Oversight of the Government's Security Classification Program--Some Improvement Still Needed

A March 1979 GAO report on executive branch oversight discussed the ineffectiveness of the Interagency Classification Review Committee in monitoring the government's information security program. GAO made several recommendations to ensure that agencies comply with the provisions of the Executive order.

As a result of the implementation of some of the recommendations, oversight of the program has improved. In some cases, however, the Information Security Oversight Office (ISOO) did not take the necessary actions to ensure effective agency compliance with the order. The staff has almost doubled, and more comprehensive inspections are being made. The Oversight Office's first annual report was more informative than prior reports. The Oversight Office is not requiring agencies to submit complete statistics on the number of classification actions, declassification categories assigned to information, mandatory review requests and appeals, individuals who classify information, and classification infractions. It has taken no steps to implement the GAO recommendation that personnel who are not original classifiers, but who apply classification markings on a derivative basis, be identified on the documents. Oversight Office waivers granted to the Departments of Defense and Energy allowing them to refrain from marking the classification level of each portion of a document containing both national security information and restricted or formerly restricted data covered by the Atomic Energy Act should be rescinded. Agencies have written directives which deny the Oversight Office access to records not specified in the Executive Order on the basis of an Oversight Office directive which was intended to control unauthorized dissemination of classified information provided by one agency to another.

Recommendations

Our recommendations from this work are listed below with a Contact for more information. Status will change from "In process" to "Open," "Closed - implemented," or "Closed - not implemented" based on our follow up work.

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