Today, the G.A.O. estimates that the salaries for government public relations employees exceed $400 million per year. By our tally, executive agencies spent $800 million this past year on advertising and public relations contracts. Every federal agency has an internet presence. The Justice Department has a YouTube channel. The E.P.A. has about two dozen Twitter accounts. President Obama established a White House Office of Digital Communications in 2009, some of whose occupants had used those skills to get him elected.

The lines between salubrious and unwholesome government information are not easy to draw. Should the government, for instance, seek to dissuade people from eating trans-fats? Still, there are some very basic steps that can help curb propaganda.

The first is to get a sense of the volume. We have no good measure of how much information the government generates, who provides it and for whom it is intended. Such data could be added to the items the White House must submit with its budget request to Congress.

The few laws that exist are inadequate and anachronistic. A 1913 statute, still on the books, sought to thwart propaganda by forbidding the hiring of “publicity experts,” a ban that has as much to do with modern communication as cuneiform tablets. A 1919 anti-lobbying statute bars agencies from whipping up citizens through telegrams but not via the internet. These laws do not define “publicity” or “propaganda,” or hint at the differences by providing distinguishing criteria (e.g., government communications should be balanced and written in a tone that doesn’t extol the agency or its activities). Updating and expanding these laws would provide an institutional counterweight to propaganda, and provide watchdogs with the information to fight it.

Mr. Trump’s inclination to play fast and loose with the truth, even after being elected, should elevate our concerns about the dangers of largely unchecked governmental power to propagandize citizens. Whether or not one likes Mr. Trump as tweeter in chief, the potential for abuse is bipartisan. When his time in office is over, the problem of errant government communications will become more dire thanks to rapid advances in information technology. Why not start to fix it now?