CharityWatch, known until 2012 as the American Institute of Philanthropy,[1] is a 501(c)(3) nonprofit organization in Chicago,[2] created in the United States by Daniel Borochoff in 1992,[3] to provide information about charities' financial efficiency, accountability, governance, and fundraising.
[6] CharityWatch rates nonprofits on an A+ (best) to F (worst) scale and provides data on charity executive salaries, governance, public transparency, donor privacy, asset reserves, and other information uncovered by its analysts during their evaluation.
[15] CharityWatch has also assigned high ratings to nonprofits with more complex accounting cases where the simplistic systems of other raters produced unfairly low scored for the same charity.
[16] CharityWatch also investigates ethical issues surrounding charity spending, including salaries and payouts, financial reporting, telemarketing and direct-mail solicitation campaigns, and governance.
CharityWatch founder Daniel Borochoff has testified before Congress about veterans charities,[17][18][19] the aftermath of Hurricanes Katrina and Rita,[20] and the philanthropic response to the 9/11 attacks.