About OpenContract
Public money should leave a public trail.
What is OpenContract?
OpenContract is a public procurement transparency and verification platform. It makes it easier for citizens, journalists, auditors, and researchers to trace, understand, and independently verify public procurement records — from tender publication to contract completion.
The platform records procurement lifecycle events against a structured data model and anchors key events to an EVM blockchain. This creates a tamper-evident public record that can be independently verified without relying on the OpenContract platform itself.
What OpenContract is not
OpenContract is not a corruption detection tool. It does not make findings of wrongdoing. It does not claim that signals or data points indicate illegal activity.
Blockchain anchoring confirms that a record was registered and has not changed since registration. It does not verify that the contents of the record are truthful, accurate, or complete.
Integrity signals are generated by deterministic rules applied to procurement data. A signal for a "single bidder" does not mean a procurement was improper — it means the data pattern matches a condition that may warrant closer review.
Methodology
Data model
Procurement records follow the Open Contracting Data Standard (OCDS). Each procurement has a unique Open Contracting Identifier (OCID). The lifecycle covers planning, tendering, bid submission, evaluation, award, contract, implementation (payments, milestones), inspection, and completion.
Document registration
Documents are registered by computing a SHA-256 cryptographic hash of the file content. This hash — not the file itself — is stored in OpenContract and optionally anchored to a blockchain. Verification works by computing the same hash of any file and comparing it against registered hashes.
Blockchain anchoring
Key events (procurement published, award published, contract created, contract amended, payment recorded) are anchored to the Base Sepolia testnet by submitting a transaction containing the SHA-256 hash of the canonical event data. The transaction hash provides a publicly verifiable, time-stamped record of when the event was registered.
Known limitations
- This is a demonstration environment. All data is fictional unless explicitly stated.
- Blockchain anchoring is on an EVM testnet (Base Sepolia), not Ethereum mainnet. Testnet data may be reset.
- Document hashing does not verify that the document content is truthful.
- Integrity signals are based only on data available in the platform.
- OpenContract cannot verify that all relevant procurement processes have been registered.
- The AI procurement analyst answers using application data. It may make errors. Always verify claims against the underlying records.
Demo environment
All procurement records shown in this environment are fictional and created for demonstration purposes only. Any resemblance to real organizations, contractors, or procurement processes is unintended. The demonstration data is seeded to illustrate all features of the platform including document verification, timeline display, financial summaries, and integrity signals.