IRS Makes Direct File Software Open Source After Trump Tried to Kill It

Direct File, the Internal Revenue Service’s long-promised free tax filing software, might be at risk of being killed off by the Trump administration, but the code that made the service possible will live on even if the program itself doesn’t. According to 404 Media, the IRS published most of the code for its Direct File on GitHub, making it open source and available for others to use, much to the chagrin of tax lobbyists everywhere. Before you mistake the move as an act of resistance by those within the agency who are trying to keep the project alive, Direct File getting open-sourced was always part of the plan. The code was published in compliance with the SHARE IT Act, which requires agencies to share custom source code (though, of course, the Trump administration is not always motivated by following the law, so this wasn’t a given). In a report published last year, the IRS explained its reasoning for making the code available publicly: “First, it would enable public scrutiny of th ... Read full article.