The federal government spends more than $3.5 trillion annually, but data on this spending lack transparency. Moreover, the data are often incomplete or have quality limitations. To address these data issues, several statutes were enacted over the last decade, including: The first, the Federal Funding Accountability and Transparency Act of 2006 (FFATA), required OMB to establish a website to provide information on grant and contract awards, and subawards.information is available at www.USASpending.gov. The second, the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009 (Recovery Act), which provided approximately $840 billion in funding, required that funding recipients’ reports on award and spending data be made available on a website.funding is available at www.Recovery.gov. Information on the spending and distribution of Hurricane Sandy funds are available on that site as well. Today, data related to Recovery Act The third, the Digital Accountability and Transparency Act of 2014 (DATA Act), expands FFATA so that taxpayers and policy makers can track federal spending more effectively. When fully implemented in 2018, the DATA Act will require federal agencies to disclose their direct expenditures and link federal contract, loan, and grant spending information to agency programs. That data are to be available on the web in machine-readable and open formats. The act also requires the establishment of government-wide financial data standards and simplified reporting requirements for entities receiving federal funds. Lastly, to improve the quality of data submitted to USAspending.gov, the act requires Inspectors General (IG) to assess the completeness, timeliness, quality, and accuracy of the spending data submitted by their respective agencies and the use of the data standards. To assist with that effort, the DATA Act also calls for the establishment of a pilot program, with participants to include, among others, a diverse group of recipients of federal awards. The purpose of the pilot program is to develop recommendations for 1) the standardization of reporting elements across the federal government, 2) the elimination of unnecessary duplication in financial reporting, and 3) the reductions of compliance costs for recipients of federal funds. Strong and consistent leadership will be needed to ensure the DATA Act is fully implemented. Our work underscores this point, as we have found that unclear guidance and weaknesses in oversight have contributed to persistent challenges with data on USASpending.gov. These challenges relate to the quality and completeness of data submitted by federal agencies. In 2010, we reported that USAspending.gov did not include information on awards from 15 programs at nine agencies for fiscal year 2008. Also in that report, we looked at a sample of 100 awards on the website and found that each award had at least one data error. To address this problem, we recommended that OMB include all required data on the site, ensure complete reporting, and clarify guidance for verifying agency-reported data. OMB generally agreed with our findings and recommendations, and subsequently issued additional guidance on agency responsibilities. Our most recent report on this subject reinforces these earlier findings. In June 2014, we reported that while agencies generally reported contract information as required, many assistance programs (e.g., grants or loans) were not reported. Specifically, we found agencies did not appropriately submit the required information on 342 assistance award programs totaling approximately $619 billion in fiscal year 2012, although many reported the information after we informed them of the omission. In addition, we found few awards on the website contained information that was fully consistent with agency records. We found that only between 2 percent and 7 percent of the awards contained information that was fully consistent with agencies’ records for all 21 data elements we examined. The element that identifies the name of the award recipient was the most consistent, while the elements that describe the award’s place of performance were generally the most inconsistent. To address these problems, we recommended the Director of OMB (1) clarify guidance on reporting award information and maintaining supporting records and (2) develop and implement oversight processes to ensure that award data are consistent with agency records. OMB generally agreed with our recommendations and we will continue to monitor OMB’s implementation. Across the federal government, initiatives are under way to implement key provisions of the DATA Act. Among these provisions is a requirement for OMB and Treasury to consult with public and private stakeholders in establishing data standards. In response, Treasury and OMB convened a data transparency town hall meeting in late September 2014 so the public could provide input to Treasury officials responsible for developing data standards. The event drew more than 200 participants from the public and private sector, including congressional staff and representatives from federal agencies, state and local governments, private industry, and transparency advocacy organizations. Agency officials provided information on efforts to standardize federal financial management data and members of the public shared their views on the importance of data standards and recommendations for successful implementation. In addition, on September 26, 2014, Treasury published notice in the Federal Register