White House Announces new Open Data Policy

Yesterday, President Obama visited Austin. Coincident with that visit, the White House issued an executive order creating a new open data policy for the Federal government.

The Federal government already had an open data policy in place. It encouraged all agencies to make their data availaable to the public, in readily consumable formats.

The significant change under this new policy is that now all newly generated government data will be open to the public by default.

An announcement from the White House said:

Under the terms of the Executive Order and a new Open Data Policy released today by the Office of Science and Technology Policy and the Office of Management and Budget, all newly generated government data will be required to be made available in open, machine-readable formats, greatly enhancing their accessibility and usefulness, while ensuring privacy and security.

More information here: Landmark Steps to Liberate Open Data