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CIA DENIES REQUEST FOR DECLASSIFIED DOCUMENT COLLECTION
In a splendid example of its dysfunctional information policies, the
Central Intelligence Agency this month denied a Freedom of Information
Act request for a copy of a CD-ROM collection of documents that it
had declassified and provided to the National Archives years ago.
The request for the CD-ROM was filed by Tim Brown of
GlobalSecurity.org in May 2001.
The CIA has declassified millions of historical documents in recent
years, but the Agency makes access to most of them about as
burdensome as possible.
The entire collection that was requested by Mr. Brown is available
to researchers who are able to visit the National Archives, but
only paper copies of the documents may be obtained.
Why not provide a complete set in soft copy?
This option was mandated by Congress when it amended the FOIA in
1996 to state: "An agency shall provide the record in any form
or format requested by the person if the record is readily
reproducible by the agency in that form or format."
But incredibly, the CIA says that to release the documents on
CD-ROM would damage national security.
"After due consideration, we have determined that the requested
material must be denied on the basis of FOIA exemption (b)(1)
[which exempts properly classified information]," wrote Alan W.
Tate, the Acting Information and Privacy Coordinator at CIA, in a
May 12 letter to Mr. Brown:
It is doubtful that the requested CD-ROM meets even the most
lenient standards for classification, particularly since all of
the component documents are in the public domain and could be
manually compiled into a softcopy collection, with some effort and
expense.
But the denial highlights the radical defects in CIA information
policy, as well as the Agency's seeming inability to accurately
assess threats to national security.
Mr. Brown of GlobalSecurity.org said he will appeal the decision.
