Information Management and Access

Agencies shall incorporate in planning, budgeting, governance, and other policies appropriate steps to ensure that:
Agencies manage information throughout its life cycle to promote openness and interoperability, and properly safeguarding systems and information; this includes all stages through which the information passes, including: creating or collection, processing, maintenance, storage, use, sharing, dissemination, and disposition; and.
Agencies shall adopt a presumption in favor of interoperability and shall proactively make information resources accessible, discoverable, and usable by the public to the extent permitted by law and subject to existing terms and conditions, privacy, security (which includes confidentiality), and other valid restrictions pertaining to access, use, and dissemination.
Agencies shall use these practices to:
Collect or create information in a way that supports downstream interoperability among information systems and streamlines dissemination to the public, where appropriate, by:
1. Creating or collecting all new government information electronically by default, in machine-readable open formats, using relevant data standards, that upon creation includes standard extensible metadata identifying any restrictions to access, use, and dissemination in accordance with open data guidance from OMB; and
2. For all instances where new government information creation or collection does not fall squarely within the public domain as U.S. government work, agencies shall include appropriate provisions in contracts, grants, and cooperative agreements and other implementing instruments to meet objectives of open data while recognizing that contractors may have proprietary interests in such information, and that protection of such information may be necessary to encourage qualified contractors to participate in and apply innovative concepts to government programs.
Ensure that the public has timely and equitable online access to the agency’s public information using a manner that is informed directly by public engagement and balanced against the costs of dissemination or accessibility improvements and demonstrate usefulness of the information.
Agencies shall ensure that the public can appropriately discover, and provide feedback about disseminated information and unreleased information by:
Maintaining a public data listing and an enterprise data inventory describing agency information resources in accordance with guidance from OMB; and
Developing other aids as necessary to assist the public in locating agency information including catalogs and directories, site maps, search functions, and other means.
Agencies shall ensure that the public can appropriately use disseminated information by:
1. Publishing information online in a, machine-readable open format that can be retrieved, downloaded, indexed, and searched by commonly used web search applications and is public, accessible, described, reusable, complete, timely, and managed in manners consistent with OMB guidance regarding open data. This includes providing such information in a format(s) accessible to employees and members of the public with disabilities in compliance with section 508 of the Rehabilitation Act of 1973, as amended (29 U.S.C. § 794d);
2. Avoid establishing, or permitting others to establish on their behalf, exclusive, restricted, or other distribution arrangements that interfere with allowing the agency to disseminate its information on a timely and equitable basis. In certain cases, it may be appropriate to engage in time-limited restrictions or exclusively in cases where the agency, due to resource constraints, would otherwise be unable to provide the information to the public on its own;
3. Avoid establishing unnecessary restrictions, including charging of fees or royalties, on the reuse, resale, or re-dissemination of Federal information by the public;
4. Recovering only the cost of dissemination if fee and user charges are necessary. They must exclude from calculation the costs associated with original collection and processing of the information. Exceptions to this policy are:
Where statutory requirements are at variance with the policy;
Where the agency collects, processes, and disseminates the information for the benefit of a specific identifiable group beyond the benefit to the general public;
Where the agency plans to establish user charges at less than cost of dissemination because of a determination that higher charges would constitute a significant barrier to properly performing the agency’s functions, including reaching members of the public whom the agency has a responsibility to inform; or
Where the Director of OMB determines an exception is warranted.
1. Ensuring that government publications are made available to depository libraries through the Government Publishing Office, as required by law (44 U.S.C. Part 19); and
2. Taking advantage of all dissemination channels, including Federal, State, local, tribal, territorial governments, libraries, nonprofit, and private sector entities, in discharging agency information dissemination responsibilities.
Agencies shall manage information in accordance with the following principles:
1. Providing notice of Federal agency privacy practices for the collection, use, maintenance, disclosure, dissemination, and destruction of records;
2. Providing adequate notice when initiating, substantially modifying, or terminating dissemination of significant information that the public may be using;
3. Identifying the source of the information disseminated to the public, if from outside the agency where practicable;
4. Considering target audiences of Federal information when determining format, frequency of update, and other information management decisions;
5. Considering the impact of decisions and actions in each stage of the information life cycle on other stages;
6. Considering the effects of information management actions on members of the public and State, local, tribal and territorial governments and their access to Federal information and ensure consultation with the public and those governments as appropriate;
7. Ensuring that, to the extent existing information dissemination policies or practices are inconsistent with the requirements of this Circular, a prompt and orderly transition to compliance with the requirements of this Circular is made;
8. Seeking to satisfy new information needs through interagency or intergovernmental sharing of information, or through nongovernmental sources, where lawful and appropriate, before creating or collecting new information;
9. Complying with all applicable laws governing the disclosure of information, including those related to the quality, privacy, confidentiality, security, and other valid access, use, and dissemination restrictions; and
10. If not public domain, provide details on the license status to potential data users to help these potential users understand whether there are any restrictions on copying, publishing, distributing, transmitting, adapting, or otherwise using the information for commercial or non-commercial purposes.