Monthly Archives: January 2014

Will Google Glass enable “augmented advocacy” in a more transparent society?

Posted on by

4

One of the more interesting aspects of Dave Eggers’ dystopic new novel, “The Circle,” is the introduction of the “SeaChange,” a small, powerful camera that can transmit wireless images to a networked global audience. The SeaChange is adopted by politicians who “go transparent,” broadcasting all of their interactions to the public all day long.

Regardless of whether that degree of radical transparency in beneficial for elected representatives or not, in early 2014, we’ve now seen many early glimpses of what a more networked world full of inexpensive cameras looks like when United States politicians are online and on camera more often, from scandals to threats to slurs to charged comments that may have changed a presidential election. Most of that video has been captured by small video cameras or, increasing, powerful smartphones. Over the next year, more people will be wearing Google Glass, Google’s powerful facial computing device. Even if Google Glass has led to a backlash, the next wave of mobile devices will be wearable, integrated into clothing, wristbands, shoes and other gear. This vision of the future is fast approaching, which means that looking for early signals of various aspects of it is crucial.

glass_promotions-01 (1)

One such signal came across my desktop earlier this week, in the form of a new app for Google Glass from RedEdge, a digital advocacy consultancy based in Arlington, Virginia. Their new “augmented advocacy” application for Google Glass is a proof of concept that demonstrates how government data can be served to someone wearing glass as she moves around the world. It’s not in the GDJ Store but people interested in testing it can request the Glass application file (android 1) from RedEdge, its maker.

“While we don’t expect widespread deployment of this app, though that would be cool, this is a window into what’s possible with wearable computing just using federal department data,” said Ian Spencer, chief technology officer of RedEdge, in an interview. “The data we used to launch this app and populate the database was all sourced from publicly available information. We primarily used publications from the Office of Management and Budget for budget figures, as well as the president’s own budget, for monetary data. Location data on federal buildings was sourced from Google Maps.”

The app leverages Google Glass’s ability to detect the wearer’s location, feeding a government data through RedEdge’s API to populate a relevant card. It pulls in from open data, formatted as JSON, and provides a list of all locations.

“You can just walk around with the app running in background,” said Spencer. “It doesn’t take up a ton of battery life. With geofencing, Glass knows when you’re near a building and triggers the app, which pops in a card that shows you a phone number and budget information. You can then tap to get more information and it loads up public contact information. Eventually the GDK [Glass Developer Kit] will let you make calls and emails.”

Visitors to the White House with this app, for instance, could call the White House switchboard, though they would be unlikely to get President Obama on the phone.
Whitehouse

The RedEdge app is currently limited by the amount of time and investment RedEdge has put into it, along with the technology of Glass itself. “Once we add more data points, we will need a more complicated API,” said Spencer. “User experience was our focus, not massive complete sets. Even if we were using a government API, which would be ideal at some point, we would need a hashing layer so that we don’t overwhelm their servers.”

The only data the developers are feeding into it is the total federal budget for a given agency, not more granular details concerning how it related to programs, their performance or who is in charge of them. It’s very much a “proof of concept.”

“We’re looking at it as a trial balloon,” said Spencer. “It started with our tech team. We haven’t had researchers go over tons of entries. If there is interest in it, we then may do more, like adding more federal data and state-level data.”

One potentially interesting application of augmented advocacy might seem to be Congress, where data from the Sunlight Foundation’s Influence Explorer or Open Congress could be integrated as the Glass wearer walked around. The technical limitations of Glass, however, mean that citizens will need to keep downloading Sunlight’s popular Congress app for smartphones.

“The problem is the precision of the GPS,” said Spencer. “If you’re wearing Glass in the Hart building, you don’t have enough accuracy. You can get building-to-building precision, but not more. There are technical problems with trying to use satellites for this, whether it’s GPS or GLONASS, the Russian version.”

That doesn’t mean such precision might not be possible in the future. As Spencer highlighted, app developers can determine “micropositioning” through wifi or Bluetooth, enabling triangulation within a room. “A classic example comes from marketing in a store –” I see you’re looking at X,” he said.

