If you want an "official" (i.e. kept up to date by the UN) machine readable list of countries then this is a better source: http://www.unicode.org/cldr/data/ch

If you want an "official" (i.e. kept up to date by the UN) machine readable list of countries then this is a better source: http://www.unicode.org/cldr/data/charts/summary/root.html http://www.unicode.org/cldr/data/charts/summary/root.html This list also has currencies and some other stuff, but a Ruby script to extract what you want should not take more than 10 lines. This list has the added advantage of being available in pretty much all the languages in the world, in case you need localisation for your project. Side note: if you want to check if a list is up to date, check for "Aruba" and country code BQ (Caribbean). They changed the status of independent country a year ago so many lists don't have it yet (used to be a Dutch colony).