#foiasoftwaresolution

This is an excerpt from E-DISCOVERY AND FOIA: WHY FOIA AGENCIES NEED E-DISCOVERY SOFTWARE INTEGRATION?

WHAT IS FOIA?

Freedom of Information Act (FOIA), also known as Public Records and FOI, represents the civil right of access to records held by the Government.

The Act defines what agency records are subject to disclosure, outlines mandatory disclosure procedures, and defines the 9 exemptions to the statute:

1.     Information that is classified to protect national security.

2.     Information related solely to the internal personnel rules and practices of an agency.

3.     Information that is prohibited from disclosure by another federal law.

4.     Trade secrets or commercial or financial information that is confidential or privileged.

5.     Privileged communications within or between agencies.

6.     Information that, if disclosed, would invade another individual’s personal privacy.

7.     Information compiled for law enforcement purposes that:

o    Could reasonably be expected to interfere with enforcement proceedings,

o    Would deprive a person of a right to a fair trial or an impartial adjudication,

o    Could reasonably be expected to constitute an unwarranted invasion of personal privacy,

o    Could reasonably be expected to disclose the identity of a confidential source,

o    Would disclose techniques and procedures for law enforcement investigations or prosecutions. Or would disclose guidelines for law enforcement investigations or prosecutions if such disclosure could reasonably be expected to risk circumvention of the law,

o    Could reasonably be expected to endanger the life or physical safety of any individual.

8.     Information that concerns the supervision of financial institutions.

This is an excerpt from Armedia.com

Does your government agency have a difficult time keeping pace with responding to FOIA requests? That is likely due to having an old instead of a modern FOIA software solution. The FOIA Project made a study where they submitted an FOIA request to 21 different federal agencies to determine response rates. Two months after they submitted the requests, only seven government agencies responded adequately by providing records.

Federal agencies are as well inefficient when it comes to handling their records. It can be tough for federal agencies to find the particular records because they are flooded with electronic data. To make things even worse, they not only are continuously producing and collecting data, but also plenty of them must retain everything in continuity. So, there’s plenty to sort through when an FOIA request knocks on the door.

It stands to reason that government agencies need a modern FOIA software solutions to deal with the FOIA deluge. Here are a few differences between an old vs modern FOIA software solution and how it can help.

1.     PRE-COLLECTION ANALYTICS

Having a modern FOIA software solution for your government agency that provides pre-collection analytics is highly beneficial. They allow the agencies to estimate the breadth of an FOIA request immediately through keywords and other advanced searching, which in turn limits the amount of data that has to be extracted from the given repository to fulfill the request.

2.     PRE-REDACTION AND DOCUMENT REPOSITORY

This is an excerpt from Armedia.com

Today, agencies are actively looking for the right software management solution in order to increase the rate and quality for responding to public records requests. Back then, agencies used basic web forms, fillable PDF’s, and even faxed requests. As solutions, such as Armedia FOIA Software Management Solution, come to market it is essential to understand what features are a must-have. Check out the 15 key features that you should look for in a software management solution.

 FOIA SOFTWARE MANAGEMENT SOLUTION: PLATFORM

The technology that runs the application is critical. It is what determines if the tool will keep up with the modern developments and your environment and if it will become a part of your daily operations or a severe thorn in your side.

 1. CLOUD-BASED

Modern FOIA software solutions should be cloud-based because they better support the way users consume technology and simplify the access to information. Our Armedia cloud-based solutions are way more secure, easier to manage, and have more frequent enhancements than ordinary, local solutions.

 2. COMPLIANT

The solution you choose should be compliant in three ways:

·         Functionality to support local and national legislation

·         Security certifications such as SOC II Type II

·         Cloud infrastructure

Armedia is compliant in all these ways.

3. LOW MAINTENANCE AND EASY SETUP

This is an excerpt taken from Armedia.com

Are you looking for ways to solve the overworked staff problem in your department? Sure, each and every agency wants to increase the effectiveness of their staff and the maturity of their department. However, only a few companies understand the core of the problem. That’s where our Armedia modern FOIA software solution comes in, to help you understand and solve the problem.

Perhaps you’re thinking,

“I don’t need a new solution. I don’t need software. I just need more, better staff.”

No, your agency does not need more, better staff. It needs increased efficiency in their productivity. We will now explain in detail how can you achieve that through a modern FOIA software solution.