That technology is already live, as Brian Fung reported in the Washington Post: stores are using cellphones to track shopping habits. In Washington, a more palatable  example might be around the Mall, where geofences and tracking trigger information about Smithsonian paintings, trees, statuary, or monuments.
IRS
The limitation on facial recognition capabilities in Glass also means that the most interesting and disturbing potential application of its gaze is still far away: looking at someone in a lobby, bar, hearing or conference and learning not only who the person is but what role he or she may play in DC’s complicated ecosystem of lobbyists, journalists, Congressional staffers, politicians, media, officials, public advocates and campaign operatives. (For now, the role of the trusted aide, whispering brief identifiers into the ears of the powerful is safe.)

When more apps like this go live in more devices, expect some fireworks to ensure around the United States and the world, as more private and semi-public spaces become recorded. Glass and its descendents will provide evidence of misbehavior by law enforcement, just as cellphones have in recent years. The cameras will be on the faces of officers, as well. While some studies suggest that police wearing cameras may improve the quality of their policing — and civil liberties advocates support their introduction — such devices aren’t popular with the New York City Police Department.

As with the dashboard cameras that supply much of the footage for “Cops” in the United States and offer some protection against corrupt police and fraud in Russia, wearable cameras look likely to end up on the helmets, glasses, lapels or shoulders of many officers in the future, from Los Angeles to London.

The aspirational view of this demo is that it will show how it’s possible to integrate more public data into the life of a citizen without requiring her to pull out a phone.

“There’s a lot of potential for this app to get people to care about an issue and take action,” said Spencer. “It’s about getting people aware. The cool thing about this is its passive nature. You start it once and it tells you when you’re near something.”
Treasury
A more dystopian view is that people will see a huge budget number and call the switchboard of a given agency to angrily complain, as opposed to the constituent relations staff of their representatives in Congress.

Given the challenges that Congress already faces with the tidal wave of social media and email that has swelled up over the last decade, that would be unhelpful at best. If future digital advocates want to make the most of such tools, they’ll need to provide users with context for the data they’re being fed, from sources to more information about the issues themselves the progress of existing campaigns.

This initial foray is, after all, just a demo. More integration may be coming in the next generation of wearables.

Lawmakers release proposed draft to codify US CTO role, create U.S. Digital Government Office (DGO)

Posted on by

7

After months of discussion regarding how the government can avoid another healthcare.gov debacle, legislative proposals are starting to emerge in Washington. Last year, FITARA gathered steam before running into a legislative impasse. Today, a new draft bill introduced for discussion in the United House of Representatives proposes specific reforms that substantially parallel those made by the United Kingdom after a similar technology debacle in its National Health Service.

The draft bill is embedded below.

The subtext for the ‘Reforming Federal Procurement of Information Technology Act’ (RFP-IT), is the newfound awareness in Congress and the nation at large driven by the issues with Healthcare.gov that something is profoundly amiss in the way that the federal government buys, builds and maintains technology.

“Studies show that 94 percent of major government IT projects between 2003 and 2012 came in over budget, behind schedule, or failed completely, said Representative Anna G. Eshoo (D-CA), ranking member of the House Communications and Technology Subcommittee, and co-sponsor of RFP-IT, in a statement. “In an $80 billion sector of our federal government’s budget, this is an absolutely unacceptable waste of taxpayer dollars. Furthermore, thousands of pages of procurement regulations discourage small innovative businesses from even attempting to navigate the rules. Our draft bill puts proven best practices to work by instituting a White House office of IT procurement and gives all American innovators a fair shake at competing for valuable federal IT contracts by lowering the burden of entry.”

