US FOIA do not allow seeking personal information?

[kushal]

Electronic FOIA Request<o></o>
If you are not seeking personal information about yourself or personal information on behalf of someone else, you may file a request electronically by using the FOIA
Request Letter Generator (go to Make a FOIA Request). Please provide as much information as you can to help us locate the requested material.

This is the content from the website here from Department of State: Freedom of Information Act (FOIA)
RTI India Act does not seem to have this restriction?
One of our member is from the Department of State, he may explain it better too.

[Satish Gupta]

I do not profess to know the reason for this restriction under FOIA, however it seems like a reasonable thing in view of the Right of Privacy Act.

When a person is requesting personal information about himself or about someone else, the government should have some method to verify the identity of the person requesting the information. In USA, the PAs require a notarized statement from the requester. At the present time there is no such system in place for internet requests. And therefore it seems prudent to ask that the requester apply on paper.