"Employees are also expected to use approved, secure methods to transmit
sensitive but unclassified information when available and practical."
But according to OMB Watch, a nonprofit group that promotes governmental accountability and citizen participation in public policy decision making, the Homeland Security language about the "
sensitive but unclassified" category is vague; of this category, the Homeland Security Act states, "The needs of State and local personnel to have access to relevant homeland security information to combat terrorism must be reconciled with the need to preserve the protected status of such information and to protect the sources and methods used to acquire such information."
Perhaps the clearest case of bad policy is to be found in a March 19, 2002, White House memorandum to executive branch agencies, urging them to withhold "
sensitive but unclassified information related to America's homeland security." This is bad policy because no one knows what it means.
But yesterday, the US president insisted that anything "
sensitive but unclassified" be taken off the Net immediately.
The STU-III provides a flexible and cost-efficient means for government organizations and defense contractors to satisfy national requirements for securing classified voice and data communications, as well as protecting
sensitive but unclassified communications.
The directive says that "such information,even if unclassified in isolation, often can reveal highly classified and other sensitive information when taken in aggregate.' To protect this, NSDD-145 proposed a new category of controllable data: "
sensitive but unclassified government or government-derived information, the loss of which could adversely affect the national security interest.' According to the White House directive, this information "shall be protected in proportion to the threat of exploitation and the associated potential damage to the national security.'
IIA's Epistle to Weinberger on Database-Wars A recent Information Industry Association (IIA) letter to Secretary of Defense Caspar Weinberger denounced a new National Security Council (NSC) policy for "
sensitive but unclassified information." The new policy purportedly places unfair restrictions on privately-owned databases.
The company will also work with the Defense Information Systems Agency to connect to DoD's non-classified internet protocol router network (NIPRNet), which is a system for exchanging
sensitive but unclassified information.
This testimony discusses three key information sharing efforts: (1) the actions that have been taken to guide the design and implementation of the Information Sharing Environment (ISE) and to report on its progress, (2) the characteristics of state and local fusion centers and the extent to which federal efforts are helping to address some of the challenges centers reported, and (3) the progress made in developing streamlined policies and procedures for designating, marking, safeguarding, and disseminating
sensitive but unclassified information.
Last year the department said employees and contractors must sign agreements that prohibited the disclosure of
sensitive but unclassified information.
In the case of fundamental research, the argument over DOD controls on
sensitive but unclassified information has been to some extent resolved, largely in favor of the universities that do this type of research (SN: 9/22/84, p.