Specifically, RFP-IT would:

  • Make the position of the U.S. chief technology officer and Presidential Innovation Fellows program permanent
  • Create a U.S. Digital Government Office (DGO) that would not only govern the country’s mammoth federal information technology project portfolio more effectively but actively build and maintain aspects of it
  • Increase the size of a contract for IT services allowable under the Small Business Act from $100,000 to $500,000
  • Create a U.S. DGO fund supported by 5% of the fees collected by executive agencies for various types of contracts

“In the 21st century, effective governance is inextricably linked with how well government leverages technology to serve its citizens,” said Representative Gerry Connolly (D-VA), ranking member of the House Oversight and Government Reform Subcommittee, and co-sponsor of RFP-IT, in a statement. “Despite incremental improvements in federal IT management over the years, the bottom line is that large-scale federal IT program failures continue to waste taxpayers’ dollars, while jeopardizing our Nation’s ability to carry out fundamental constitutional responsibilities, from conducting a census to securing our borders. Our RFP-IT discussion draft recognizes that transforming how the federal government procures critical IT assets will likely require bolstering ongoing efforts to comprehensively strengthen general federal IT management practices with targeted enhancements that promote innovative and bold procurement strategies from the White House on down.”

The legislative proposal earned qualified praise from Clay Johnson, former Presidential Innovation Fellow and CEO of the Department for Better Technology, whose advocacy for reforming government IT procurement and fixing the issues behind Healthcare.gov seemed to be on every cable news channel and editorial page last fall and winter.

“This, I think, really works well alongside FITARA, which calls for increased agency CIO authority,” wrote Johnson. “What will hopefully end up happening if both bills pass, is that good talent can get inside of government, and agencies that perform well can operate independently, and agencies that don’t can be pulled back in and reformed, while still having operational continuity (meaning: while that reform is happening, IT projects can still be done well, and run by the DGO).”

In 2014, digital government supports open government. What’s unclear is whether this proposal from two Democratic lawmakers can gain a Republican co-sponsor in the GOP-controlled legislative body or if a federal IT reform-minded Senator like Mr. Carper or Mr. Booker will take it up in the Senate.

This is singular bill isn’t a panacea, however, Johnson emphasized, pointing to the need to fix SAM.gov, the error-prone website for contractors to register with the federal government, and reforms to registration for “set-aside” business.

“We’re not sure how Congress writes a ‘stop throwing errors when a user clicks submit on sam.gov’ law,” wrote Johnson. “That’s going to take hearings, and most likely, a digital government office to fix. And we think this is a bill that complements Issa’s FITARA. Since this bill is at the discussion draft stage, perhaps soon we’ll see some Republicans jump on board.

UPDATE:
 On July 30, RFP-IT was officially introduced. (Full text of the bill, via Rep. Eshoo’s office): “The Reforming Federal Procurement of Information Technology (RFP-IT) Act, introduced by Rep. Anna G. Eshoo (D-Calif.), Ranking Member of the Communications and Technology Subcommittee, Rep. Gerry Connolly (D-Va.), Ranking Member of the Oversight and Government Reform Subcommittee, Rep. Richard Hanna (R-N.Y.), Chairman of the Small Business Subcommittee on Contracting and Workforce, and Rep. Eric Swalwell (D-Calif.), Ranking Member of the Committee on Science, Space and Technology’s Energy Subcommittee, and Rep. Suzan DelBene (D-Wash.)”

Here’s the quick summary of revised RFP-IT Act:

1) It would officially establish a Digital Government Office within the White House Office of Management and Budget (OMB), with the U.S. CIO at its head as a Senate-confirmed presidential appointee, reporting to the head of the OMB, shifting from “electronic government” to “digital government.”
2) It would codify the Presidential Innovation Fellows program.
3) It would expand competition for federal IT contracting under a simplified process that would ease the regulatory and compliance burden upon smaller companies bidding, bumping the threshold for information tech projects up to $500,000.
4) Establish a digital service pilot program
5) Direct the General Services Administrator to conduct an in-depth analysis of IT Schedule 70.
6) Direct the Comptroller General of the United States to produce three reports to Congress within 2 years of the law passing, on 1) the effectiveness of the 18F program of the General Services Administration, 2) IT Schedule 70, and 3) “challenges and barriers to entry for small business technology firms.”

