2012 set a record for the number of Freedom of Information Request rejections since Barack Obama took office. During a presidency where the incumbent touted developments in government transparency, experts say this indicates little progress.


The US government either withheld or fully censored one third of applications under the Freedom of Information Act. The CIA and the Pentagon led the count of the organizations most likely to censor outgoing materials.

The amount of rejected Freedom of Information Act material censored by the government is often a test of transparency. The administration cited legal exceptions to restrict revealing materials more than 479,000 times, a roughly 22 percent increase over the previous year.