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Secrecy and Security News

Newer News: September 2012

August 2012

• SEAL Author's Attorney Disputes Applicability of NonDisclosure Agreement, letter to DoD General Counsel Jeh Johnson, August 31. "Mr. Owen is proud of his service and respectful of his obligations. But he has earned the right to tell his story."
• DoD Letter Says "No Easy Day" Author is in Material Breach of Nondisclosure Agreement, letter from DoD General Counsel Jeh Johnson, August 30. "The Department is considering pursuing against you, and all those acting in concert with you, all remedies legally available to us in light of this situation."
• Government is ramping up document declassifications by Charles S. Clark, Government Executive, August 29. "Three years into the Obama administration's push to speed document declassification, officials touted considerable progress on a backlog that once was nearly 400 million pages at a public forum Wednesday hosted by the National Archives and Records Administration."
• The Document That Might Spell Trouble for Ex-Navy SEAL Author by John Hudson, The Atlantic Wire, August 27. "If ex-Navy SEAL Matt Bissonnette discloses classified information in his upcoming tell-all on the mission to kill Osama bin Laden, he could be subject to criminal prosecution under the Espionage Act, as we noted earlier. But even if he doesn't divulge any secrets, he's still got major legal problems."
• Bin Laden Raid SEAL Author Faces "Double Jeopardy" by Mark Thompson, Time Battleland, August 27. "Even if he takes care to ensure he spills no SEAL secrets, he could still be in trouble for not letting the government vet his book prior to publication."
• Email Message from SOCOM Commander Adm. William McRaven to All Personnel, August 24. "I am becoming increasingly concerned about how former members of the special operations community are using their 'celebrity' status to advance their personal or professional agendas."
• Ha'aretz Removes Passage on PM's Threat To Use Warheads; Censor Refuses Comment, DNI Open Source Center, August 9. "A passage from an op-ed piece in the Ha'aretz newspaper was deleted from the Ha'aretz website. The excised passage dealt with an incident that took place in 1998 when Binyamin Netanyahu was prime minister."
• Public Interest Groups Urge Intel Committees to Preserve Annual Report on Security Clearances, August 7. "We believe the annual report on security clearances provides exceptional value to the public and should continue to be published."
• No legal obstacle to David Petraeus pick by Josh Gerstein, Politico, August 7. "Experts say there's no legal obstacle to Petraeus running for vice president, though he would have to resign his job as Central Intelligence Agency director. And the vetting process might be a bit more awkward than with a typical VP prospect."
• NCIS Targets Danger Room in Silliest Leak Investigation Ever by Sharon Weinberger and Noah Shachtman, Wired Danger Room, August 7. "In its mounting campaign against leakers, the U.S. government isn't just going after officials who revealed weighty secrets like the White House's drone strike 'kill list' or its plan to sabotage Iran's nuclear sites. Federal agents are also chasing a leaker who gave Danger Room a document asking for a futuristic laser weapon that could set insurgents' clothes on fire from nine miles away."
• Obama administration struggles to live up to its transparency promise, Post analysis shows by James Ball, Washington Post, August 3. "New evidence suggests that administration officials have struggled to overturn the long-standing culture of secrecy in Washington. Some of these high-profile transparency measures have stalled, and by some measures the government is keeping more secrets than before."
• Defense vague on plan to plug press leaks by Austin Wright and Leigh Munsil, Politico, August 2. "While the Pentagon insists it's not doing anything that should alarm reporters, it has yet to offer a direct response as to exactly what it means when it says it's going to monitor news reports for unauthorized disclosures."

Older News: July 2012

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Maintained by Steven Aftergood
Updated September 3, 2012