ARMEDIA AS A MODERN FOIA SOFTWARE SOLUTION

This is an excerpt taken from Armedia.com

The UC Berkeley School of Information Management and Systems addressed the growing need for more efficient Records Management in 2003, reporting:

“The world’s total yearly production of print, film, optical, and magnetic content would require roughly 1.5 billion gigabytes of storage. This is the equivalent of 250 megabytes per person for each man, woman, and child on earth… Over 96% of business information is in digital format, 1% is on paper and that 70% is never printed.”

In 2013,  15 years later, Seeking Alpha published a blog post in which they claim that since 2015, 90% of the world’s data has been generated:

“That year [2015], the digital universe, i.e., the reservoir of data created and copied, totaled less than 10 zettabytes – that would be 10, followed by 21 zeros. By 2020, it is expected to grow more than four times to 44 zettabytes. Just five years after that, it could reach 180 zettabytes”.

I don’t know about you, but I found this information startling.

And as the numbers show, year after year, effective records management becomes even more critical.

Government agencies are one of the largest contributors to the growth of records in the US.  In addition, most of the data that government agencies create are governed by at least one data-handling legislation. This kind of complexity brings agencies to a point of having to rely on records management software.

Furthermore, things get even more complex because some of the government records should be released in the public as per the Freedom of Information Act. Then the records management system should enable the FOIA agencies to quickly, easily and legally release certain documents that can be released, while being able to do a needed redaction of that document before it is released to the requestor.

So, if you are the one in charge of choosing a records management solution for your FOIA agency, DoD 5015 compliant software is a good starting point.

This is an excerpt taken from Armedia.com

We all know that price is not always the indicator of quality, and yet, we still tend to make rash judgments based solely on the price tag of a product. You have probably been in a situation like this: looking at the product name, and jumping to the bottom line, and skipping all the Features list. That’s how we end up buying cheap solutions that in the end, get us paying twice.

The world of FOIA Software Solutions is no different. Organizations, led by the acceptable asking price and crafty marketing tricks end up buying an FOIA Software Solution that will prove to be painfully expensive in the long run.

As someone who has been in the industry for almost two decades, the best software purchasing advice I can give is: Don’t look at the price tag before you spend considerable time looking at the quality of the solution. Let me expand on this a bit.

TO CHEAP OR NOT TO CHEAP: WHERE DOES QUALITY RESIDE?

It never ceases to amaze me just how many people buy so many things, and the reason for purchase is “because it’s cheap.” Buyer’s Remorse is probably the flip side of this reason.

Most people end up realizing that something cheap that doesn’t do the job is actually an expense. A wasted chunk of cash.

Expensive FOIA Software Solutions, or any other solution for that matter, don’t always deliver a service proportional to the paid amount of money.

This is an excerpt taken from Armedia.com 

Balancing the public’s right to information with the need for cybersecurity is a difficult job. But, modern technology and standardized workflows can make this a reliable process.

Our team at Armedia knows how important cyber-security is, and with our 15 years of experience in the industry, our team knows how to be a leader in the game.

Trying to help FOIA agencies to increase transparency, without crossing the thin line between transparency and security, we’ve partnered with ArkCase to build the ArkCase FOIA solution. In my humble opinion, this is perhaps the top-range modern FOIA Software Solution.

In collaboration with industry leaders like ArkCase, Alfresco, AWS, Ephesoft etc. we provide customized, robust FOIA Software Solution with the following features:

Customized processes/procedures/controls. This customization prevents those unintentional cyber-threats we talked about. This way each employee will know when and what to do in the process, reducing time, effort, human errors, and data leakage.

Federated and advanced search. This feature allows employees to easily search through the documents for a specific keyword and key phrase. This way, your employees can easily find needed information and respond to the FOIA requests much faster.

Security and access controls. Armedia has collaborated with Alfresco, the only open-source and DoD 5015 compliant data management platform. This means that with the ArkCase FOIA Software Solution, FOIA agencies don’t need to worry about data security. We have built-in security measures that will stop any prying eyes from ever seeing something that’s not supposed to go public.

One interface for communication. Unlike the old e-mail systems for communication that outdated solutions use, the ArkCase FOIA Software Solution uses one interface for communication with both colleagues/departments/organizations and requesters. This feature dramatically contributes to the prevention of cyber attacks and data leakage.

Centralized database. The centralized database of this FOIA Software Solution allows great storage and easy access to all data in one single place. Armedia uses AWS Cloud for secure data storage so every FOIA agency can be sure their data is safely stored and can be accessed whenever needed, only by authorized people.