Infrastructure — Election Security Glossary
50 election security terms in the Infrastructure category, with definitions sourced from NIST, CISA, EAC, and 30+ authoritative documents.
Browse all 50 terms in Infrastructure
National Critical Functions
The functions of government and the private sector that are so vital to the United States that their disruption, corruption, or dysfunction would have a debilitating effect on…
National Cybersecurity Assistance Fund
A proposed fund administered by the Federal Emergency Management Agency that would distribute grants to public and private entities for solutions, projects, and programs where a)…
National Security Industrial Sector
The worldwide industrial complex that enables research and development, as well as the design, production, delivery, and maintenance of military weapons systems, subsystems, and…
Operations Technology
The hardware and software systems used to operate industrial control devices.
Primary Services Node (prsn)
A Key Management Infrastructure (KMI) core node that provides the users' central point of access to KMI products, services, and information.
Product Source Node (psn)
The Key Management Infrastructure core node that provides central generation of cryptographic key material.
Sector Specific Agencies
Federal agencies that have institutional knowledge and specialized expertise about a critical infrastructure sector.
Systemically Important Critical Infrastructure (sici)
A proposed designation of critical infrastructure entities that manage systems and assets whose disruption could have cascading, destabilizing effects on U.S.
Critical Infrastructure Partnership Advisory Council (cipac)
Council established by DHS under 6 U.S.C.
Critical Infrastructure Sector
A logical collection of assets, systems, or networks that provide a common function to the economy, government, or society; NIPP 2013 addresses 16 critical infrastructure sectors,…
Executive Order 13636
Executive Order that calls for the Federal Government to closely coordinate with critical infrastructure owners and operators to improve cybersecurity information sharing; develop…
Government Coordinating Council (gcc)
The government counterpart to the Sector Coordinating Council for each sector established to enable interagency and intergovernmental coordination; comprises representatives…
By ESG Editorial Team · Drawing on CISA, EAC, and 25+ sources on election infrastructure and critical infrastructure designation
Election infrastructure is the underlying set of systems, facilities, and services that elections depend on. It includes the buildings where election offices are housed, the warehouses where voting equipment is stored between elections, the data centers that host voter registration systems, the communications networks that connect precincts to central tabulation, and the power and connectivity that keep all of this running.
Why this category matters for election security is that the integrity of an election depends on the integrity of the infrastructure it runs on. A compromised election management system, a warehouse that has been physically breached, or a power outage on election night are not abstract threats. They are realistic failure modes that election offices must plan for.
Federal designation of election infrastructure as critical infrastructure (in 2017) brought election systems into the same framework as power grids, water systems, and financial networks. That designation brought with it access to threat intelligence, incident response support, and prioritization for federal resources. State and local election offices have used that access to harden their infrastructure.
The terminology in this category covers both the infrastructure itself and the practice of protecting it. The concepts here are concrete. They describe the systems, facilities, and services that election administration depends on.
Key Concepts
Election Infrastructure
The systems, facilities, and services that support election administration, designated as critical infrastructure by the U.S. government in 2017.
Secure Storage
Locked, monitored, and access-controlled storage for ballots, voting equipment, and election records between elections.
Network Security
The protection of election data as it moves through the networks that connect precincts, jurisdictions, and central systems.
How These Terms Relate
These concepts together describe the underlying infrastructure that elections depend on. The terminology here covers both the infrastructure itself and the practice of protecting it. The unifying theme is that infrastructure is foundational. The strongest procedures in the world are not effective if the systems they run on are unreliable or compromised. The election-specific application of that principle is the work of ensuring that the buildings, networks, and systems on which elections run are themselves secure and resilient.
Related categories
37 terms
The network-level infrastructure that connects election systems.
Hardware44 terms
The physical devices that comprise election infrastructure.
Software39 terms
The code that runs on election infrastructure.
Physical Security23 terms
The controls that protect election infrastructure from physical threats.
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