Last week, the IRS published the majority of Direct File’s source code to GitHub, with one of the people who worked on Direct File noting that “establishing trust with taxpayers was core to our approach for designing and building Direct File.” IRS Direct File, commonly referred to as Direct File, is a tax-filing program offered by the IRS that allows US taxpayers to prepare and electronically file federal income tax returns at no cost. The majority of Direct File’s source code getting uploaded to GitHub is a step forward for free software, both because of Direct File’s scale and what it represents: that there is still a lot of power in collective action. It will protect the work of its developers regardless of whether Direct File will be offered for the 2025 tax season.
Did the government claim it was accurate to the law? I’m guessing just providing code doesn’t open the government to liability. That would fall on anyone who implemented it. I always assumed that’s why for-cost software has Ts&Cs that indemnify them unless you pay extra for the protection.
From the license:
Yeah, I’d say that would cover them pretty well. Also, happy cake day!