Groups Demand Public Input in Writing "Sensitive But Unclassified" Procedures - Sensitive But Unclassified

Sensitive But Unclassified: News Background Analysis Correspondence Gov Docs Links

Published: 08/27/2003

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Groups Demand Public Input in Writing "Sensitive But Unclassified" Procedures

Seventy-five organizations representing journalists, scientists, librarians, environmental groups, privacy advocates, and others today sent a letter to Homeland Security Secretary Tom Ridge calling on the Department of Homeland Security to allow public input on procedures for "safeguarding" and sharing a vaguely defined set of information between firefighters, police officers, public health researchers and federal, state, and local governments.

Under the auspices of fighting terrorism, the Department is poised to write - without guarantees for public input - procedures that could sweep up otherwise publicly available information that has nothing to do with terrorism into a zone of secrecy while subjecting millions of Americans to confidentiality agreements.

The letter asks Secretary Ridge to release to the public a draft version of the new procedures - which would not themselves contain classified information - and address public comments in writing a final version. The letter expresses concern that the procedures may cut a broad swath of information out of the public domain, that the procedures would subject millions inside and outside of government to nondisclosure agreements and criminal penalties for disclosing information improperly, and cut out the ability of journalists, community groups, and others to inform the public of activities of federal, state and local governments.

The law that created the Department, the Homeland Security Act, included a provision that required the federal government to safeguard and share "homeland security information" with government officials, public health professionals, firefighters and others in order to respond to a terrorist attack.

Included in that set of information is a potentially broad set of information, such as maps of environmental contamination, that is not classified but which may be perceived as helpful to a terrorist or potentially helpful in responding to or preventing an unknown future attack.

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