.eac.gov/docs/Revised%20Certification%20QA%20v2%20(%20BH%20rev%20)%202%20(%2

0GH%20edits%20).pdf . 3 Resolutions adopted by the TGDC. 
Further, the Security and Transparency subcommittee recommended that “development 

of new, secure, possibly paperless approaches could result in systems that are more 

usable, accessible, and easier to audit”4 and that “[innovative] approaches could promise 

greater usability, accessibility, and greater confidence and accuracy in future elections.”5

At the March 2007 TGDC plenary meeting, an ambitious white paper was presented.6

This white paper outlined “high-level, guiding requirements” and an approach for 

“reviewing, testing, and certifying” Innovation Class systems. The white paper describes 

a logical, fair, reasoned and transparent process that would allow “a path towards 

achieving certification.” The paper astutely points out “[c]onstraints on voting systems 

[...] are justifiable only to the extent they promote ultimate goals.” 

At the May 2007 TGDC plenary meeting, a draft version of the next iteration of the 

VVSG was published.7 This was the first version of the VVSG to contain information 

regarding the Innovation Class.8

 The applicable guidelines in this draft document are 

brief and do not seem to follow the stated goals of resolution #03-06, as adopted by the 

TGDC. 

As written, the goal of resolution #03-06, “spur[ring] development of new and innovative 

secure voting systems,” is not fulfilled by the current draft of the next iteration of the 

VVSG. Contrary to the resolution’s goal, the draft document states that Innovation Class 

submissions “must follow the same procedures that any submitter of a voting system 

must follow...” and are expected “to follow all rules of class hierarchy and requirement 

inheritance.” The resolution further requires the inclusion “in the next iteration VVSG a 

new class of voting systems.” Rather than defining a new class, the draft document 

requests “the creation of a new device class for each distinct innovative device.” 

Additionally, the draft document omits any mention of the resolution’s “high-level, 

guiding requirements,” “path towards achieving certification,” or “approaches for 

reviewing, testing, and certifying systems.” 

The Innovation Class section of the current draft of the next iteration of the VVSG is not 

precise, directly testable, or clear. 

Section 2.8-A required “justifications” of “New device classes to be created and where 

they fit into the device class hierarchy” and “Suggested requirements and test methods 

for new classes.” To whom should these be justified and under what standards will they 

be considered “justifiable?” 

 

4

 Wack, John (NIST) Auditing Approaches for VVSG 2007, December 4 2006 http://vote.nist.gov/STSAuditing-Recommendations-Wack.pdf . 5

 Rivest, Ronald L. (TGDC) Software Independence and Encouraging Innovation in VVSG 2007, 

December 4, 2006 http://vote.nist.gov/STS-SI-Rivest.pdf . 6

 (Security & Transparency Subcommittee) Voting systems innovations class (Draft), NIST March 10, 

2007 http://vote.nist.gov/meeting-03222007/InnovationClass7.pdf . 7

(TGDC) Draft VVSG Recommendations to the EAC. May 2007 http://vote.nist.gov/meeting05212007/VVSG-Draft-05242007.pdf . 8

 (TGDC) Draft VVSG Recommendations to the EAC. Volume 3 Section 2.8. 
Section 2.8-B requires the identification of “all requirements that apply to the new class.” 

While this requirement is directly testable, how would it be tested for accuracy in 

defining which requirements “apply” and which do not? 

 

Section 2.8-C offers: 

“Each distinct innovative class submission SHALL include 

documentation that provides an explanation as to why the voting system 

and its accompanying devices are innovative and how they differ from 

voting technology that implement other voting device classes in the 

VVSG.” 

The “Discussion” text for this requirement states the purpose of “evaluating whether the 

creation of a new class is justified.” How will justification be tested? 

The draft document further stifles innovation with sections 2.6.2 and 2.7-A, which state 

“subclasses are not allowed to relax or remove requirements inherited from a superclass” 

and “Extensions SHALL not contradict or relax requirements of these Guidelines.” While 

“relax” is not clearly defined, these guidelines seem to fall under the category of 

“requirements that might eventually prove inadequate, constraining, or irrelevant to a 

specific new technology” 

Without any new clear and testable guidelines, it appears that the current Innovation 

Class requirements could allow a submitter to declare any “new device classes” as fitting 

under “Voting device” (assuming above that level is not possible) in the class hierarchy 

(§2.8-A.1), any “suggested requirements and test methods,” regardless of value (§2.8-

A.2), and subjective “Justifications for items 1 and 2” (§2.8-A.3). Further, a submitter 

could identify only meaningless “requirements that apply to the new class” (§2.8-B) or no 

requirements at all and present a subjective “explanation as to why the voting system and 

its accompanying devices are innovative.” (§2.8-C) 

To truly “spur development of new and innovative secure voting systems,” as well as to 

continue the relevance of the VVSG, it is important that NIST, the TGDC, and the EAC 

provide a reasonable path to certification for innovative technology.