Category Overview

Voting Systems — Election Security Glossary

1,792 election security terms in the Voting Systems category, with definitions sourced from NIST, CISA, EAC, and 30+ authoritative documents.

Browse all 1,792 terms in Voting Systems

Repeat Election

An election that is held again because of an irreparable irregularity that renders it impossible to determine the winner.

Medium consensus1 source

Repeating Key

A key on a keyboard or virtual keyboard which, when held down or continuously pressed, causes more than one instance of its corresponding character to be generated or transmitted.

Medium consensus1 source

Repetition

The ability of a to repeat upon request any information it provides to the VOTING STATION voter.

Medium consensus1 source

Replacement Absentee Ballot

"The county auditor may issue replacement to a registered voter who ABSENTEE BALLOTS claims that the ballot originally issued was destroyed, spoiled, lost, or not received.

Medium consensus1 source

Replacement Ballot

The term for a ballot given to a voter to replace a 42 U.S.C.

Medium consensus1 source

Report Item

"Any one of the numeric values (totals or counts) that must appear in any of the vote data reports.

Medium consensus1 source

Report Item Error

The "absolute value of the difference between the correct value and the reported value" of a ITEM.

Medium consensus1 source

Report Total Error

The "sum of all of the from all of the reports" produced by a voting REPORT ITEM ERRORS system.

Medium consensus1 source

Report Total Volume

The "sum of all of the correct values for all of the that are supposed to appear in REPORT ITEMS the reports" produced by a voting system.

Medium consensus1 source

Reporting Context

The "scope within which reported totals or counts are calculated (e.g., or PRECINCT ELECTION DISTRICT).

Medium consensus1 source

Reporting Group

Any category of voters whose ballots are totaled separately, such as or ABSENTEE VOTERS VOTERS.

Medium consensus1 source

Repository

An organization which receives "voting system software (source and executable code) that has been certified from test labs or the national certification authority.

Medium consensus1 source

By ESG Editorial Team · Drawing on NIST, the EAC, VVSG, IEEE, and 30+ authoritative sources on voting system design and certification

Voting systems are the machines, software, and supporting infrastructure through which voters mark, cast, and have their ballots counted. The category includes optical scanners, ballot-marking devices, direct-recording electronic (DRE) systems, hand-marked paper ballots, and the back-end systems that aggregate results from precincts and report them to the public.

Why this category matters for election security is rooted in the trust voters place in the systems that record their intent. A voting system that loses votes, that miscounts, or that allows manipulation without detection undermines the legitimacy of the entire election. Conversely, a system that is well designed, well tested, and well understood by election officials produces results that withstand scrutiny even when contested. The work of building and maintaining that trustworthiness is continuous.

Federal testing and certification programs establish a baseline. The Voluntary Voting System Guidelines (VVSG), administered by the Election Assistance Commission, define the technical and security requirements a system must meet to be used in federal elections. State testing goes further in some cases, certifying specific configurations, requiring additional documentation, or limiting the use of particular system features. Once a system is in the field, the work of securing it continues through patch management, configuration control, and pre-election logic and accuracy testing.

The terminology in this category reflects the technical and procedural landscape that voting systems inhabit. The concepts here are not optional. Every term describes a system property that has been the subject of standards, recommendations, and in some cases federal law.

Key Concepts

Voting System

The integrated hardware and software used by voters to cast ballots and by election officials to count them.

Optical Scan

A voting system that reads marked paper ballots using optical sensors and counts the marks electronically.

Ballot Marking Device

A device that allows voters to mark their choices on an electronic interface, then prints a human-readable paper ballot.

Voter Verifiable Paper Audit Trail

A printed paper record produced simultaneously with an electronic vote, allowing the voter to confirm their choices before casting.

Cast Vote Record

The permanent record of a single vote as captured and stored by a voting system, in electronic and/or paper form.

Direct Recording Electronic

A voting system that records votes directly into electronic memory, with or without a contemporaneous paper record.

Voluntary Voting System Guidelines

The federal technical standards published by the EAC that define security, accuracy, and accessibility requirements for certified voting systems.

How These Terms Relate

These concepts together describe the technical core of how votes are cast and counted. A voting system is more than a single device. It is an integrated chain of hardware, software, and procedures that begins when a voter enters the booth and ends when results are reported. The terminology here covers that full chain. Optical scan, ballot-marking devices, DRE systems, and VVPAT each represent different points on a spectrum of automation and paper reliance. The choice between them is a policy decision shaped by jurisdiction, voter expectations, and the trade-offs between speed, accessibility, auditability, and security.