Gabriela Schneider, the Communications Director of the Sunlight Foundation, writes:

David Brisson marked the completion of his fall internship at Sunlight today by posting a recap of his independent research project. Since it digs into FOIA, I thought you all would appreciate it: http://blog.sunlightfoundation.com/2009/12/18/can-the-internet-save-foia...

DocumentCloud is a new service being developed with startup funding from the James L. Knight Foundation. It sounds like an excellent service. It will be software, a Web site, and a set of open standards that will make original source documents easy to find, share, read and collaborate on, anywhere on the Web."

I cannot help but wonder why libraries are not at the forefront of projects like this.

Started by reporters at the New York Times and ProPublica, this service will give individuals and organizations involved in original reporting mechanisms for sharing the documents they obtain and discover and making those documents available to other for new reporting and new uses.

Over two dozen organizations are working on the development of DocumentCloud, including traditional publications and news organizations such as The Atlantic, Chicago Tribune, Forbes, The Seattle Times, Thomson Reuters, Washington Post, and WNYC Radio, as well as organizations that collect and publish documents, such as The National Security Archive, ACLU National Security Project, OpenCRS, and the Sunlight Foundation,

Users will be able to search for documents by date, topic, person, location, etc. and will be able to do "document dives," collaboratively examining large sets of documents. Think of it as a card catalog for primary source documents. DocumentCloud is not meant to be a general document hosting service, like Scribd, Docstoc or Google Docs. Our goal is to build a service that makes source documents easier to find and share regardless of where they are hosted. It is a complement to these services, and not a competitor. the goal is to make documents even easier to find on search engines. DocumentCloud will have information about documents and relations between them, for example what locations, people, or organizations a group of documents have in common. Conceived of by journalists working at ProPublica and The New York Times, DocumentCloud will be managed as an independent nonprofit.

Their FAQ notes: "Will there be an API? Hell yes."

See also: Coming soon: Data mining made easier, By Alex Byers, Nieman Watchdog (July 11, 2009).

Catching up with some updates released in August:

CRS has updated its Access to Government Information in the United States report. The latest edition is dated August 31, 2009 (via OpenCRS.com).

The Justice Department released its 2009 edition of Department of Justice Guide to the Freedom of Information Act on August 10. The announcement says the "2009 edition contains a newly updated and revised discussion of all aspects of the Freedom of Information Act, as amended by the OPEN Government Act, including the Act's procedural requirements, its exemptions and exclusions, as well as considerations applicable to FOIA litigation."

Steven Aftergood reports (CIA Updates Digital Archive, Restricts Access, Secrecy News, March 26, 2009) on the release by the Central Intelligence Agency of a new tool that allows users to search on-line to discover the availability of declassified CIA documents. The tool is the CIA FOIA - 25-Year Program Archive Search.

But you cannot download the documents you discover. Steven notes that the CIA will not "put the entire CREST database online so that anyone, anywhere could download these declassified, often heavily censored records. Nor will CIA release an electronic copy of the CREST database so that others may post it."

The CIA justifies withholding the complete text because, "The Agency evidently believes that there are latent secrets concealed in the declassified record that could somehow be extracted by a clever analyst who reviewed them in electronic form."

See also: Pozen, David. The Mosaic Theory, National Security, and the Freedom of Information Act. SSRN eLibrary. 26 Mar 2009.

Steven also says:

In 1995, President Clinton ordered agencies that classify information to “establish a Governmentwide database of information that has been declassified” (Executive Order 12958, section 3.8). That never happened, and in 2003 President Bush deleted the requirement (Executive Order 13292, section 3.7). Restoring such a requirement, and fulfilling it, would be an appealing feature of a new executive order on classification.

This is great news, especially given it's coming during Sunshine Week! This looks like a repudiation of the Ashcroft memo which had reversed FOIA regulations that had been based on guidelines which had established a “presumption” in favor disclosure. The Ashcroft memo reversed those regulations and told agencies to "carefully consider the fundamental values behind the exemptions – national security, privacy, government’s interests, etc – and to lean in their favor whenever possible." (quoted from Coalition of Journalists for Open Government).

