County report card · New York
Lewis County, New York
County portal uses Cloudflare bot detection which deters automated access but may be bypassed by determined actors
- Population
- 26,570
- Portal
- Assessor & Recorder
- Portal vendor
- Schneider Geospatial
What the audit checked
Four low-cost protections every online records portal can have. How we rate counties.
- robots.txtYes — permissive
- Terms of useNot checked
- Bot challengeCloudflare bot detection
- Owner notificationUnknown
Portal audited: lewispublic.sdgnys.com/index.aspx, www.searchiqs.com/NYLEW/Login.aspx, www.taxlookup.net/search.aspx?jurisdiction=sandycreekcsd&year=2013, lewiscountyny.giscloud.com/
Doing well
- Technical barriers (cloudflare) that deter casual bulk access
Room to grow
- Expanding the robots.txt file to disallow automated scrapers
What to ask for
Three low-cost steps that have worked in other counties to close gaps like this one:
1. Adding clear robots.txt rules that disallow automated scrapers
2. Updating the Terms of Use to prohibit automated access
3. Implementing a notification system that alerts residents when their records are accessed
The full playbook is What Counties Can Do.