The ongoing failure to establish a robust, reliable and productive declassification program is steadily eroding the study of intelligence history and may lead to the collapse of the entire field, one intelligence historian told the National Security Agency last month. “I don’t think it’s an exaggeration to say that we’re at a crisis point in […]
The House of Representatives yesterday passed the “Grid Reliability and Infrastructure Defense Act” which is intended to bolster that national electric grid against terrorist attacks, cyber threats, electromagnetic pulse weapons and solar storms. The Act authorizes the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission to issue emergency orders to protect critical electric infrastructure, and to take other measures […]
The Office of the Director of National Intelligence has released the unclassified portions of its Congressional Budget Justification Book for Fiscal Year 2008 (pdf), in response to a three year old Freedom of Information Act request from the Federation of American Scientists. Most of the substance of the document and all of the budget figures […]
Noteworthy new reports from the Congressional Research Service obtained by Secrecy News that have not previously been made available online include the following (all pdf). “Deepwater Horizon Oil Spill: Selected Issues for Congress,” May 27, 2010. “Deferred Examination of Patent Applications: Implications for Innovation Policy,” May 27, 2010. “Post-Employment, ‘Revolving Door,’ Laws for Federal Personnel,” […]
The United Nations Human Rights Council last week presented a new set of institutional and policy practices for intelligence agencies that it said would help to improve accountability and protection of human rights in intelligence policy. The new “Compilation of good practices on legal and institutional frameworks and measures to ensure respect for human rights […]
The U.S. Army has arrested Spc. Bradley Manning of Potomac, Maryland for unauthorized disclosure of classified information. Among other things, he is suspected of having provided the video of a 2007 Apache helicopter strike in Baghdad that killed several civilians to the Wikileaks web site, which published it online in April of this year. The […]
“German security authorities reported a substantial increase in crime and attacks on police in 2009 related to left-wing political groups and individuals,” said a new report (pdf) from the DNI Open Source Center. “According to Germany’s Interior Ministry, more extremist crimes and acts of violence occurred in 2009 than in any year since 2001. The […]
By Hans M. Kristensen The world’s nuclear weapon states possess an estimated 22,600 nuclear weapons, of which more than 7,500 are deployed. This and much more according to a chapter I co-authored in the latest yearbook from the Swedish International Peace Research Institute (SIPRI). Copyright prevents us from making a copy of the chapter available here, […]
In a move that may help to discourage habitual secrecy in military-funded research, the Department of Defense last week reaffirmed a Reagan-era policy that the products of fundamental scientific research should normally be unrestricted. However, the policy also said that if national security required imposing controls on such research, then formal classification was the only […]
In 1992, the Department of Energy performed what may have been the most thoughtful and self-critical assessment of classification policy that any government agency has ever carried out. It is now available online. “This study represents the first fundamental review of classification policy for nuclear weapons and nuclear weapon-related information since the Atomic Energy Act […]
by Alicia Godsberg The NPT Review Conference ended last Friday with the adoption by consensus of a Final Document that includes both a review of commitments and a forward looking action plan for nuclear disarmament, non-proliferation and the promotion of the peaceful uses of nuclear energy. In the early part of last week it was […]
The DNI Open Source Center recently prepared a pictorial profile of members of the Cabinet of the Hashemite Kingdom of Jordan who were appointed in December 2009 by King Abdallah II. (The bios of the Cabinet members are derived from reporting in the Jordan Times.) A copy was obtained by Secrecy News. See “Jordanian Cabinet” […]