Glossary – Countdown to Disclosure

Core terminology

UAP: Unidentified anomalous phenomena. A current umbrella term for observations or detections that are not immediately identified. The definition can vary by institution and may include airborne, spaceborne, seaborne, or transmedium detections.
UFO: Unidentified flying object. A historical and popular term describing an observed object that has not been identified. It describes a state of knowledge, not an origin.
Unresolved: A case for which the available public data does not support a confident identification. Unresolved does not mean inexplicable or extraterrestrial.
Resolved: A case assigned an explanation with a stated level of confidence, such as balloon, aircraft, satellite, sensor artifact, or atmospheric effect.
Anomalous: Departing from what an observer or system expected. Apparent anomalous behavior can result from missing context, geometry, calibration, perception, or a genuinely unusual event.

AARO: The All-domain Anomaly Resolution Office, the U.S. defense organization assigned to receive, analyze, and resolve UAP reports and examine the historical record.
ODNI: The Office of the Director of National Intelligence, which coordinates the U.S. Intelligence Community and has participated in statutory UAP reporting.
Project Blue Book: The U.S. Air Force program that investigated UFO reports from 1952 until its closure in 1969. Its records are held by the National Archives.
UAPTF: The Unidentified Aerial Phenomena Task Force, a Department of Defense effort that preceded AARO.
AAWSAP / AATIP: Names associated with Pentagon-funded work examining anomalous aerospace reports. Public accounts often blur the programs, dates, scopes, and informal follow-on activity, so primary documentation matters.
NICAP: The National Investigations Committee on Aerial Phenomena, a civilian UFO research organization active during the mid-twentieth century.

Primary source: An original document, recording, image, dataset, physical record, or first-hand account. A primary source can still be mistaken, incomplete, or deceptive.
Secondary source: Reporting or analysis that interprets primary material and other evidence.
Provenance: The documented origin and history of a record or object: who created it, where it came from, how it was handled, and whether it was altered.
Chain of custody: The documented sequence of possession and handling used to evaluate whether evidence remained intact.
Corroboration: Independent evidence that supports part of an account. Multiple retellings from one underlying source are not independent corroboration.
Sensor artifact: A misleading feature introduced by a camera, radar, processing system, display, compression, or operating mode rather than the observed object.
Parallax: Apparent motion caused by a change in viewing position or geometry. It can make distant objects appear to move rapidly relative to a foreground.
Metadata: Information about a file or record, such as creation time, device, location, format, or edit history. Metadata can be removed or changed and must be interpreted in context.

FOIA: The U.S. Freedom of Information Act, which provides a process to request existing federal agency records subject to exemptions.
Declassified: Formally removed from national-security classification. Declassification does not establish that every statement inside a document is accurate.
Redaction: Information withheld from a released record, normally marked with an exemption or legal basis.
Reading room: An agency repository for records released proactively or through repeated public-record requests.