Terms of use
Last updated 2026-08-23.
These terms cover ainpi.dev, the JSON and CSV files under /api/v1/, the
search and lookup APIs, the MCP server, and any AINPI dataset published
through a data marketplace or a Delta Sharing recipient.
If you do not accept these terms, do not use the service.
What this is
AINPI is a public-interest research project that audits federal healthcare provider directory data. It measures published government files and reports what it finds, with the compute scripts open so anyone can reproduce or contradict the result.
It is a measurement of a dataset. It is not a provider directory, a credentialing service, a clearinghouse, or a source of truth about any individual practitioner or organization.
Verify before you act
Every AINPI signal is a data-quality flag derived from cross-checking public federal databases. A flag means the sources disagree. It does not mean a provider has done anything wrong.
This matters concretely. AINPI has published a documented false-positive rate in one of its own signals. The SAM.gov extract sometimes carries an NPI that does not belong to the named excluded party. In one worked example, three of four candidates turned out to be false positives, and only a check against the primary sources caught them. Every affected record ships with the verification URLs.
Never decide anything about a named provider on an AINPI record alone. That covers enrollment, payment, credentialing, employment, network and referral decisions. Check the primary sources first: the NPPES registry, the OIG exclusions list, and SAM.gov. If an AINPI record and a primary source disagree, the primary source is right, and we would like to hear about it.
No warranty
The service is provided as is, without warranty of any kind, express or implied, including fitness for a particular purpose. AINPI does not warrant that the data is accurate, current or complete. Upstream sources change without notice, and some of them have changed in ways that silently broke measurements; where that has happened it is recorded in the methodology.
To the maximum extent permitted by law, AINPI and FHIR IQ are not liable for any loss arising from use of the service or reliance on its output.
Acceptable use
You may read, query, download, redistribute and build on AINPI data under the terms on the data licence page. You may not:
- present AINPI output as an official government record, or as a determination about any individual;
- use it to harass, defame or make an adverse determination about a named provider without independent verification;
- attempt to re-identify any individual beyond what the public source files already disclose;
- circumvent rate limits, or issue automated traffic at a volume that degrades the service for others.
Rate limits apply to every metered route and are published on the
developer page. Static files under /api/v1/ are served from a
CDN and are not rate limited. Exceeding a limit returns HTTP 429; sustained
abuse may result in a block.
Personal data
The underlying federal files are public and contain business contact information about providers. AINPI publishes counts, locations and identifiers drawn from those files, and deliberately does not republish sensitive values it finds in them. When a scan detected Social Security numbers in the federal export, the finding reported the count, the field they sat in and the affected states, and did not publish the numbers themselves.
If you are a provider and believe a record about you is wrong, the fix belongs upstream at NPPES, because that is where the data comes from. Write to gene@fhiriq.com and we will tell you which source produced the record.
See the privacy policy for what the site collects about you, which is nothing unless you submit a form.
Paid tiers
Where an AINPI dataset or service is offered on paid terms, those terms are set out in the applicable order form or marketplace listing and take precedence over this page where the two conflict. Nothing here obliges AINPI to keep any free tier available indefinitely, though the release archive of federal public-use files is intended to stay free.
Changes
These terms may change. Material changes will be noted here with a new date at the top, and the full history is in the git repository.