Enforcement of Revised Information Disclosure Act to "Strengthen Public's Right to Know"... Information Disclosure Requests with Only 'Date of Birth'

[Asia Economy Reporter Lim Cheol-young] The Ministry of the Interior and Safety announced on the 22nd that the 'Enforcement Decree and Enforcement Rules of the Act on Disclosure of Information by Public Agencies,' aimed at securing transparency in national administration and strengthening the public's right to know, will be revised and enforced starting from the 23rd.

According to the revised Information Disclosure Act, detailed standards for information disclosure training conducted for all employees of public institutions will be established. Specific training content includes matters related to the request processing procedures and the use of the information disclosure system. Public institutions are required to conduct information disclosure training at least once a year.

Considering public convenience, forms related to information disclosure, such as information disclosure request forms, will be rationally improved. In line with the revised Information Disclosure Act's intent to write the date of birth instead of the resident registration number when requesting information disclosure, the resident registration number field in the information disclosure request and objection forms will be replaced with the date of birth. Additionally, when notifying whether information will be disclosed, if non-disclosure is due to decision-making processes or other reasons, the stage and expected end date must be provided.

Furthermore, the scope of pre-disclosure information related to bidding contracts will be expanded. For contracts conducted by the state, information on the evaluation criteria for selecting the successful bidder and the results of that evaluation must be specified as subjects for pre-disclosure. For contracts conducted by local governments, all contracts, including general bidding beyond the existing private contracts, will be expanded as subjects for pre-disclosure, and, similar to national contracts, the evaluation criteria and results related to the selection of the successful bidder must be disclosed. The costs borne by the requester within the scope of actual expenses for information disclosure will also be significantly reduced.

Among the revised contents, the expansion of pre-disclosure bidding contract information and the reduction of information disclosure fees will be implemented after December 23, as follow-up measures require time. The Ministry of the Interior and Safety plans to actively support the revitalization of information disclosure by publishing an information disclosure operation guidebook this year to enable public institutions to operate the information disclosure system in accordance with the revised legal standards.

Han Chang-seop, Director of the Government Innovation Organization Office, said, “We expect that the revision of the Enforcement Decree and Enforcement Rules of the Information Disclosure Act will strengthen transparency in national administration and the public's right to know,” adding, “We will continue to support the operation of the information disclosure system in public institutions to realize an open innovative government that communicates with the people.”

This content was produced with the assistance of AI translation services.