President Obama to host Google+ Hangout on January 31st

Posted on by

0

20140123-231418.jpg

The Google home page currently has a link to ask President Obama a question in a Google+ Hangout. That’s some mighty popular online real estate devoted to citizen engagement.

The first presidential hangout featured real questions from citizens. I hope this one is up to the same standard.

You can see publicly shared questions on the #AskObama2014 hashtag on YouTube or Google+.

More details on the “virtual road trip” with President Obama are available at the official Google blog.

We are, once again, living in the future.

obama-hangout

Privacy and Civil Liberties Report Finds NSA bulk phone records program illegal and ineffective

Posted on by

0

Earlier this afternoon, I emailed info@pclob.gov in search of the report that the New York Times  and Washington Post had obtained and reported upon this morning. 2 hours later, I received a response: www.pclob.gov. There, visitors can now find, download and read a “Report on the Telephone Records Program Conducted under Section 215 of the USA PATRIOT Act and on the Operations of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court” and separate statements by Elisebeth Collins Cook  Rachel Brand. As Charlie Savage and Ellen Nakashima reported, Cook and Brand dissented from the report’s recommendation to end the collection of phone records under the 215 programs of the USA Patriot Act.

The privacy and civil liberties board’s report is strongly critical of the impact that mass surveillance has upon the privacy and civil liberties of American citizens, along with billions of other people around the world.

“The Section 215 bulk telephone records program lacks a viable legal foundation under Section 215, implicates constitutional concerns under the First and Fourth Amendments, raises serious threats to privacy and civil liberties as a policy matter, and has shown only limited value. As a result, the Board recommends that the government end the program.”

PCLOB Board Members meet with President Obama on June 21, 2013​. Photo by Pete Souza.

PCLOB Board Members meet with President Obama on June 21, 2013​. Photo by Pete Souza.

While President Obama met with the board and heard their recommendations prior to his speech last week, his administration is disputing its legal analysis.

“We disagree with the board’s analysis on the legality,” said Caitlin Hayden, spokeswoman for the White House National Security Council, in an e-mail to Bloomberg News. “The administration believes that the program is lawful.”

House Intelligence Committee Chairman Mike Rogers (R-MI) was also critical of the report’s findings. “I am disappointed that three members of the Board decided to step well beyond their policy and oversight role and conducted a legal review of a program that has been thoroughly reviewed,” he said in a statement.

The Electronic Frontier Foundation hailed the report as a vindication of its position on the consitutionality of the programs.

“The board’s other recommendations—increasing transparency and changing the FISA court in important ways—similarly reflect a nearly universal consensus that significant reform is needed,” wrote Mark Rumold, a staff attorney. “In the coming weeks, PCLOB is set to release a second report addressing the NSA’s collection under Section 702 of the FISA Amendments Act. We hope that the board will apply similar principles and recognize the threat of mass surveillance to the privacy rights of all people, not just American citizens.”

Senators introduce bill to rename U.S. GPO “Government Publishing Office”

Posted on by

0

As ever, laws and institutions lag the rapid pace of technological change. In 2014, for instance, mandating that the person designated to publish federal information must be a practical printer “versed in the art of bookbinding” is a statutory remnant of a bygone age.

Last week, Senator Amy Klobuchar [D-MN] introduced the Government Publishing Office Act of 2014, S.1947, which would rename the United States Government Printing Office the Government Publishing Office. (It would also strike the bookbinding requirement.)

The current Public Printer of the United States supported the proposal. “Publishing defines a broad range of services that includes print, digital, and future technological advancements,” said Public Printer Davita Vance-Cooks, in a statement. “The name Government Publishing Office better reflects the services that GPO currently provides and will provide in the future. I appreciate the efforts of Senators Klobuchar and Chambliss for introducing and supporting this bill. GPO will continue to meet the information needs of Congress, Federal agencies, and the public and
carry out our mission of Keeping America Informed.”

