bogeyman
3rd August 2012, 20:44
The Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) is a federal freedom of information law that allows for the full or partial disclosure of previously unreleased information and documents controlled by the United States government. The Act defines agency records subject to disclosure, outlines mandatory disclosure procedures and grants nine exemptions to the statute. It was originally enacted by President Lyndon B. Johnson on July 4, 1966 as 5 U.S.C. § 552 of Pub.L. 89-554 which enacted Title 5 of the United States Code, and went into effect the following year.
It has received many amendments since it’s original creation, and each federal agency has enacted its own interpretation and regulations and incorproated these into the FOIA.
Tricks of the Trade
There is a number of “tricks” or “intelligence techniques” which can be used by those who implement these regulatory procedures, in order to restrict your access to information, especially if the information is of political nature, intelligence nature or does not follow the current publics perception of what those in power wish you to have.
One of the primary concerns, of any government body to a FOIA request is the “public's reaction” to any information that is deemed releaseable. They do not want a “public headache” which may result in the reaction to the releaseable documents.
A number of activities the intelligence services as well as other government departments delibrately and/or systematicly use in order to make your FOIA request more difficult to obtain any useful documentation:
1. Deny any records exist.
2. Cannot confirm or deny any records exist.
3. Provide proof that the documents you seek exist in order for the authorities to find the records.
4. Provide copies of the documents you wish to obtain, so they can locate the documents you wish declassified.
5. Charge outlandish fees for unresponsive requests.
6. Provide releaseable documents, which are almost completely censoured
7. Very long period of time passes before they respond to your request for documents, then deny any documents exist.
8. Provide documentation which is already avaliable in the public arena.
9. Providing information of such a low grade is wasn’t worth the effort of the FOIA request.
10. Provided rehashed material, and nothing new is released.
11. Providing almost unreadable documentation stating it is the “best copy avaliable”
12. Sending your FOIA request to the wrong department or agency in order to obtain a “no records” exist response.
13. Provide a blanket response to a FOIA on a particular subject.
14. State they never received your FOIA request.
15. Obtain more specific information out of the requester that any information they provide you via the FOIA.
16. Confirming the records exist, but cannot locate the source of the documents you requested.
17. Move the documents so they are under the preview of a “non governmental” organization, thus not subject to the FOIA.
18. Documents releasable under one agencies regulations, but not another, even though it is the same informaton.
19. State they have sent copies to you of documents which have been declassified, but they never arrive.
20. Send a one line response, “no records exist”.
21. Provide you with a “Fact Sheet” as a response to a FOIA request, even though this “Fact Sheet” is avaliable freely without a FOIA request.
22. Use technical jargon of such complexity, as not to understand the nature of the response, since it involves detailed understanding of that particular agency.
23. Provide you with important documents, but providing a counter response to dumb down the contents of the documents they have provide you.
All the aforementioned has over a period of time happen to me during my FOIA requests.
Of note I did receive one document some years back concerning the subject of the UFO. The document itself was of low grade quality, pretty much what I expected. But something caught my eye. At the bottom of this document was the term "PN" and a 15 digit number. I filed a request for this number and what it meant. I received a reply stating the "PN" stood for "Project Number" and the 15 digit number was an ongoing project collecting information on a variety of subjects and had been active for 25 years, one of the subjects of this collection was parapsychology. There is no way you would of been able to guess this number to file a request, and hence another "trick" in their book to with hold information. The letter itself was from the United States Air Force.
It has received many amendments since it’s original creation, and each federal agency has enacted its own interpretation and regulations and incorproated these into the FOIA.
Tricks of the Trade
There is a number of “tricks” or “intelligence techniques” which can be used by those who implement these regulatory procedures, in order to restrict your access to information, especially if the information is of political nature, intelligence nature or does not follow the current publics perception of what those in power wish you to have.
One of the primary concerns, of any government body to a FOIA request is the “public's reaction” to any information that is deemed releaseable. They do not want a “public headache” which may result in the reaction to the releaseable documents.
A number of activities the intelligence services as well as other government departments delibrately and/or systematicly use in order to make your FOIA request more difficult to obtain any useful documentation:
1. Deny any records exist.
2. Cannot confirm or deny any records exist.
3. Provide proof that the documents you seek exist in order for the authorities to find the records.
4. Provide copies of the documents you wish to obtain, so they can locate the documents you wish declassified.
5. Charge outlandish fees for unresponsive requests.
6. Provide releaseable documents, which are almost completely censoured
7. Very long period of time passes before they respond to your request for documents, then deny any documents exist.
8. Provide documentation which is already avaliable in the public arena.
9. Providing information of such a low grade is wasn’t worth the effort of the FOIA request.
10. Provided rehashed material, and nothing new is released.
11. Providing almost unreadable documentation stating it is the “best copy avaliable”
12. Sending your FOIA request to the wrong department or agency in order to obtain a “no records” exist response.
13. Provide a blanket response to a FOIA on a particular subject.
14. State they never received your FOIA request.
15. Obtain more specific information out of the requester that any information they provide you via the FOIA.
16. Confirming the records exist, but cannot locate the source of the documents you requested.
17. Move the documents so they are under the preview of a “non governmental” organization, thus not subject to the FOIA.
18. Documents releasable under one agencies regulations, but not another, even though it is the same informaton.
19. State they have sent copies to you of documents which have been declassified, but they never arrive.
20. Send a one line response, “no records exist”.
21. Provide you with a “Fact Sheet” as a response to a FOIA request, even though this “Fact Sheet” is avaliable freely without a FOIA request.
22. Use technical jargon of such complexity, as not to understand the nature of the response, since it involves detailed understanding of that particular agency.
23. Provide you with important documents, but providing a counter response to dumb down the contents of the documents they have provide you.
All the aforementioned has over a period of time happen to me during my FOIA requests.
Of note I did receive one document some years back concerning the subject of the UFO. The document itself was of low grade quality, pretty much what I expected. But something caught my eye. At the bottom of this document was the term "PN" and a 15 digit number. I filed a request for this number and what it meant. I received a reply stating the "PN" stood for "Project Number" and the 15 digit number was an ongoing project collecting information on a variety of subjects and had been active for 25 years, one of the subjects of this collection was parapsychology. There is no way you would of been able to guess this number to file a request, and hence another "trick" in their book to with hold information. The letter itself was from the United States Air Force.