​​​The Federal Funding Accountability and Transparency Act of 2006 (FFATA) was signed into law on September 26, 2006 and mandated the creation of a publicly available, searchable website that would provide the American public access to information on entities and organizations receiving federal funds. USAspending.gov went live in 2007 with data on prime recipient transactions. In 2008, the Government Funding and Transparency Act​ amended FFATA to include the reporting of sub-awards transactions by the prime recipients.

In January 2014, the Office of Management and Budget gave the Department of the Treasury's Bureau of the Fiscal Service​ the operational authority of USAspending.gov and tasked Fiscal Service with making improvements to the site's usability, presentation, and search functionalities. Improvements to the data quality were not initially included nor do the improvements encompass the requirements of the Digital Accountability and Transparency Act of 2014​ (DATA Act​). 

The new USAspending.gov was launched in March 2015. 

Read the full legislation. Federal Funding Accountability and Transparency Act