On the contents

The daily reports of the Foreign Broadcast Information Service (FBIS) were the US government's source per se of globally freely accessible information for more than half a century. Founded in the year 1941 within the Office of the Coordinator of Information and subordinated to the CIA as of 1947, the main task of the FBIS was to monitor, record, transcript and finally translate from over 50 languages all broadcasts of foreign governments, official news services, as well as secret broadcasts from occupied territories worldwide on behalf of the political decision-takers and analysts.
The database of the provider Readex thus pools an abundance of information from over 100 countries of the world outside the USA on key issues of the 20th century, such as the Cold War, the Mideast conflict, racial relations, Apartheid, nuclear weapons, etc.

The database is subdivided in to three parts:

• FBIS Daily Reports 1941 – 1974
• FBIS Daily Reports 1974 – 1996
  • Part 1: Middle East, Africa, Near East and South Asia (MEA, NES)
  • Part 2: Sub-Saharan Africa & South Asia (SSA, SAF, AFR, SAS)
  • Part 3: China (CHI)
  • Part 4: Asia, Pacific and East Asia (APA, EAS)
  • Part 5: Latin America (LAT, LAM)
  • Part 6: Eastern Europe (EEU)
  • Part 7: Soviet Union and Central Eurasia (SOV)
  • Part 8: Western Europe (WEU)
• FBIS Daily Reports Annexes

The reports are available in the form of images, can be searched in full-text mode and can be downloaded in the PDF format. It is helpful to narrow down large quantities of hits by searching for continents or countries or regions, the type, such as text, extract, abstract, etc., the title of the report or the time. In addition, certain historical events, such as the "Berlin blockade", can be searched for.

Information on the product (proposal)  (PDF, 137 KB)
Information on the FBIS (information brochure)  (PDF 11.2 MB)

Test phase and feedback

The contents are an excellent source thematically also for interdisciplinary and trans-regional research.
If the database is frequented well during the test period and the feedback from research is positive, it is intended to negotiate a license with the support of the DFG, which will both enable access and possibilities of use within the scope of all specialised information services and, in addition, be available as a national license to all correspondingly authorised institutions.

We highly appreciate your feedback on the FBIS.
Depending on your focal point of interest, please contact

• for historical topics (unrelated to Eastern Europe):  fid-geschichte@bsb-muenchen.de
• for studies of Eastern Europe:  fidost-lizenzen@bsb-muenchen.de

Access to the database

• Access for registered users of the Bayerische Staatsbibliothek
  (within the scope of access for authorized national-license institutions)
   
• Access for further individual users and the FID community
  Register now  (in case you do not have an access code yet)