# Pro V&V **Pro V&V** is a Huntsville, Alabama testing laboratory and **one of only two Voting System Test Laboratories (VSTLs) accredited by the [[Election Assistance Commission]]**. The other is [[SLI Compliance]]. It was founded in 2011, and its laboratory director is Jack Cobb, who previously worked at Wyle Laboratories. The EAC first accredited it on February 24, 2015, and its current certificate is dated April 1, 2025. ## What a VSTL does A VSTL is where the federal voting-system standard, the [[Voluntary Voting System Guidelines]], actually gets applied to a machine. The process: 1. [[National Institute of Standards and Technology]] checks the lab's technical competence and recommends it. 2. The EAC reviews the non-technical side (conflicts of interest, structure, recordkeeping). 3. **The commissioners vote** to accredit. The manufacturer then picks which of the two labs will test its system, and pays it. Pro V&V tested [[Smartmatic]]'s VSR1 2.1, the second system certified to VVSG 2.0 (November 2025). It is now testing [[Election Systems & Software]]'s EVS 7.0.0.0 to the same standard. ## The 2020 audits Pro V&V's work after 2020 made it a name in the election-denial fight: - **Georgia, November 2020.** For Secretary of State [[Brad Raffensperger]], Pro V&V examined [[Dominion Voting Systems]] machines sampled from six counties. It found only certified software and "no evidence of the machines being tampered." - **Maricopa County, February 2021.** Pro V&V and SLI ran the county's own audits of its Dominion equipment and found no hacking or vote-switching. The Arizona Senate went ahead with its own review by [[Cyber Ninjas]] anyway. ## The "lapsed accreditation" claim Claims later circulated that the labs' accreditations had lapsed because their certificates had not been re-signed. On October 27, 2023, the EAC rejected that. It said that "a failure to issue an updated VSTL Certificate… does not indicate the lab is no longer accredited," and that "The EAC has never voted to revoke VSTL accreditation." ## Why the set of two is now fixed Accrediting a lab, and revoking one, both need commissioners. The EAC has had none since July 2026, and its August 2026 operations memo confirms that a new lab cannot be added without them. So: - No third laboratory can enter the market. - Neither existing accreditation can be pulled, whatever happens. - If either lab stopped working, national testing capacity would halve, with no way to replace it until the Senate confirms new commissioners. ## See Also - [[How a Voting System Is Certified and Decertified]] - [[SLI Compliance]] · [[Election Assistance Commission]] · [[National Institute of Standards and Technology]] - [[Voluntary Voting System Guidelines]] · [[Dominion Voting Systems]] · [[Election Systems & Software]] - [[Election Conspiracy Theories]] · [[Cyber Ninjas]]