Ministry of Defence
The United Kingdom's defence ministry. Ran the UFO desk in its successive forms — AI5(b), S4, DS8, Sec(AS), DI55 — until December 2009, then released the files.
No scorecard yet
Aletheca has not filed with this body, so there is nothing to measure. A zero here would read as “releases nothing” rather than “never asked”, which is why the row is absent instead of empty. Filing outside the United States is not yet supported, so for now this record is for reading and routing.
How it takes requests
- 01emailMOD Information Rights Teamverified
CIO-FOI@mod.gov.uk
- 02portalgov.uk FOI guidance and online routeverified
https://www.gov.uk/make-a-freedom-of-information-request
- 03mailPostal mailunconfirmed
MOD Information Rights Team, Ministry of Defence, Main Building, Whitehall, London SW1A 2HB
Routes marked verified were fetched and confirmed against the body’s own official pages; those marked unconfirmed are well documented but have not been checked here, and none has been proven by a delivered letter. Aletheca cannot yet originate a request outside the United States — this record exists so a request about these holdings can be routed to the right door.
What it holds
- UFO desk (Sec(AS)/DI55) policy and correspondence after the 2009 closure
- Air defence and radar incident reporting
- FOI releases published on gov.uk
Record classes this kind of body normally keeps. Useful for drafting a request a records officer can act on without guessing — a request describing records the agency does not hold is refused as no-records, which costs a filing fee and teaches nobody anything.
Filing tips
- The UFO desk closed on 1 December 2009 and its files went to The National Archives — historic sighting reports are a TNA request, not an MoD one.
- If s.26 (defence) is claimed, ask for the public-interest balance to be stated; it is a qualified exemption, not an absolute one.