NIST HAVA TGDC meeting report

["David Webber \(XML\)" <david@drrw.info>]

Team,

Patrick Gannon and I attended the meeting at NIST 
yesterday.  Patrick is on the formal executive committee
and so was able to make comments in support of OASIS
EML use at appropriate junctures. TDGC is at some point 
tasked with evaluting the usefulness of EML.  The 
researchers are aware of the potential for use of EML 4.0
for recording election records.

I distributed copies of my slide presentation to members of
the TGDC committee and also NIST researchers and this 
generally appeared to be well received.

The NIST researchers presented 3 sets of information - and particularly
around the notion of what is VVPAT - that is strongly supportive of 
the notion of VVPB that I have been envisioning in the 
trusted process model.

Such objective theoretical analysis around the need to provide an
anonymous voting process is not binding on anyone - but does
add weight to what we are saying.  It also helps clarify for those
States that have adopted VVPAT - just what that notion is and
how it needs to be implemented to ensure voters are not
compromised.  NIST also presented an excellent paper on 
threats and risks in voting systems; including analysis of
network security.

The presentations and Word documents are not online yet.

I've added placeholders to them in my slides - and I've asked
NIST if they can provide copies directly to me.  

In either case - as soon as I know more - I will provide those
links.

In the meantime - I have updated my slides to reinforce the 
notions of how and why VVPAT = VVPB, the need to do
100% crosscheck instead of a 1% audit (current TGDC thinking!)
and other useful supportive content.

This appears to be a strong opportunity for NIST and OASIS
to work together to develop XML syntax components in 
support of the HAVA TDGC recommendations and findings.

My updated slides are here:

 http://drrw.net/backup/Trusted-Ballot-Processing-Systems.pdf

 http://drrw.net/backup/Trusted%20Ballot%20Processing%20Systems.ppt 

Enjoy, DW