“The idea of renaming GPO was discussed in a December Committee on House Administration hearing entitled “Mission of the Government Printing Office in a post-print world”, which I wrote about here,” said Daniel Schuman, policy director at Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington (CREW), in a blog post on the GPO bill.

While many questions about the GPO’s digital future remain, there’s some hope that at least the name for institution might receive an update.

For more on the history of the Government Printing Office, watch citizen archivist Carl Malamud’s talk from 2009, embedded below:

We can only wonder how the last five years might have been different if President Obama had nominated him as the head of the U.S. GPO.

Opening IRS e-file data would add innovation and transparency to $1.6 trillion U.S. nonprofit sector

Posted on by

4

One of the most important open government data efforts in United States history came into being in 1993, when citizen archivist Carl Malamud used a small planning grant from the National Science Foundation to license data from the Securities and Exchange Commission, published the SEC data on the Internet and then operated it for two years. At the end of the grant, the SEC decided to make the EDGAR data available itself — albeit not without some significant prodding — and has continued to do so ever since. You can read the history behind putting periodic reports of public corporations online at Malamud’s website, public.resource.org.

Meals-on-Wheels-Reports

Two decades later, Malamud is working to make the law public, reform copyright, and free up government data again, buying, processing and publishing millions of public tax filings from nonprofits to the Internal Revenue Service. He has made the bulk data from these efforts available to the public and anyone else who wants to use it.

“This is exactly analogous to the SEC and the EDGAR database,” Malamud told me, in an phone interview last year. The trouble is that data has been deliberately dumbed down, he said. “If you make the data available, you will get innovation.”

Making millions of Form 990 returns free online is not a minor public service. Despite many nonprofits file their Form 990s electronically, the IRS does not publish the data. Rather, the government agency releases images of millions of returns formatted as .TIFF files onto multiple DVDs to people and companies willing and able to pay thousands of dollars for them. Services like Guidestar, for instance, acquire the data, convert it to PDFs and use it to provide information about nonprofits. (Registered users view the returns on their website.)

As Sam Roudman reported at TechPresident, Luke Rosiak, a senior watchdog reporter for the Washington Examiner, took the files Malamud published and made them more useful. Specifically, he used credits for processing that Amazon donated to participants in the 2013 National Day of Civic Hacking to make the .TIFF files text-searchable. Rosiak then set up CItizenAudit.org a new website that makes nonprofit transparency easy.

“This is useful information to track lobbying,” Malamud told me. “A state attorney general could just search for all nonprofits that received funds from a donor.”

Malamud estimates nearly 9% of jobs in the U.S. are in this sector. “This is an issue of capital allocation and market efficiency,” he said. “Who are the most efficient players? This is more than a CEO making too much money — it’s about ensuring that investments in nonprofits get a return.

Malamud’s open data is acting as a platform for innovation, much as legislation.gov.uk is the United Kingdom. The difference is that it’s the effort of a citizen that’s providing the open data, not the agency: Form 990 data is not on Data.gov.

Opening Form 990 data should be a no-brainer for an Obama administration that has taken historic steps to open government data. Liberating nonprofit sector data would provide useful transparency into a $1.6 trillion dollar sector for the U.S. economy.

After many letters to the White House and discussions with the IRS, however, Malamud filed suit against the IRS to release Form 990 data online this summer.

“I think inertia is behind the delay,” he told me, in our interview. “These are not the expense accounts of government employees. This is something much more fundamental about a $1.6 trillion dollar marketplace. It’s not about who gave money to a politician.”

When asked for comment, a spokesperson for the White House Office of Management and Budget said that the IRS “has been engaging on this topic with interested stakeholders” and that “the Administration’s Fiscal Year 2014 revenue proposals would let the IRS receive all Form 990 information electronically, allowing us to make all such data available in machine readable format.”

