You might have seen the stories in the news about missing, altered, or blocked federal information. Perhaps you have heard from your professional organizations? Perhaps you’ve gone to a bookmarked governmental website to find that you no longer have access to data that you had previously? Librarians, archivists, and data professionals have been collaborating on efforts to capture and retain as much of that data as possible.

The Data Rescue Project is a coordinated effort among a group of data organizations, the International Association for Social Science Information Service and Technology (IASSIST), Research Data Access and Preservation Association (RDAP), and members of the Data Curation Network. Their goal is to serve as a clearinghouse for data rescue-related efforts and data access points for public United States governmental data that are currently at risk. The project has developed The Data Rescue Tracker, which catalogs existing public data rescue efforts to help reduce duplication of rescue efforts.

Milner Library is here to help guide researchers to other reliable sources or provide assistance with your research needs. A valuable resource, recently launched by the Government Publishing Office, is DiscoverGov. It is a unified interface for trusted government information that enhances discoverability of federal information sources. DiscoverGov uses persistent uniform resource locators (PURLs) to provide stable URLs to online federal information. Archived versions, of both historical and recent information, may be available in DiscoverGov and through other sources. Please don’t hesitate to reach out for support.

If you have any questions, please contact Angela Bonnell, head of Government Information and Maps, or Chad Kahl, Data and Social Sciences librarian.