the work behind Direct File is really interesting and I made a lot of it available online to read as well - https://docs.openfile.tax/en/latest/
As a side note, when the documentation page is viewed in a dark mode browser, I see black text on black background (https://docs.openfile.tax/en/latest/).
it bugged me for a long time why a person can't store facts about themselves and let some software figure out which of those facts are needed for filling out any form, which needs the usual personal facts.
then one can review the required facts and decide which ones are they willing to share.
in fact governments could even standardize the kind of info they are dealing with usually and when a citizen wants the government to do something, instead of filling out forms, they could provide their own, self-hosted fact db, run the govt's query and provide the results (after review)
Then, sometimes your case is picked for audit and then they check if what you declared is correct as per applicable laws or not.
See, here is a small mom and pop shop... who owns that? Is the premises on rent? How much ? Is the rent deed valid and proper? Maybe you are paying less rent than declaring? Are you actually employing people you say you are? Are you paying them exactly you say you are paying?
How would you ensure that fact db is not having funny data ?
Say i am saying i am paying 100 bucks a week for fuel but fact is, my shop is next door to my home and i am just pocketing this cash daily. If i keep putting this 100 bucks weekly expense in this factdb, how will govt know.that i am not lying?
As for fraud, the same way they check for lies now, cross reference reports and then audit.
There's nothing in the comment you're responding to that suggests that it's instead meant to be a solution to the problem of the government (or any other org) being unable to trust the inputs to its systems or ameliorate the costs of bad actors at all.
A person entering lies in their personal fact database tomorrow can submit the same lies on their personal income tax return today.
It really is embarrassing how ineffective and useless the US gov has become.
https://chrisgiven.com/2025/06/saying-goodbye/
https://chrisgiven.com/2025/05/direct-file-on-github/
https://github.com/IRS-Public/direct-file
(In the latest version of the bill being negotiated in Congress, the language to sunset Direct File has been removed, but this of course could change due to the fluidity of the situation; regardless, we are all better off having learned from this and having access to the source code)
99.999% of people here would never be able to use it anyway.
As soon as practicable, and not later than 30 days after the date of the enactment of this Act, the Secretary of the Treasury shall ensure that the Internal Revenue Service Direct File program has been terminated.
(This is the text of the bill on the website as of the time I posted this, it can change or be wrong now.
https://www.congress.gov/bill/119th-congress/house-bill/1/te...)
