Non-FOI vs FOI

July 15, 2008 1:54 PM

A (US) government agency wants to create a database of data that is voluntarily submitted by members of the public. The database has fields of data that get populated, some with personal data. The data records are made freely available to the public either through a regular periodic data dump, or through FOI requests, although personal data is blanked out (some fields in their entirety, some fields partially) To what extent can said agency decide it also wants "non-FOI fields" added to the database. What is allowed to be exempted from FOI requests other than personal data?
posted by blue_wardrobe to law & government (8 comments total)

For the love of matthowie -

Why are you asking us, Random Internet Strangers, instead of a lawyer familiar with FOIA?
posted by Tomorrowful at 2:00 PM on July 15

@tomorrowful: fair question.

Because, gummint being what it is, the answers won't make that much of a difference... :(

I don't mean to say that I am asking here because I don't care about the answer, but it's a little bit of an idle question.

However, there are several behind-the-scenes questions in my head, which are not legal in nature, such as:
a) What ideas might you have when designing a government data system, so that such private data fields don't get used as a dumping ground for data that *should* be disclosed but someone doesn't *want* to disclose?
b) How might one explain the necessary concepts of FOI and non-FOI to data entry clerks?

Random Internet Strangers often have very interesting insights.
posted by blue_wardrobe at 2:11 PM on July 15

I'm confused. I get the last sentence, but not the rest of it. What does it matter that there is some data which the agency does not want to give out and some data it does in the database?

Plus, the privacy act comes into play here in a big way. that's really complex.
posted by Ironmouth at 2:16 PM on July 15

The idea that an agency could get around a FOIA request by a wink-and-nudge "we don't have that data", when any disgruntled employee could point out that in fact they do have that data, "oh those? we were told to misfile them under pink parasols" doesn't seem likely. I suspect they'd be better off just denying the request.
posted by nomisxid at 2:58 PM on July 15

What is allowed to be exempted from FOI requests other than personal data?

I'd imagine national security information would fall into that category.
posted by desjardins at 3:40 PM on July 15

@box: thanks for the interesting insight. :)

@ironmouth:
The privacy aspect is certainly complex. I got hung up on this, because I just assumed that the database was all public interest material, which it is anytime apart from when the gov't gets involved, but desjardins made me re-evaluate.

@desjardins:

It's not national security, but you made me think.

In this case, the agency concerned has an (important but minor) law enforcement role, which was not immediately apparent to me in the context of this database.

Most of the reports are just about interesting scientific observations, but some could contain information about the failure of certain companies to live up to regulatory requirements.

I suspect the data concerned will be along the lines of "How should we proceed to deal with this breach of regulations / law / etc." - I guess it would be fair to assume that FOI would protect this kind of data from untimely disclosure.
posted by blue_wardrobe at 4:01 PM on July 15

We're talking about the Federal FOIA, right? Well, have you actually read the law? Exemptions are spelled out pretty clearly in 5 U.S.C. 552 -- skip down about 2/3 to section (b)
posted by meta_eli at 7:40 PM on July 15

Also, keep in mind that under FOIA there is (supposed to be) a presumption of openness. That is to say, all the data in your database is presumed to be responsive to FOI requests, UNLESS it fits a specific exemption outlined in FOIA itself or another federal law.
posted by meta_eli at 7:45 PM on July 15