Who We Are and What We Do

Do UFOs fascinate you? Are you a history buff who wants to learn more about the Bay of Pigs, Vietnam or the A-12 Oxcart? Have stories about spies always fascinated you? You can find information about all of these topics and more in the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) Electronic Reading Room.

What is the Electronic Reading Room?

The FOIA Electronic Reading Room is provided as a public service by the CIA and its Office of Information Management. Here you can view previously released documents, released through the FOIA and other disclosure statutes. If you would like to view our previously released documents and collections, visit our Frequently Requested Records, our Special Collections, and our 25 Year Program Archive. You can search all the documents by using the search bar at the top of the page, or you can browse collections of documents on historically significant topics compiled by our office. Please note that not all documents reside in collections, so you may wish to perform a search as well as browse the collection you are interested in. Because of CIA's need to comply with U.S. national security laws, some documents - or parts of documents - cannot be released to the public. Specifically, the CIA has the responsibility to protect intelligence sources and methods from disclosure.

Additional Information

We also provide basic guidance to assist you in exercising your rights to request and view government records through the following disclosure statutes:

• The Freedom of Information Act (FOIA)
• The Privacy Act (PA), and
• Executive Order 13526 (EO).
• If you would like additional information about FOIA, best practices for filing a request or need mediation services, visit the OGIS website - Office of Government Information Services

This guidance is not intended to be a comprehensive treatment of the complex issues associated with these laws, but rather an overview of how they are carried out at CIA.
Learn more if you are interested in submitting a FOIA request or Privacy Act request.

What's New at FOIA?

Site last updated: August 8, 2012

An Underwater Ice Station Zebra: Recovering a Secret Spy Satellite Capsule from 16,400 feet Below the Pacific Ocean

(August 8, 2012)

The Trieste II Deep Sea Vehicle I (DSV-1), the U.S. Navy's most advanced deep sea submersible at the time, surfaced about 350 miles north of the Hawaiian Islands in the pre-dawn hours of 26 April 1972 after having salvaged a mysterious item from 16,400 feet below the Pacific Ocean. Publicly known as a nondescript "data package" from the Scripps Institute of Oceanography, the object was actually part of a film capsule from an American photoreconnaissance satellite, codenamed HEXAGON. Before today's digital technology, photoreconnaissance satellites used film, which capsules ejected from the satellite returned to Earth. The capsules, called "buckets," reentered the Earth's atmosphere and deployed a parachute as they descended toward the primary reentry zone near the Hawaiian Islands. In the case of the first HEXAGON mission in the summer of 1971, the parachute broke off causing the bucket to crash into the ocean, sinking on impact. This release of CIA material includes photos of the capsule on the ocean floor, pictures of the Trieste II (DSV-1), documents, and an article explaining how the CIA and U.S. Navy undertook the deepest undersea salvage then attempted. We have also provided a link to the U.S. Naval Undersea Museum, where the Trieste II (DSV-1) is on permanent display.

FY 2011 CIA FOIA Annual Reports

(Updated February 24, 2012)
The CIA FOIA Annual Report is now available in PDF, and in machine-readable XML formats.

Top Searches!

(December 14, 2011)
The Frequently Requested Records section now shows September thru November 2011 Top 25 Search Phrases and Top 25 Documents viewed.

What was the Missile Gap?

(November 28, 2011)
The Missile Gap was in essence a growing perception in the West, especially in the USA, that the Soviet Union was quickly developing an intercontinental range ballistic missile (ICBM) capability earlier, in greater numbers, and with far more capability than that of the United States. Even as that perception was disproved, it became evident that the Soviets were placing their major effort toward developing strategic missiles against which, once launched, there was no defense. The perceived missile gap that ensued was based on a comparison between US ICBM strength as then programmed, and reasonable, although erroneous estimates of prospective Soviet ICBM strength that were generally accepted.

Both the Eisenhower and Kennedy administrations struggled to formulate policy in response to what was then believed to be an ever-growing advantage in Soviet strategic missiles. Breakthroughs in technology and innovative use of aerial and satellite photography eventually provided the CIA with a more accurate assessment of Soviet missile capacity, allowing policy makers to shift gears.

To convey the intelligence controversy, CIA's Historical Collections Division has released a large selection of documents (189) declassified for the first time, coupled with other documents which were formerly declassified, but released here again with significant previously withheld text now restored based on new, broader declassification guidelines.

