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Yep. Who would have guessed 25 years later I'd be bored and then a year later this packet showed up at my doorstep? It's oddly perfect timing, around all the AI

Yep. Who would have guessed 25 years later I'd be bored and then a year later this packet showed up at my doorstep? It's oddly perfect timing, around all the AI discourse. :)

0xEF 3y ago
I'm surprised it only took them a year. Would you care to share more about your experience on filing FOIA? The circles I run in seem to view it as a clunky, bloated process, but I feel like it has gotten better than when it was introduced. I have zero first-hand experience, though.
- kotaKat 3y ago
  No problem to help, but bad news: Every government agency has different processes. You'll have to go through their own FOIA office. The NSA FOIA form is actually really easy: https://www.nsa.gov/about/contact-us/Submit-a-FOIA-Request/ https://www.nsa.gov/about/contact-us/Submit-a-FOIA-Request/ I simply asked for what I wanted (information about policy memos about 'Furby Alerts' and recording devices at the NSA from late 1998 to early 1999) and submitted the form. About a month later I got a response back from the NSA acknowledging they got my request, and located records that were part of another FOIA request being processed as well, so I'd get those documents as well once released. And then... yesterday afternoon I got the message "hey what did you get from the DoD?" - bewildered, sending me a photo of the cover (in the full article). They finally delivered, and I hastily scanned my spoils for everyone. :)
  - qingcharles 3y ago
    And to piggyback on your comment. State FOIA is a different beast to federal FOIA. Lots of states have much tighter timelines. Illinois requires the government body to respond with the records within 5 business days.
  - trevyn 3y ago
    https://www.muckrock.com/ https://www.muckrock.com/ seems to have a lot of good information on this too, and fun-to-look-through archives of requests and responses.
qingcharles 3y ago
I need to redo my FOIA request [0]. I was investigated by the Secret Service in 1996 as they thought I intended to assassinate President Clinton. This was down to me selling a selling a shell account on a Linux server to someone, who in retrospect, might have had fundamentalist ideals and that person sending a detailed email to the White House outlining their plot, from my domain. I always wanted to see the chain of events that led to the Special Branch turning up on my door step in England. [0] I FOIA'd this a couple of years back, but I changed address and never got the documents, only a letter to say it was being worked on.

Yep. Who would have guessed 25 years later I'd be bored and then a year later this packet showed up at my doorstep? It's oddly perfect timing, around all the AI discourse. :)

0xEF 3y ago

I'm surprised it only took them a year. Would you care to share more about your experience on filing FOIA? The circles I run in seem to view it as a clunky, bloated process, but I feel like it has gotten better than when it was introduced. I have zero first-hand experience, though.

kotaKat 3y ago
No problem to help, but bad news: Every government agency has different processes. You'll have to go through their own FOIA office. The NSA FOIA form is actually really easy: https://www.nsa.gov/about/contact-us/Submit-a-FOIA-Request/ https://www.nsa.gov/about/contact-us/Submit-a-FOIA-Request/ I simply asked for what I wanted (information about policy memos about 'Furby Alerts' and recording devices at the NSA from late 1998 to early 1999) and submitted the form. About a month later I got a response back from the NSA acknowledging they got my request, and located records that were part of another FOIA request being processed as well, so I'd get those documents as well once released. And then... yesterday afternoon I got the message "hey what did you get from the DoD?" - bewildered, sending me a photo of the cover (in the full article). They finally delivered, and I hastily scanned my spoils for everyone. :)
- qingcharles 3y ago
  And to piggyback on your comment. State FOIA is a different beast to federal FOIA. Lots of states have much tighter timelines. Illinois requires the government body to respond with the records within 5 business days.
- trevyn 3y ago
  https://www.muckrock.com/ https://www.muckrock.com/ seems to have a lot of good information on this too, and fun-to-look-through archives of requests and responses.

qingcharles 3y ago

I need to redo my FOIA request [0]. I was investigated by the Secret Service in 1996 as they thought I intended to assassinate President Clinton. This was down to me selling a selling a shell account on a Linux server to someone, who in retrospect, might have had fundamentalist ideals and that person sending a detailed email to the White House outlining their plot, from my domain. I always wanted to see the chain of events that led to the Special Branch turning up on my door step in England. [0] I FOIA'd this a couple of years back, but I changed address and never got the documents, only a letter to say it was being worked on.