Website on Open Records in 50 States

The Marion Brecher Citizen Access Project (CAP), from the University of Florida College of Journalism and Communications, is a “comparative guide to state laws controlling citizen access to government meetings and records.” The project provides a growing database of information on public records that uses a ‘sunshine’ index rating scale (to indicate the level of …

Subjects: E-Government, Freedom of Information, Government Documents

Report on Democratic Candidate Websites

Digital Democrats, An Online Analysis of the Presidential Candidates, is an in-depth survey (92 pages, pdf) of how the websites of the eight declared candidates (Howard Dean, John Edwards, Dick Gephardt, John Kerry, Dennis Kucinich, Joe Lieberman, Carol Moselely Braun and Al Sharpton) are leveraging the online forum for the purposes of fundraising, communicating with …

Subjects: Internet

Supreme Court Declines Review of Wiretapping Case

The ACLU’s March 24 press release expressed disappointment over the Supreme Court’s order yesterday to reject their request to review the November 18, 2002 decision by the United States Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court of Review upholding the DOJ’s use of wiretapping and interception of e-mail and other communications as provided by the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance …

Subjects: Civil Liberties

Homeland Security and Cyber-Attacks

The Department of Homeland Security issued a press announcement on Operation LIBERTY SHIELD, which “is a comprehensive national plan designed to increase protections for America’s citizens and infrastructure while maintaining the free flow of goods and people across our border with minimal disruption to our economy and way of life.” Under the topic CyberSecurity, the …

Subjects: Civil Liberties, Cybercrime, Internet

Resource for Competitive Intelligence Research

Today’s Search Day highlights a low cost resource on market data from subscription-based Dun & Bradstreet, called ZapaData (requires free registration). This site would no doubt prove useful to those conducting competitive intelligence research, with access to a database of 14 million business records from which company reports are compiled. The site also offers free …

Subjects: Legal Research

DoD Webmasters Policies And Guidelines

Via the DoD DefenseLINK website, you will find numerous interesting links to policies and guidelines that circumscribe what information may be posted online for public access by agency webmasters and content providers. Topics addressed include security policy, findability, privacy, accessibility, copyright, and specific memos and directives concerning clearance procedures.

Subjects: Freedom of Information