Today, Malamud sent a letter of complaint to Howard Shelanski, administrator of the Office of Information and Regulatory Affairs in the White House Office of Management and Budget, asking for a review of the pricing policies of the IRS after a significant increase year-over-year. Specifically, Malamud wrote that the IRS is violating the requirements of President Obama’s executive order on open data:

The current method of distribution is a clear violation of the President’s instructions to
move towards more open data formats, including the requirements of the May 9, 2013
Executive Order making “open and machine readable the new default for government
information.”

I believe the current pricing policies do not make any sense for a government
information dissemination service in this century, hence my request for your review.
There are also significant additional issues that the IRS refuses to address, including
substantial privacy problems with their database and a flat-our refusal to even
consider release of the Form 990 E-File data, a format that would greatly increase the
transparency and effectiveness of our non-profit marketplace and is required by law.

It’s not clear at all whether the continued pressure from Malamud, the obvious utility of CitizenAudit.org or the bipartisan budget deal that President Obama signed in December will push the IRS to freely release open government data about the nonprofit sector,

The furor last summer over the IRS investigating the status of conservative groups claimed tax-exempt status, however, could carry over into political pressure to reform. If political groups were tax-exempt and nonprofit e-file data were published about them, it would be possible for auditors, journalists and Congressional investigators to detect patterns. The IRS would need to be careful about scrubbing the data of personal information: last year, the IRS mistakenly exposed thousands of Social Security numbers when it posted 527 forms online — an issue that Malamud, as it turns out, discovered in an audit.

“This data is up there with EDGAR, in terms of its potential,” said Malamud. “There are lots of databases. Few are as vital to government at large. This is not just about jobs. It’s like not releasing patent data.”

If the IRS were to modernize its audit system, inspector generals could use automated predictive data analysis to find aberrations to flag for a human to examine, enabling government watchdogs and investigative journalists to potentially detect similar issues much earlier.

That level of data-driven transparency remains in the future. In the meantime, CitizenAudit.org is currently running on a server in Rosiak’s apartment.

Whether the IRS adopts it as the SEC did EDGAR remains to be seen.

[Image Credit: Meals on Wheels]

California court rules blogger has same First Amendment protections as traditional media

Posted on by

2

Here’s the summary of the decision, published earlier today:

The panel affirmed in part and reversed in part the district
court’s judgment awarding compensatory damages to a
bankruptcy trustee on a defamation claim against an Internet
blogger.

The panel held that Gertz v. Robert Welch, Inc., 418 U.S. 323, 350 (1974) (holding that the First Amendment required only a “negligence standard for private defamation actions”), is not limited to cases with institutional media defendants.
The panel further held that the blog post at issue addressed a matter of public concern, and the district court should have instructed the jury that it could not find the blogger liable for defamation unless it found that she acted negligently. The panel held that the bankruptcy trustee did not become a “public official” simply by virtue of court appointment, or by receiving compensation from the court. The panel remanded for a new trial on the blog post at issue, and affirmed the district court’s summary judgment on the other blog posts
that were deemed constitutionally protected opinions.

You can read the whole thing ruling (appropriately enough) or the backstory on the case of the Obsidian Finance Group and defendant Crystal Cox, whom Benjamin Souede and Eugene Volokh represented.

The ruling provides support for the view that the First Amendment applies more broadly to protect speech by all American citizens and acts of journalism, as opposed to solely protecting publications by institutional, credentialed media.

What’s next for net neutrality? Reclassification or a tiered Internet?

Posted on by

1

“I will take a back seat to no one in my commitment to network neutrality, because once providers start to privilege some applications or websites over others, then the smaller voices get squeezed out and we all lose. The Internet is perhaps the most open network in history, and we have to keep it that way.” — Senator Barack Obama, November 14, 2007

As of yet, there has been no direct comment from the president who supported net neutrality as a candidate in California, just over six years ago. 

Yesterday, The White House told The Hill that it is “‘still reviewing the court’s decision,” but won’t abandon the push to ensure that Internet providers treat all traffic the same,” including a statement from an unnamed government official:

“President Obama remains committed to an open internet, where consumers are free to choose the websites they want to visit and the online services they want to use, and where online innovators are allowed to compete on a level playing field based on the quality of their products.”

