FBI Is the Worst FOIA Performer

krou writes "The National Security Archive at George Washington University has awarded its 2009 Rosemary Award to the FBI for worst freedom of information performance (PDF of the award). Previous winners have been the CIA and the Treasury. The NSA notes that 'The FBI's reports to Congress show that the Bureau is unable to find any records in response to two-thirds of its incoming FOIA requests on average over the past four years, when the other major government agencies averaged only a 13% "no records" response to public requests.' The FBI's explanation, according to the NSA, is that 'files are indexed only by reference terms that have to be manually applied by individual agents,' and even then, 'agents don't always index all relevant terms.' Furthermore, 'unless a requester specifically asks for a broader search, the FBI will only look in a central database of electronic file names at FBI headquarters in Washington.' Any search will therefore 'miss any internal or cross-references to people who are not the subject of an investigation, any records stored at other FBI offices around the country, and any records created before 1970.'"

congrats

[mewshi_nya]

At least you won an award for your sucking...

Re:The NSA?

[krou]

NSA in this context is "National Security Archive", not "National Security Agency".

Re:Why would this surprise anyone?

[Anonymous Coward]

I love madlibs!

Re:Also...

[Thelasko]

They can't return anything from an FOIA request if they don't have anything on you.

While it is true that there are likely many people requesting their own FBI file, only to discover that it doesn't exist, why didn't the FBI use that as an excuse? Instead, the article notes:

The FBI's explanation, according to the NSA, is that 'files are indexed only by reference terms that have to be manually applied by individual agents,' and even then, 'agents don't always index all relevant terms.'

Re:Not too surprising

[evan_arrrr!]

BABY. PLURAL: BABIES.