EAC - Voluntary Voting System Guidelines

Name : | Ted Selker
Organization : | CalTech/MIT Voting Technology Project
Post Date : | 9/30/2005
Section Comments
Section : | 3.4
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Comment : | There is a requirement stipulating a mean time between failures of 135 hours. Observing paper-trail printers in use, one in twenty needed attentions sometime during the set-up or voting. I've been told of elections with worse problems than that. The mean time between failures should take the entire system into consideration and be set at an error level that is acceptable for that system. For example, if one is designing a system for LA and doesn't want to have hundreds of mistakes, then the mean time between failure for all equipment has to be low enough so that a couple of million people can vote without losing a vote.. This is only possible with excellent checks and balances on the chain of the custody of voting machines. This should be specified in the guidelines. [Statements submitted at EAC public hearing, July 28, 2005, Pasadena]