After yesterday’s ruling against the FCC, what happens next isn’t obvious, though there’s a growing chorus of commentary, predictions and advocacy.

Journalist John Hermann described a nightmare scenario and venture capitalist Fred Wilson mapped out a similarly dire future at his blog.

The man President Obama nominated to protect an Open Internet, Julius Genachowski, didn’t get the legal rulemaking around network neutrality right. Tim Wu and Jon Brodkin explain this effectively & succinctly. Nilay Patel is particularly unsparing in his analysis.

So, three things are clear:

1) If you’re reading this online — and by definition you are, given where I’m writing this — you should care about the issue. Here’s a quick FAQ from CNET on why.

2) The new FCC Chairman, Tom Wheeler, has a difficult decision ahead of him. 

He was ambiguous about his position on the issue in his blog post about network neutrality.

3) There’s going to be a ruckus about this issue in DC in 2014. 

Critics of the telecommunications industry and public interest advocates like Susan Crawford and Marvin Ammori are up in arms, advocating for the FCC to reclassify the Internet. Brian Fung mapped out a way for network neutrality to survivee. Hint: it involves more rulemaking and lawsuits.

Meanwhile, Congress is talking about whether 2014 is the year to rewrite the Telecommunications Act, the law written in 1934 and updated in 1996 that governs the space.

And so it goes.

IRS enables Americans to download their tax transcripts over the Internet

Posted on by

42

UPDATE: This service was taken offline after IRS security was compromised.

UPDATE: Learn how to download your tax transcript from IRS.gov.

button_online_transcript

Earlier today, at the White House Education Datapalooza, an official from the United States Department of the Treasury informed a packed theater and livestream that students, parents and citizens would finally be able to do something simple and profoundly useful over the Internet: download a transcript of their tax return from the Internal Revenue Service.

“I am very excited to announce that the IRS has just launched, this week, a transcript application which will give taxpayers the ability to view, print, and download tax transcripts,” said Katherine Sydor, a policy advisor in the Office of Consumer Policy of the Treasury, “making it easier for student borrowers to access tax records he or she might need to submit loan applications or grant applications.” [VIDEO]

Previously, filers could request a copy of the transcript (not the full return) but would have to wait 5-10 business days to receive it in the mail. For people who needed more rapid access for applications, the delay could be critical. A White House fact sheet subsequently confirmed the news, under the rubric of “streamlining application paperwork,” and a quick follow up with an official secured the correct URL for the new IRS Web application to get a tax transcript.

irs-transcript

I created an account, which involved jumping through the  hoops familiar from establishing online access bank accounts — choosing pass phrase, pass image and security questions — and then answered a number of questions that made it pretty clear that the IRS knew exactly who I was and where I had lived. (It’s not clear whether they hold this information or used a credit bureau, from the consumer-side.)

When I tried to actually download the transcript, though, I ran into some issues: first, a browser error in Chrome — “This XML file does not appear to have any style information associated with it. The document tree is shown below.” Using Firefox, however, I was able to at least get the page where I could choose from various years of transcripts.

irs-transcript-purposes

Unfortunately, clicking any of the links delivered a file that my Macbook was unable to parse. I was, however, able to log into IRS.gov and easily download last year’s tax return with one click to my iPhone. Success!

While the technical problems I ran into suggest that Apple computer users might run into some issues, I have a funny feeling that (the vast majority) of people who are running Internet Explorer on a Windows machine will fare better.

The fact that American citizens could not access their own tax returns online in 2014 might seem jarring but, until this week, that was the status quo. This advance represents the sort of somewhat mundane but important shift that the Obama administration’s approach to digital government have enabled over the past five years.