Official: US to Release Data Unless Harm Foreseen. NY Times, March 19, 2009

The guidelines were expected to be released later Thursday, amid Sunshine Week, an annual national observation by journalism groups and other organizations to promote open government and freedom of information.

The new standard essentially returns to one issued by Attorney General Janet Reno during the Clinton administration. It would replace a more restrictive policy imposed by the Bush administration under which the Justice Department would defend any sound legal argument for withholding records.

Justice is responsible for government-wide guidance on how to implement the records law because it defends agencies in court if they are sued by people who disagree with a decision to withhold records. Under the Holder standard, Justice lawyers would not defend a decision to withhold records unless their release could be shown to produce foreseeable harm.

The new standards were also expected to encourage agencies to release more documents where the law leaves the decision to their discretion -- an amplification of Obama's order that they adopt a ''presumption for disclosure.''

The standards could also affect the outcome of a dozen or more pending lawsuits, including ones to obtain the legal rationales behind Bush administration anti-terrorism tactics like wiretapping Americans without a warrant and harsh interrogation of terrorism detainees.

EFF Launches Search Tool for Uncovered Government Documents, Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF), March 16th, 2009.

In celebration of Sunshine Week, the Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF) today launched a sophisticated search tool that allows the public to closely examine thousands of pages of documents the organization has pried loose from secretive government agencies. The documents relate to a wide range of cutting-edge technology issues and government policies that affect civil liberties and personal privacy.

Search EFF's FOIA Documents.

ACLU Blog of Rights Post [Familiar Story: CIA Destroys More Tapes] (March 2, 2009):

"Back in December 2007, we learned that the CIA had destroyed two videotapes depicting the "harsh interrogation" of two detainees in U.S. custody. This morning, we learned ... the CIA has actually destroyed 92 tapes. Those tapes are directly responsive to the ACLU’s October 2003 Freedom of Information Act request asking the government to release all documents and information pertaining to the treatment of detainees held in U.S. custody overseas."

The Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) is a remarkable tool. On Wednesday, January 21st, President Obama published a memorandum for the Heads of Executive Departments and Agencies on the broad topic of FOIA at the White House Briefing Room:

"A democracy requires accountability, and accountability requires transparency. As Justice Louis Brandeis wrote, "sunlight is said to be the best of disinfectants." In our democracy, the Freedom of Information Act (FOIA), which encourages accountability through transparency, is the most prominent expression of a profound national commitment to ensuring an open Government. At the heart of that commitment is the idea that accountability is in the interest of the Government and the citizenry alike..."

As noted here before, the Federal Reserve has been reluctant to release documents about bailout money.

Now according to POGO, "Governmentattic.org has posted several documents from the Federal Reserve in response to a FOIA request about the Fed's lending activities related to the credit crisis" but "the Fed was withholding over 2,000 pages of information under the (b)(4) and (b)(5) FOIA exemptions, which protect against the disclosure of "trade secrets" and "inter-agency or intra-agency memorandums or letters.""

The Fed Knows Best, Project on Government Oversight, Feb 23, 2009.

The 10th edition of the “Federal Open Government Guide” has been published by the Reporters Committee for Freedom of the Press (RCFP). The guide helps citizens to better understand and use the Freedom of Information Act (FOIA). This new edition covers laws such as the Government in the Sunshine Act (GSA), the Federal Advisory Committee Act (FACA), and the Privacy Act.

You can buy a copy from the RCFP for $10 or you can use the free online version. It includes an automated FOIA letter generator that creates requests and appeals.

Tip o' the hat to the OMB Watch Blog for the heads up.

The Smithsonian Institution is not subject to FOIA but has been using a policy for releasing records modeled on FOIA since November. On Monday the Institution formally adopted a new policy for responding to records requests, bowing to pressure from the Senate and open government groups.

