FOIA Advisor

FOIA News: Who files the most FOIA requests?

FOIA News (2015-2023)Ryan MulveyComment

Who files the most FOIA requests?  It's not who you think.

Cory Schouten, Columbia Journalism Review, Mar. 17, 2017

JOURNALISTS, you probably think FOIA requests are about you.

But for the most part, they’re not. Journalists today comprise only a small fraction (7.6 percent) of requests under the Freedom of Information Act, a 1966 law enacted to help reporters hold the federal government accountable.

These days, businesses, law firms, and individuals are more prolific users of FOIA, according to the largest-ever analysis of FOIA request logs. Data guru Max Galka’s FOIA Mapper project set out to determine who uses the law by mining 229,000 requests directed to 85 government agencies.

Read more here.