There’s a lot of talk about the weaknesses of systems in U.S. elections these days. (The recent complaints about Texas voting systems “flipping votes” just show how everything looks like a security issue right now.)

Some of the media coverage hasn’t made it clear what exactly has been hacked, and how does it affect the outcomes of an election. A term like “election system” or even “electoral system” gets used without defining what that is.

There’s more technology in the workflow of elections than you might think, with an intricate web of users’ needs to meet. Certainly there will be discussions about all this at your Thanksgiving dinner table in the aftermath of the midterm elections. Here’s your guide to correcting Uncle Harry.

Voters register and vote

Let’s start with the voter-facing systems. There are 2 major pieces of technology that voters interact with. One is the voter registration system, and the other is the voting system.

The voter registration system is typically a database that is part of a state-wide software system. It is a register of people who are eligible and have signed up to vote. In 36 states plus Washington D.C., voters can register to vote on a website. A few states have developed APIs that third-party groups can connect to for their own voter registration drives.

Besides the state’s own voter registration application, inputs to this system come from paper forms, electronic transfers from other state agencies, clean data feeds from other state agencies like the Department of Motor Vehicles, and data from third party organizations like Rock the Vote.

37 states and Washington, D.C. make it possible to register to vote online. This image is from vote.virginia.gov.

Having an up-to-date database of voters is important for any number of reasons, but mainly to ensure that fewer people have to cast a provisional ballot on election day because their name isn’t on the list. In some voting jurisdictions, the list of voters is printed out to be physically checked at the polls by a nice poll worker. In other places, the voter registration data is copied to electronic poll books that run on tablets or notebook computers. Having this technology makes it super easy to implement same-day voter registration because poll workers can check the status of the of the voter in the database — and register anyone who isn’t already on the list.

The voting system is what the voter uses to vote. (This is different from the election system.) It might be an optical or digital scanner that counts hand-marked paper ballots. It might also be a ballot marking device — a digital UI that prints out a human-readable paper ballot that is then cast and counted in an optical or digital scanner. In some places — fewer every year — it’s a touchscreen system that records the votes on data storage on that machine.

Election workers check people in and manage ballots

In polling places, election workers check to see if the voter is in the poll book. More jurisdictions are adopting electronic poll books. There are a few commercial packages. Several jurisdictions have built their own.

After the election worker determines that the voter is in poll book, and hasn’t voted already, they check the voter in, and send them on to get their ballot.

In some jurisdictions, ballots are printed on demand. For example, at vote centers where any voter in the county can vote, the correct ballot for each voter is printed on site.

A voter marks choices on a paper ballot that will be optically scanned to tally. (This was taken during a research study, not during a real election!)

In a polling place that is just for people who live in voting district, there may be printed ballots to mark by hand, or an electronic system which voters use to mark their choices before printing a paper ballot. Sadly, there are still some electronic systems with no paper ballot for voters to review or to use in an audit. Each electronic system has its own procedure for making sure each person only votes once. These are called ballot access tokens or ballot authorization codes — they range from a piece of paper to an access card.

Enter a number associated with a voter’s ballot definition, and activate a plastic card to access the ballot on an electronic voting system.

Every polling place has at least one accessible voting system. That’s usually a ballot marking device.

There might also be ballots in other languages, when required by the federal Voting Rights Act or state law.

In most polling places where voters use printed ballots, they take the ballots to a scanner to scan and tally the votes for the precinct, but there are some places where ballots are counted in the central office.

As you can see, there is a lot of variation.

Election officials in counties and towns administer elections

As you might expect, there’s an election management system (or EMS, of course) in the elections office. It holds various databases (including GIS data for district boundaries), formats ballots, programs voting systems and ballot scanners. It also collects all the ballot results from every vote center or polling place into the final tally. Sometimes, the tallying system can automatically deliver results to a public website as each precinct reports.

There are dozens of locally developed apps for managing locations for polling places. There are more for sourcing, recruiting, screening, and scheduling election workers. There are yet other systems for training election workers. There are other apps and systems for managing voter outreach and education.

Some larger jurisdictions, like Orange County, California, even do all of their own printing of voter materials, outreach materials, and thousands of ballots, envelopes, and notices.

While the federal Election Assistance Commission defines the “voting system” as the collection of all of the systems and processes from defining the ballot to posting the results. All this technology and procedures are part of the overall election system. An election system is more like a concept than a thing. It’s the collection of laws, traditions, processes, practices, people, and technology that make up an overall ecosystem, if you will. This is what voters are actually navigating as they decide whether to take part, and if so, how.

This is different from the electoral system. The electoral system is the set of methods, laws, and rules used to elect representatives to government and, generally, how to conduct elections and determine the results. For example, each stat’s electoral system determines things like whether candidates win by plurality or majority, if there’s proportional representation, ranked, preferential voting, or how primaries are run.

The rules also establish the length of the term of office and when and how elections will be held. And more.

All of those terms — voting system, election system, electoral system — may sound synonymous, but they’re not. Voter-facing tech used to mark and cast ballots is the most visible part of the voting system. Tech used by poll workers and election officials makes up the election management system. All of that rolls up, along with laws, rules, customs, and processes to make the electoral system. Now ask your Uncle Harry, which of the systems have actually been hacked?

** Fun election facts to impress your Aunt Judy at Thanksgiving: