Honesty by construction.
OpenTAC is built so the data is citable in an investigation or a paper. Confidence is a first-class field, every claim carries its source, and nothing is invented to fill a gap.
Every claim carries its source
Operator, unit, base and role each link to a primary source. Confidence is recorded as verified, reported or going-dark — never implied. You can click through to the evidence behind any identity.
Unknowns are left blank
Where OpenTAC doesn't know, it says so. A field with no sourced value stays empty rather than being guessed or interpolated — the absence is information, too.
The gap is the story
Position history is archived without sampling. When a contact goes dark, the gap is shown as a gap and flagged by the dark-span detector — never papered over with a fabricated position.
Predictions are labelled
Satellite positions are propagated from public orbital elements and are always marked as predictions, with the element epoch and age on screen so staleness is visible. They are never tasking, signals, or payload data.
Assets, not individuals.
OpenTAC tracks state and public-service assets. The watchlist scope rules forbid private individuals and minors and are enforced in CI; scope-sensitive categories route to a designated reviewer. A Code of Conduct is shown on first run — the tool is built for accountability and journalism, not targeting.
Trust comes from being checkable.
The application is MIT-licensed and the watchlist is CC-BY-SA — audit every line.