• Smithsonian formally adopts new FOIA-like policy, Hannah Bergman, The Reporters Committee for Freedom of the Press, January 27, 2009.

"When considering requests for Smithsonian information, the Smithsonian will apply a presumption of disclosure. It will be the policy of the Smithsonian to disclose information unless this Directive clearly provides otherwise, except where disclosure would be harmful to an interest protected by an exemption. Where release would not be harmful to the Smithsonian or to an interest protected by an exemption, the Smithsonian may choose to release information that falls within an existing exemption."

But...

"Smithsonian trade secrets and Smithsonian commercial or financial information directly related to the Smithsonian’s revenue-generating activities, including fund-raising and development activities, and where release of the information would be likely to cause the Smithsonian substantial competitive harm or impair its ability to carry out its charitable and educational mission by raising private funds."

The National Security Archive has released a new guide, Effective FOIA Requesting for Everyone. Its aim is to provide “comprehensive overview of how to obtain documents from federal executive branch agencies.” It is divided into six chapters and all of them are available online in PDF format.

ProPublica has a very nice page listing Bush Administration memos that dealt with the "War on Terror." The list is annotated and has links to those that are public and lists those that are still secret.

• The Missing Memos, by Dan Nguyen and Christopher Weaver, ProPublica, January 28, 2009.

The Bush administration’s "war on terror"—including its controversial policies on detentions, interrogations and warrantless wiretapping—was all underpinned by legal memoranda. While some of those memos have been released (primarily as a result of ACLU lawsuits), the former administration chose to keep many others secret, citing security and confidentiality concerns.

The decision to release them now lies with President Obama. To help inform the debate—and inject an extra dose of accountability—we’re posting a list of the relevant memos, both public and secret.

governmentattic.org describes itself this way:

governmentattic.org provides electronic copies of hundreds of interesting Federal Government documents obtained under the Freedom of Information Act. Fascinating historical documents, reports on items in the news, oddities and fun stuff and government bloopers, they're all here. Think of browsing this site as rummaging through the Government's Attic -- hence our name.

Bruce Schneier says of one document that has recently show up at governmentattic, "Just declassified by the NSA, this document -- A History of U.S. Communications Security (Volumes I and II); the David G. Boak Lectures, National Security Agency (NSA), 1973 -- is definitely worth reading. The first sections are highly redacted, but the remainder is fascinating."

Steven Aftergood has the story here:

DoE Seeks to Limit Public Interest FOIA Disclosures, Secrecy News, December 15, 2008.

"A proposed new Department of Energy regulation would eliminate the so-called 'public interest' balancing test that encourages DOE officials to release information under the Freedom of Information Act even when it is legally exempt from disclosure if doing so would serve the public interest.... In comments on the proposed regulation submitted by the Federation of American Scientists, we argued that 'there is a widespread and well-founded expectation that the incoming Obama Administration will rescind the Ashcroft FOIA policy and define a more forthcoming disclosure policy. In light of that probable scenario, I would urge DOE to cancel its proposed revision of [the public interest balancing test], or else to suspend action on it for six months while the new Administration prepares new government-wide FOIA guidance.'"

Fed Refuses to Disclose Recipients of $2 Trillion (Update2), By Mark Pittman, Bloomberg, Dec. 12, 2008.

The Federal Reserve refused a request by Bloomberg News to disclose the recipients of more than $2 trillion of emergency loans from U.S. taxpayers and the assets the central bank is accepting as collateral.

Bloomberg filed suit Nov. 7 under the U.S. Freedom of Information Act requesting details about the terms of 11 Fed lending programs, most created during the deepest financial crisis since the Great Depression.

The Fed responded Dec. 8, saying it’s allowed to withhold internal memos as well as information about trade secrets and commercial information. The institution confirmed that a records search found 231 pages of documents pertaining to some of the requests.