Historical Collection on Ronald Reagan, Intelligence, and the End of the Cold War

(November 3, 2011)

In the 1980s, the Cold War was going strong and was made worse by events such as the death of three Soviet leaders in a span of three years, the Soviet shootdown of a Korean airliner, and the USSR's support for Communist governments and movements in Afghanistan and Central America. This collection of declassified documents and other material highlights what the CIA provided President Reagan and other top members of his national security team on key issues affecting US-Soviet relations. The collection--made up of intelligence assessments, National Intelligence Estimates, high-level memos, and DCI talking points--consists of over 200 documents, some 60 of which are either being made available to the public for the first time or are being re-released with new material. To help put this material in perspective, we are also including non-CIA documents from the archives of the Reagan Library to fill out the collection on the policy end.

The Berlin Wall Collection

(October 26, 2011)

Erected literally overnight, the building of the Berlin Wall was the culmination of over a decade of escalating confrontations and contentious blockades contrived to encourage the west to abandon Berlin to the Communist Bloc. The Berlin Wall Collection contains the documents, essays and overviews from the eleven U.S. Government organizations that provide the background and the political ramifications of the Wall's construction.

The Best of CREST (BOC)

(October 7, 2011)

The CIA Declassification Center (CDC) is pleased to announce the addition of the Best of CREST to the existing CREST Finding Aid. In addition to CREST document metadata, CDC will include the images of specific collections of CREST documents for searching and viewing. The first installment includes over 250,000 pages of the following collections:

Office of the DCI Collection (ODCI): This collection consists of 28,550 documents/129,000 pages and contains the records of the first five Directors of Central Intelligence: Admiral Roscoe Hillenkoetter, General Walter "Bedell" Smith, Allen Dulles, John McCone, and Richard Helms. These records run from the beginning of CIA in 1947 through the late 1960s and include a wide variety of memos, letters, minutes of meetings, chronologies and related files from the Office of the DCI (ODCI) that document the high level workings of the CIA during its early years.

Directorate of Intelligence (DI) Central Intelligence Bulletins: This collection consists of 8,800 documents/123,000 pages and contains a collection of daily Central Intelligence Bulletins (CIB), National Intelligence Bulletins (NIB) and National Intelligence Dailies (NID) running from 1951 through 1979. The CIBs/NIBs were published six days a week (Monday through Saturday) and were all source compilations of articles and consisting initially of short Daily Briefs and longer Significant Intelligence Reports and Estimates on key events and tops of the day. The CIBs/ NIBs were circulated to high level policy-makers in the US Government.

Bay of Pigs Release

(Updated August 2, 2011)

The CIA history of the Bay of Pigs operation in 1961, originally classified top secret, based on dozens of interviews with key operatives and officials and hundreds of CIA documents. The four volumes include information never before released and comprise (I) Air Operations, March 1960-1961; (II) Participation in the Conduct of Foreign Policy; (III) Evolution of CIA's Anti-Castro Policies, 1959-January 1961; and (IV) The Taylor Committee Investigation of the Bay of Pigs.

Volume I - Air Operations, March 1960-April 1961

• Part 1
• Part 2
• Part 3

Volume II - Participation in the Conduct of Foreign Policy 92

• Part 1
• Part 2

Volume III - Evolution of CIA's Anti-Castro Policies, 1951-January 1961

Volume IV - The Taylor Committee Investigation of the Bay of Pigs

CIA Declassifies Oldest Documents in U.S. Government Collection

(April 19, 2011)

The Central Intelligence Agency today declassified the United States Government's six oldest classified documents, dating from 1917 and 1918. These documents, which describe secret writing techniques and are housed at the National Archives, are believed to be the only remaining classified documents from the World War I era. Documents describing secret writing fall under the CIA's purview to declassify.

"These documents remained classified for nearly a century until recent advancements in technology made it possible to release them," CIA Director Leon E. Panetta said. "When historical information is no longer sensitive, we take seriously our responsibility to share it with the American people."

One document outlines the chemicals and techniques necessary for developing certain types of secret writing ink and a method for opening sealed letters without detection. Another memorandum dated June 14, 1918 - written in French - reveals the formula used for German secret ink.

"The CIA recognizes the importance of opening these historical documents to the public," said Joseph Lambert, the Agency's Director of Information Management Services. "In fiscal year 2010 alone, the Agency declassified and released over 1.1 million pages of documents."

The documents will be available on CIA.gov and in the CIA Records Search Tool (CREST) at the National Archives in College Park, Maryland. CREST currently houses over 10 million pages of declassified Agency documents. Since 1995, the Agency has released over 30 million pages as a result of Executive Orders, the Freedom of Information Act (FOIA), the Privacy Act, and mandatory declassification reviews.

Wartime Statutes - Instruments of Soviet Control

(March 23, 2011)

The collection, consisting of 22 documents, provides insight into how the Soviet Union codified its control over the armed forces of its Eastern European allies. The release of this collection coincides with a panel discussion at the Wilson Center.

The event will take place Tuesday, April 5, 2011 at 1:00p.m. - 4:30 p.m.

Please visit the Wilson Center website to RSVP. The event is free.