Comments on: Overcoming Overclassification http://www.fas.org/blog/secrecy/2008/09/overclassification.html Secrecy News from the FAS Project on Government Secrecy Tue, 24 Nov 2009 18:23:26 -0500 http://wordpress.org/?v=abc hourly 1 By: David F. Hayes http://www.fas.org/blog/secrecy/2008/09/overclassification.html/comment-page-1#comment-2493 David F. Hayes Sat, 17 Jan 2009 23:15:50 +0000 http://www.fas.org/blog/secrecy/?p=1948#comment-2493 I am struck by the posture of Ms. Bisson's statement. This view is based on a "certitude" that cannot be proven and is precisely the attitude which EO 12958 sought to remedy. In my experience classification was frequently abused to fortify the thin gruel of evidence for one policy initiative or another. Hey, (the reasoning goes) if the report didn't originate in a dead drop and cost the taxpayer millions of dollars, how could it be of any value? I am struck by the posture of Ms. Bisson’s statement. This view is based on a “certitude” that cannot be proven and is precisely the attitude which EO 12958 sought to remedy.

In my experience classification was frequently abused to fortify the thin gruel of evidence for one policy initiative or another. Hey, (the reasoning goes) if the report didn’t originate in a dead drop and cost the taxpayer millions of dollars, how could it be of any value?

]]> By: celeste bisson http://www.fas.org/blog/secrecy/2008/09/overclassification.html/comment-page-1#comment-2181 celeste bisson Tue, 04 Nov 2008 19:03:47 +0000 http://www.fas.org/blog/secrecy/?p=1948#comment-2181 Although there is a great amount of information which has been overclassified (mainly due to lack of education), there is probably ten times as much which is underclassified. The only clear way to cut through this is to hire and properly train foreign disclosure officers who will work with their security officers, review the security classification guides and train classification originators. Although there is a great amount of information which has been overclassified (mainly due to lack of education), there is probably ten times as much which is underclassified. The only clear way to cut through this is to hire and properly train foreign disclosure officers who will work with their security officers, review the security classification guides and train classification originators.

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