Project 4β Spotlight: Zach Everson on Public Data and Investigative Reporting

Narmin Mammadova

Last updated on

2026-09-01

3 min read

AI Summary:

Through Project 4β, investigative reporter Zach Everson uses Oxylabs' residential proxies to monitor hundreds of public disclosure sites in the background, allowing him to track financial filings and political accountability data at a scale that would be impossible manually.

Overview

Some of the most important facts about public life are already out there - if you know where to look and have the patience to pull them together. The difficulty is that these records sit across dozens of disclosure systems that were never designed to be read side by side, which makes them hard to capture, compare, and act on at any meaningful scale.

Zach Everson has spent years working with exactly this kind of material, following the money to understand how political influence turns into private gain. Here, he explains why he follows the money, what makes public data hard to handle at scale, and how residential proxy access through Project 4β lets him monitor hundreds of sources in the background instead of checking a handful by hand.

About Zach Everson

Zach Everson spent about a decade as a food and travel writer before switching beats shortly after the 2016 U.S presidential election. A self-described political junkie, he saw the country entering a new and potentially dangerous era - and moved into political and financial accountability reporting. He went on to cover money in politics as a staff writer at Forbes, where his focus settled on the point where public office turns into private profit.

What keeps him on the beat is a simple belief that following the money is the clearest way to cut through the noise and see what's really going on. He has since moved from reporting to watchdog work, so he now sits on both sides of the process: first surfacing facts as a journalist, then building on the public record reporters create.

Why the money trail

Public data sits at the very center of that work. Everson got started using OSINT tools to track who was patronizing Trump’s hotels and clubs, then expanded into campaign finance data, business filings, lawmakers’ financial disclosures, trademark applications, restaurant health inspections, and nonprofit tax returns.

Following the money - where it comes from, where it goes, who it buys - is how you cut through the rhetoric to what's actually happening.

Zach Everson, Investigative reporter and government accountability researcher

The case for that access, in his view, has only sharpened: politicians’ willingness to lie outright is worse than at any point in his lifetime, and public web data is what lets reporters and watchdogs check them against the record. His own focus - how Trump’s family has profited from the presidency - depends on public filings that reveal finances the Trump Organization itself would never disclose.

The hard part is rarely finding the useful information, as there is an enormous amount of it. The difficulty is capturing, scrubbing, and analyzing it efficiently when every disclosure system is built differently - a Senate lobbying filing, a country property record.

Infrastructure matters

Through Project 4β, Everson used Oxylabs' residential proxies to help him monitor hundreds of websites for new filings and updates - work that would be impossible to sustain manually.

Without residential proxies, I'd be limited to checking a handful of sites by hand; with them, I can monitor hundreds in the background while I work on other stories.

Zach Everson, Investigative reporter and government accountability researcher

This kind of support matters, especially now. The media industry is under serious financial strain, and although powerful new tools are being developed that could help reporters do their jobs better than ever, many of them carry price tags that make them out of reach for the journalists who need them most. Initiatives like Project 4β exist precisely to close that gap.

What is next

Looking ahead, the biggest opportunity Everson sees lies in the space between the journalism itself and the advocacy that grows out of it. Reporters surface facts and place them on the public record, civil society organizations build on that record to push for change, and technology partners make both possible. When any of those three is weakened, abuse of power becomes far easier to get away with.

Join Project 4β

Investigative reporting like Zach Everson’s depends on the reachability of public data, and on the tools to capture it before it changes or disappears. At Project 4β, that is exactly the gap we work to close: giving reporters and researchers the infrastructure that allows them to monitor public information at the scale their work demands.

We are proud to support investigative journalists and civil society organizations, including partners such as Bellingcat, Global Witness, The Pulitzer Center, Doublethink Lab, and Debunk.org. If your reporting, research, or mission depends on publicly available web data, we would like to support you. Tell us about your data needs through our form or via 4beta@oxylabs.io.

Forget about complex web scraping processes

Choose Oxylabs' advanced web intelligence collection solutions to gather real-time public data hassle-free.

About the author

Narmin Mammadova

PR Content Manager

Narmin is the PR Content Manager for Project 4β at Oxylabs. She enjoys the challenge of getting people to care, and pro bono work gives her good stories to tell. In her spare time, she travels whenever possible or indulges her love of poetry and reciting.

Learn more about the author Narmin Mammadova Learn more about the author Narmin Mammadova

All information on Oxylabs Blog is provided on an "as is" basis and for informational purposes only. We make no representation and disclaim all liability with respect to your use of any information contained on Oxylabs Blog or any third-party websites that may be linked therein. Before engaging in scraping activities of any kind you should consult your legal advisors and carefully read the particular website's terms of service or receive a scraping license.