Non-authoritative FOIA research, curated by 18F, a digital delivery team in the US federal government.
A number of public platforms have been built to process Freedom of Information requests.
This list does not include proprietary or internal solutions that requestors do not see.
We can't guarantee the accuracy of this page -- it represents initial research of team members, and could be incomplete or become out-of-date.
Updated: 2017-04-28
Alaveteli is an unofficial, open source information request platform, built by the UK organization mySociety. It is the result of generalizing the platform they built for WhatDoTheyKnow.
Alavateli has extensive documentation, a reasonably active mailing list, and a dedicated blog.
It's not obvious what the publication policy is for all requests on all deployed instances. On WhatDoTheyKnow, you can read the full back-and-forth between requestor and agency, and download released data.
- Ruby/Rails
Updated: 2017-04-28
FOIA.gov is an official, closed source website maintained by the Department of Justice that focuses on providing information about the FOIA and its administration. The site publishes statistical information about the administration of FOIA, which comes from the annual Chief FOIA Officer reports. The site also publishes contact information for the various FOIA offices across the Federal government.
FOIA.gov provides a basic web search powered by bing.com.
Updated: 2016-04-26
FOIA Machine is an unofficial, open source FOIA portal. It is built and by the Center for Investigative Reporting (CIR) and operated by MuckRock.
FOIA Machine joined MuckRock in November 2016:
FOIA Machine will remain free to let users manually track their own requests, while MuckRock will continue to offer a “full service” experience that submits the requests directly to the agency, automatically follows up, and conveniently digitizes any responsive documents.
Aimed at an audience of journalists, users make FOIA requests through FOIA Machine, which then submits your request to any of multiple governments on your behalf. Users can track request status, and receive responses to their requests.
FOIA Machine was originally funded with a bit under $50,000 through a prototype grant from the Knight Foundation. CIR built an alpha with this funding, and then requested further funding through a successful Kickstarter campaign that raised a bit over $50,000.
The site works, and there are public
requests,
but it's not clear how information is released. Even the requests marked as
"Fulfilled" have no visible information for public download. Their
updates indicate
progress is continuing.
FOIAMachine appears to send form letters via email. Contact information for agencies is user submitted and very incomplete. Major agencies such as the Department of Treasury don't have contact info or are not disambiguated from state government entities with similar names.
(Per Kickstarter video)
- Automates submission of requests
- Tracks requests
- Logs important dates (i.e. date filed)
- Reminders
- Email alerts
- Aggregates information
- Build information on improving request in the future
- Tracks how well law is working
Updated: 2017-04-28
FOIAonline is an official, closed source portal operated by the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA).
FOIAonline allows citizens to request information directly from participating agencies. At time of this writing, there are 16 participating agencies. Information available includes requests, appeals, and response documents. The information grows as agencies process additional requests.
FOIAonline is funded at least in part through the financial support of participating agencies.
FOIAonline allows you to search FOIA requests that have been made through its system. It's not clear whether one can browse without knowing a search term in advance.
Requests that result in the release of records can make those records publicly available, as on this FOIA request to the EPA. A "partial grant/partial denial", there are 126 documents attached to the request, mainly PDFs. There appears to be no requestor/agency discussion visible to the public, beyond the original request, nor any explanation for the partial grant/denial.
Updated: 2017-05-03
FOIAXpress PAL is an official, closed source, add-on to FOIAXpress providing a public web portal to submit and track FOIA requests. US Department of Agriculture is one agency using FOIAXpress PAL.
On its own, FOIAXpress is a commercial off-the-shelf web-based application for processing FOIA and Privacy Act requests. FOIAXpress can be used by federal agencies and offices as well as state and local governments. Not all FOIAXpress users have the PAL add-on.
Updated: 2017-04-28
Froide is an unofficial, open source Freedom of Information platform used in Germany and Austria. It was designed to mimic the functionality of What do they know.
According to the website, Froide connects entities through a man-to-many relationship to allow the public body to be accountable under different laws. Requests are mailed to public bodies through the platform via a special, request-unique email address. It offers a read/write REST API and redaction of PDFs.
The platform is internationalized so it can be used in other languages.
- Python/Django
- django-haystack for abstract search
- Apache Solr as search provider
- Hosted REST API
Updated: 2017-04-28
iFOIA is an unofficial, closed source platform that allows users to generate new requests for information from state and federal offices. iFOIA requires a user to register for an account and generate requests. This process guides users through the entire information request process. Once complete, the user is able to send the information electronically or print the completed request to send offline.
Once completed, the user is able to maintain open and completed requests, as well as share requests with others. One additional feature is an ability to maintain information requests created outside of iFOIA and use the platform to appeal a prior determination. However, responsive documents associated with a completed request do not seem to be collected and made available to the public through iFOIA.
This project was developed by the Reporters Committee for Freedom of the Press.
Updated: 2017-04-26
MuckRock is an unofficial, open source platform for making FOIA requests of various levels of government.
MuckRock publishes the results of many FOI requests online, and makes them searchable. MuckRock has a business model based on filing requests, scanning documents, supporting embargoed responses, and custom plans for large organizations. Users are also able to crowdsource finances to cover request fees.
MuckRock received some initial funding by the Knight Foundation, Freedom of the Press Foundation, and the Sunlight Foundation.
The platform was open sourced under the AGPL license in November 2016.
- Hosted API
- Python/Django
- scikit-learn for document classification
- documentcloud.org for OCR
- django-watson for full-text search
MuckRock provides an API to access their data including some examples of how it can be used. FOIA requests can also be submitted through this API. The documentation seems limited.
Updated: 2016-04-28
RecordTrac is the official, open source portal for the City of Oakland, California.
It was developed by Code for America's fellows working alongside the City of Oakland. It processes requests for California's FOIA equivalent, the California Public Records Act.
In Oakland, every satisfied request is made available to the public. Each request, such as this request for the Mayor's schedule, has a history of requestor interaction, and each published document.
RecordTrac acts as a single repository for managing requests and responses. When a request comes in, a notification is sent to the point of contact based on the department identified in the request. Documents fulfilling requests are often linked in the response or uploaded to scribd.com.
There doesn't appear to be any active development on RecordTrac.
- Python/Flask
- PostgreSQL full text search (Request search only)