Preserving Data in Government Act of 2020
Latest action · Aug 6, 2020 Read twice and referred to the Committee on Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs.
Progress
Where this bill reached, and when. A stage with no date was not reached; one that failed a vote and later carried shows the date it carried.
- IntroducedAug 6, 2020
- Passed SenateNot reached
- Passed HouseNot reached
- To the PresidentNot reached
- Became lawNot reached
Summary
Preserving Data in Government Act of 2020
This bill requires federal agencies to preserve public access to existing open datasets and prevent the removal of existing datasets without public notice.
Specifically, the bill requires that any open government data asset that is made available to the public for at least 90 consecutive days (1) remain machine-readable, available in an open format, and part of the worldwide public domain or, if necessary, be published with an open license; and (2) not be altered in such a way as to decrease its machine-readable nature.
It shall not be a violation of such requirement to alter (1) the digital location or format of any open government data asset for routine asset maintenance or long-term archiving if such alteration does not decrease the open public accessibility or the machine-readable nature of the data, or (2) the contents of such data asset to update it or correct an error. Any substantial alteration of the data asset's contents shall be recorded in a log that is made available to the public.
An agency may remove such data asset from public availability under specified circumstances, such as if the agency determines that the data asset is too costly to maintain or does not provide sufficient value to the public.
This bill shall not apply to such data asset that is required to be removed from public availability or altered under another provision of law.
Cosponsors 1
Members who signed on, in the order they did. All signed on Aug 6, 2020.
| Seat | Cosponsor | Signed on | |
|---|---|---|---|
| R-CO | Cory Gardner | Original | Aug 6, 2020 |
Actions 2
Everything that happened, newest first.
- Aug 6, 2020Introduced in Senate
- Aug 6, 2020Read twice and referred to the Committee on Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs.
Subjects
Assigned by the Library of Congress. Policy area: Government Operations and Politics.
Text 1
Each version as it was printed, newest first.
- Aug 6, 2020Introduced in Senate
Everything here is as published by Congress: the summary is the Congressional Research Service's, the action wording is the clerks', and the subjects are the Library of Congress's. How far it got is read from the actions themselves, taking the most recent one of each kind, so a bill that failed a vote and later passed is shown as having passed. Records come from this bill on Congress.gov and govinfo.gov.