While the troubles behind the botched launch of Healthcare.gov have shaken the confidence of many citizens in the capacity of this administration to deliver effective digital services and months of headlines about digital surveillance by the National Security Agency have diminished trust in government overall, the ability of the “tech surge” to fix the site and the success of the technology team at the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau not only offers a guide for how to avoid similar issues but highlights a less salacious and boring reality that will generate no headlines nor heated rhetoric on cable news shows: most public officials and civil servants are quietly working to deliver better customer service for citizens.

Being able to download a tax transcript online is not, however, without risks. The Internal Revenue Service will need to continue to be vigilant about security. The new functionality will almost certainly inspire fraudsters to create mockups of the government website that look similar and then send phishing emails to consumers, urging them to “log in” to fake websites.

Perhaps most problematically, people will download tax transcripts to mobile devices and laptops and then not take steps to protect them with encryption. If you do download your transcripts or personal health information, make sure to also install full disk encryption on every machine you own. Leaving your files unprotected there is like leaving the door to your house unlocked with your tax returns and medical records on the kitchen table.

I have asked the IRS for comment on the new feature, browser and operating system and security guidance and will update this post if and when I receive any.

Update: comment from the IRS on follows.

How much time and technical resources did the IRS invest in deploying the feature? Has the IRS increased the capacity of the website for more demand?

From establishing the business case and receiving funding plus approval to start the work to implementation took approximately one year. Additional time was spent in ideation, innovation, and confirming requirements of the product prior to receiving approval.

I had trouble downloading my transcript on an Apple computer using Chrome and Firefox. (I was able to get it through my iPhone.) What browsers and operating systems does the new function officially support?

As a web application, Get Transcript is supported on most modern OS/browser combinations. While there may be intermittent issues due to certain end-user configurations, IRS has not implemented any restrictions against certain browsers or operating systems. We are continuing to work open issues as they are identified and validated.

A side note: For the best user experience, taxpayers may want to try up-to-date versions of internet explorer and a supported version of Microsoft windows; however, that is certainly not a requirement.)

Does the IRS have any guidance for ensuring that Americans connect securely to the website and then protect tax returns on their home computers once they have downloaded them?

The IRS has made good progress on oversight and enhanced security controls in the area of information technology. With state-of-the-art technology as the foundation for our portal (e.g. irs.gov), we continue to focus on protecting the PII of all taxpayers when communicating with the IRS.

However, security is a two-way street with both the IRS and users needing to take steps for a secure experience. On our end, our security is comparable to leaders in private industry.

Our IRS2GO app has successfully completed a security assessment and received approval to launch by our cybersecurity organization after being scanned for weaknesses and vulnerabilities.

Any personally identifiable information (PII) or sensitive information transmitted to the IRS through IRS2Go for refund status or tax record requests uses secure communication channels that meet or exceed federal requirements for encryption. No PII is passed back to the taxpayer through IRS2GO and no PII is stored on the smartphone by the application.

When using our popular Where’s My Refund? application, taxpayers may notice just a few of our security measures. The URL for Where’s My Refund? begins with https. Just like in private industry, the “s” is a key indicator that a web user should notice indicating you are in a “secure session.” Taxpayers may also notice our message that we recommend they close their browser when finished accessing your refund status.

As we become a more mobile society and able to link to the internet while we’re on the go, we remind taxpayers to take precautions to protect themselves from being victimized, including using secure networks, firewalls, virus protection and other safeguards.

We always recommend taxpayers check with the Federal Trade Commission for the latest on reporting incidents of identity theft. You can find more information on our website, including tips if you believe you have become the victim of identity theft.

Does the IRS have any plans to provide Americans with access or insight to estimated tax returns online in the future? Now that we have the ability to establish user accounts, would it ever be possible, for instance, for people with simple taxes (1040EZ, etc) to log in, review an estimated return, make any required edits, and then e-file it on IRS.gov?

IRS: The IRS is considering a number of new proposals that may become a part of the online services roadmap some time in the future. This may include a taxpayer account where up to date status could be securely reviewed by the account owner.

Note: This post has been updated throughout to make it clear that the IRS has provided online access to tax transcripts, not the entire return. You can read up on the difference between a tax transcript and tax return here.