The U.S. Department of Justice (DOJ) announced, effective this week, all foreign agents filing with the DOJ under the Foreign Agents Registration Act (FARA) must submit their initial registration statements using its new online eFile system.

In the DOJ’s announcement, the agency said the “upgraded filing system allows registrants to submit data through a self-guided, web-based questionnaire, rather than uploading PDFs.”

While the current system will only allow for initial registrations, all other FARA filings will continue to use the existing eFiling system until further notice.

FARA is a disclosure statute requiring persons acting as agents of foreign principals in a political or quasi-political capacity to make public disclosure of their relationship with and activities for the foreign principal.