Anonymous intake and portal access

Last updated: August 27, 2026

Three settings decide how the public reaches your request form and what a requester can see afterwards. They are small toggles with large consequences for your workload and your statutory exposure.

How to set them

  1. Go to Settings, then Channels, then Citizen Portal.
  2. Scroll to Login & access.
  3. Set Allow anonymous filing (no account required).
  4. Set Show the public request-status tracker.
  5. Set Show the released-records archive to signed-in requesters.

The screen saves as you go, and Preview landing page opens the live portal in a new tab so you can check the result.

Anonymous filing

With anonymous filing on, someone can file without creating an account. They give an email address and receive a reference number and a tracking link.

Most public records statutes do not permit an agency to require identification as a condition of filing, and none permit asking why the records are wanted. Turning this off is a decision to check with counsel rather than an operational preference.

The practical consequence: anonymous requests appear in your queue with the origin Citizen Portal (Anonymous). They are ordinary requests and carry ordinary deadlines.

The status tracker

With the tracker on, a requester can check where their request has got to without contacting you.

This is the cheapest reduction in inbound correspondence available. Every request that reaches a records office also generates chasing emails, and a tracker answers most of them before they are sent.

The released-records archive

This shows signed-in requesters what your agency has already released. It works alongside the Public records catalog setting further up the screen, which offers a browsable page of published releases to everyone.

Turning the catalog on offers the page. It does not publish anything: each release is opted into the catalog individually from Published Cases, so nothing becomes public because a toggle was flipped.

Abuse protection

The public request form carries a CAPTCHA and a hidden honeypot field, and both are always on. There are no settings for them on this screen.

If your agency needs to detect or throttle coordinated filing campaigns, that is not something the portal settings currently offer. Raise it with your Govflo contact rather than looking for a control.