Accupoll AVS 1000

The AVS 1000 is a Direct Recording Electronic (DRE) voting machine with a voter-verified paper audit trail by AccuPoll, Inc. This article generally describes the specific AccuPoll — AVS 1000 model.

Voter verification
The AccuPoll — AVS 1000 has a federally-qualified voter-verified paper audit trail capability.

Brief description
The AccuPoll AVS 1000 is a smart-card activated multilingual touchscreen system that records votes on internal flash memory, an internal hard-drive and an administrative workstation. Voters insert a “smart-card” into the machine and then make their choices by touching an area on a computer screen, much in the same way that modern ATMs work. The votes are then recorded to internal flash memory, an internal hard drive and a laptop computer connected by cable to the AVS 1000. When polls close, the contents of the hard-drive for a particular machine are written to a writeable CDROM that is removed and physically transported to a tabulation facility.

On August 2nd, 2005, AccuPoll launched a series of new features including “SureCount” featuring groundbreaking new Proof of Vote (PoV) options. With this added feature, AccuPoll can operate in “standard mode” (PoV not scanned) or “SureCount” mode (PoV scanned). In SureCount mode, only the PoV that has been scanned will be counted in the election tally. AccuPoll also introduced features in response to the needs of the disabled community: 1) suppressed display of the visual ballot on the screen – when a blind voter is voting using the audio ballot; and 2) suppressed printing of a voter’s ballot selections in human readable form on the PoV. Both options are selected by the voter and, in either case, full read-back of the PoV is available via the audio PoV facility.

Detailed Voting Process
When the voter enters the precinct, he or she is given a “GoVote key” by a poll worker after confirming the voter is registered. The GoVote key is a "smart-card" which is the size and shape of a credit card and contains a computer chip, some memory and basic data. The voter then takes the smart card to a voting machine and inserts it into the machine to allow voting. After using the touchscreen to vote, the vote is recorded electronically in multiple locations. Two copies of raw data are recorded to both flash memory and a hard drive. Another copy is transmitted over serial cable and stored to a hard drive on a special laptop computer called the Voter Administrative Workstation (VAW); there is one VAW per precinct. The voter's GoVote key is reset to ensure that it can only be used to vote once. The machine then prints a piece of paper called a “proof of vote” which the voter can inspect for accuracy. If the vote is correct, the voter deposits the “proof of vote” facedown in a ballot box. The key is then returned to a poll worker. If the vote is incorrect, poll workers mark the “proof of vote” as spoiled, and issue a new GoVote key to the voter.

When the polls close, a poll worker or election official uses a differently programmed GoVote key and password generated specifically for that precinct to close each voting machine. This puts them into a post-election mode where they will no longer record votes. At this point, the poll workers write the contents of the VAW to a writeable CDROM, which then contains the votes for the entire precinct. The contents of the voting machines on flash memory and on their hard-drives are left to provide additional redundancy. The CD-ROMs and ballot boxes for each precinct are physically transported to a tabulation facility. A personal computer called a Central Vote Consolidator (CVC) reads the data from the CD-ROMs and provides the interface to a main tabulation server called the Central Count Server (CCS). This process copies the vote data from the disks and tabulates the results. The CD-ROMs and the paper audit trails can then become part of the official record of the vote.

Pre-2008 election
AccuPoll Bankruptcy In early 2006 AccuPoll went Bankrupt drawing into question machine approval by elections officials and what degree of support will be available to districts using them.

NASED Qualification Status
The National Association of State Election Directors Status:
 * 02/20/04: AccuPoll DRE AVS1 & AVS2 (firmware 2.4.3)
 * 04/19/2005: AccuPoll DRE (firmware 2.5)

External resources
“Security Analysis of the Diebold AccuVote-TS Voting Machine ,” Center for Information Technology Policy, Princeton University, September, 2006. See http://itpolicy.princeton.edu/voting/. Diebold’s response may be found at http://www.diebold.com/dieboldes/pdf/princetonstatement.pdf.

Tadayoshi Kohno, Adam Stubblefield, Aviel D. Rubin, and Dan S. Wallach, “Analysis of an Electronic Voting Machine”, IEEE Symposium on Security and Privacy 2004. IEEE Computer Society Press, May 2004. See: http://avirubin.com/vote.pdf

“DRE Security Assessment, Volume 1, Computerized Voting Systems, Summary of Findings and Recommendations,” InfoSENTRY, 21 Nov. 2003. See: http://www.sos.state.oh.us/sos/hava/files/InfoSentry1.pdf

“Direct Recording Electronic (DRE) Technical Security Assessment Report,” Compuware Corporation, 21 Nov. 2003. See: http://www.sos.state.oh.us/sos/hava/files/compuware.pdf

“Risk Assessment Report: Diebold Accuvote-TS Voting System and Processes (redacted)”, Science Applications International Corporation SAIC-6099-2003-261, Sept. 2, 2003. See: http://www.dbm.maryland.gov/SBE

“Trusted Agent Report -- Diebold AccuVote-TS Voting System,” RABA Technologies, Jan. 20, 2004. See: http://www.raba.com/text/press/TA_Report_AccuVote.pdf