Since 1994 the Government Publishing Office or GPO (formerly the Government Printing Office) has been providing trustworthy government information online for free to anyone. The GPO is a government agency falling under the legislative branch of government and by law provides free access to government documents produced by all three branches of government. Until the onset of electronic access, the only way to accomplish this was through the Federal Depository Library Program whereby documents are sent to designated government libraries across the country. Now, in conjunction with the FDLP, government information is widely available online through the site GovInfo.gov.
Last year a record number of 1.15 billion retrievals were accessed through GovInfo. This is an
increase of 32% over 2022 and an increase of 215% over 2018! The most popular
source of information in 2023 was the Federal Register (the Federal Register is
a daily compilation of documents produced by the Executive branch including
changes to federal regulations, notices from federal agencies, executive orders
and other presidential documents).
The GPO’s electronic dissemination of information began in
1994 with the creation of GPOAccess. In
2009 the next generation system, the Federal Digital System (FDsys), was introduced. In 2016, the current site GovInfo was
launched. But the GPO is not only
assigned the duty of spreading government information; it is also given the responsibility
to preserve government documents for future posterity, including those
documents born digital. In 2019 GovInfo
was the first US digital depository, and the second in the world, to be certified
as having the “highest global standard of excellence possible” in providing access
and preservation to these important materials.
