Total U.S. intelligence spending last year declined by more than 10%. Intelligence spending has been on a downward slope for the last few years since its peak in 2010. But last year’s drop, disclosed yesterday in newly declassified budget data for FY2013, was the steepest one-year decline in intelligence spending since at least the end […]
New and updated reports from the Congressional Research Service that Congress has withheld from online public distribution include the following. Sovereign Debt in Advanced Economies: Overview and Issues for Congress, October 28, 2013 Foreign Assistance: Public-Private Partnerships (PPPs), October 28, 2013 Oil and Natural Gas Industry Tax Issues in the FY2014 Budget Proposal, October 30, […]
There were 139 new “secrecy orders” granted on patent applications during Fiscal Year 2013, according to new data released under the Freedom of Information Act by the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office. Under the Invention Secrecy Act of 1951, secrecy orders may be imposed by government agencies on patent applications if their disclosure would be […]
New or newly updated reports from the Congressional Research Service that Congress has withheld from online public distribution include the following. Army Drawdown and Restructuring: Background and Issues for Congress, October 25, 2013 Afghanistan: Post-Taliban Governance, Security, and U.S. Policy, October 23, 2013 Chemical Regulation in the European Union: Registration, Evaluation, and Authorization of Chemicals, […]
By Hans M. Kristensen With every official statement about the B61 nuclear bomb life-extension program, the capabilities of the new version (B61-12) appear to be increasing. Previously, officials from the DOD, STRATCOM, and NNSA said the program is a consolidation of the B61-3, B61-4, B61-7, and B61-10 gravity bombs that would provide no additional military […]
The Department of Defense Inspector General yesterday released its Evaluation of Over-Classification of National Security Information. Unfortunately, the new report is superficial, incomplete and sheds little light on either the problem of overclassification or any potential solution. Like other Inspectors General who have recently been evaluating classification policy under the Reducing Over-Classification Act, the DoD […]
New or updated reports from the Congressional Research Service obtained by Secrecy News include the following. Carbon Capture: A Technology Assessment, October 21, 2013 Social Security: What Would Happen If the Trust Funds Ran Out?, October 21, 2013 Video Relay Service: Program Funding and Reform, October 22, 2013 Mandatory Minimum Sentencing: Federal Aggravated Identity Theft, […]
Although former State Department contractor Stephen Jin-Woo Kim will not go to trial before next year on charges of leaking classified information to Fox News reporter James Rosen, the pre-trial maneuvering by the prosecution and the defense is accelerating. Prosecutors notified the court last week that their theories regarding the defendant’s motive for allegedly leaking […]
New and updated reports from the Congressional Research Service that Congress has withheld from online distribution include the following. Federal Mandatory Minimum Sentencing: The 18 U.S.C. 924(c) Tack-On in Cases Involving Drugs or Violence, October 21, 2013 The Mental Health Workforce: A Primer, October 18, 2013 Student Bullying: Overview of Research, Federal Initiatives, and Legal […]
When people criticize overclassification of national security information, what exactly are they talking about? Is it too much secrecy? The wrong sort of secrecy? Classifying something at too high a level? Oddly, there is no widely-accepted definition of the term. But since the solution to overclassification, if any, will naturally be shaped by the way […]
The laws that govern and regulate the communications industry are substantially out of date and need to be revised, according to a new report from the Congressional Research Service. “The communications sector does not look at all as it did when the Telecommunications Act was passed in 1996. Most significantly, consumer behavior in 2013 bears […]
Scientists in the nuclear weapons program at the Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory (LLNL) are feeling blue, according to a recent internal report. “We heard that there is a sense of increased stress and reduced morale among LLNL technical employees in the weapons program, stemming from a (perceived, at least) combination of reduced resources and increased […]