The Government Information Awareness (GIA) project was an initiative of the MIT Media Lab, designed "to provide American citizens with digital tools for participating in the democratic process.
[9] GIA was designed to tap into the Collective Intelligence of the American citizenry, allowing anyone to "submit information, judge credibility and make connections.
"[10] The database allowed anyone to contribute anonymously, but with a feature to contact the government member in question, to facilitate the opportunity for confirmation or denial.
[11] GIA allowed people to "explore data, track events, find patterns and build profiles related to specific government officials or political issues."
Information was readily available on topics from campaign finance and corporate ties, religious affiliation, and educational background, to real-time notifications when a given government official would be appearing on television.