seeking public comment on the establishment of financial data standards by November 25, 2014. These actions are consistent with our recommendations based on lessons learned from the implementation of both USAspending.gov and Recovery.gov. These lessons stressed the importance of obtaining input from federal agencies, recipients, and subrecipients early in the development of new transparency systems to minimize reporting burden. The DATA Act also calls on Treasury to establish a data analysis center or to expand an existing service, to provide data, analytic tools, and data management techniques for preventing or reducing improper payments and improving the efficiency and transparency in federal spending. The act also directs Treasury to work with federal agencies, including IGs and federal law enforcement agencies, to provide data from the data analysis center to identify and reduce fraud waste and abuse and for use in the conduct of criminal investigations, among other purposes. In response to this requirement, Treasury established the Data Transparency Office which is working with the Recovery Board to transfer assets from the board’s Recovery Operations Center to Treasury.assumed program responsibility for USAspending.gov to display accurate government-wide spending data to the public, as called for in the act. Building on lessons learned from the implementation of the Recovery Act, the DATA Act’s provisions also ensure that implementation will be closely monitored. These provisions require IGs and us to assess the implementation of the act throughout the next 7 years (see figure 1 for a timeline of key DATA Act provisions). The DATA Act requires the Inspectors General to assess the completeness, timeliness, quality and accuracy of spending data submitted by their respective agencies and the use of the data standards. These reports are due 18 months after OMB and Treasury issue data standards guidance and then within 2 and 4 years after that. The Treasury IG is leading the IG community’s efforts to develop a comprehensive framework of audit procedures, in consultation with us, to ensure IGs meet their auditing and reporting responsibilities under the act. The Treasury IG is also reviewing Treasury’s standup of a Transparency Office and Treasury’s efforts to improve USASpending.gov, as well as Treasury’s plans to implement its responsibilities under the DATA Act. We are fully prepared to meet the DATA Act’s oversight and consultative roles for us as well. The act requires us to review IG reports on agency spending data quality and use of data standards in compliance with the act, and IGs are to consult with us to assess the completeness and accuracy of agency data. We are working with the Treasury IG and through the Council of Inspectors General for Integrity and Efficiency to develop common audit procedures and practices across the federal accountability community to avoid duplication. We are also working to ensure that the Treasury’s implementation efforts follow good consultative practices, and that views from both federal and nonfederal stakeholders are appropriately considered as data standards are developed. We also will evaluate the data standards to ensure that they are complete, clear, and at the right level of specificity. Toward that end, we plan to provide an interim report to the Congress in 2015 on the establishment of the standards. To effectively implement the DATA Act, the federal government will need to address multiple technical issues. The first of these issues involves developing and defining common data elements across multiple reporting areas. Among the lessons learned from the implementation of the Recovery Act’s transparency provisions was the value of standardized data for improving data quality and transparency, including uniform information for contracts and financial assistance awards. To address this issue for DATA Act implementation, the DOD and the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) are examining data elements used by the procurement and grants communities to identify financial data elements common to both communities that can be standardized.assessment focuses on 72 data elements that are linked to five data Their areas: (1) identification of award; (2) awardee/recipient information; (3) place of performance; (4) period of performance; and (5) identification of agencies. HHS and DOD were able to reach agreement on a basic set of data elements that could be standardized across the procurement and award communities. Some of the elements will require changes in policy, while in other cases agencies will have to change how they collect and report data. Plans to identify and coordinate recommended policy changes with OMB are under way. Another related issue is how to enhance data transparency while protecting individual privacy and national security. The DATA Act does not require the disclosure of any information that is exempt from disclosure under the Freedom of Information Act, including information that is specifically authorized to be kept secret in the interest of national defense or foreign policy. Additionally, the DATA Act does not require federal agencies to report direct payments to individuals. However, some federal agencies have raised concerns about how privacy and national security can be maintained if more data are made available. In January 2013, we co-hosted a forum on data analytics with the Recovery Board and The Council of Inspectors General for Integrity and Efficiency.