GAO questions progress on e-voting standards

With lingering concerns about the security of e-voting systems, the U.S. Election Assistance Commission (EAC) needs to define security policies and set up a machine-certification program to help state and local election officials use e-voting equipment, according to a report issued Friday by the U.S. Government Accountability Office (GAO).
"Until these efforts are completed, there is a risk that many state and local jurisdictions will rely on voting systems that were not developed, acquired, tested, operated or managed in accordance with rigorous security and reliability standards -- potentially affecting the reliability of future elections and voter confidence in the accuracy of the vote count," the GAO report said.
The EAC, established with the Help America Vote Act passed by Congress in 2002, is working on several initiatives to help state and local governments improve their management of e-voting systems, the GAO said. The EAC is working on security and reliability standards and on programs to certify voting machines and accredit independent laboratories to test e-voting systems, the GAO said. But those efforts aren't finished and are "unlikely to have a significant effect in the 2006 federal election cycle," the report said.