SAFE BRIEFING FOR DR. ANTHONY OETTINGER

• Document Type: CREST
• Collection: General CIA Records
• Document Number (FOIA) /ESDN (CREST): CIA-RDP80B01495R001200140009-8
• Release Decision: RIPPUB
• Original Classification: K
• Document Page Count: 2
• Document Creation Date: December 19, 2016
• Document Release Date: November 3, 2005
• Sequence Number: 9
• Publication Date: December 6, 1974
• Content Type: MFR

Approved For ReIL a 2006/02/01 : CIA-RDP80BO1495R06M00140009-8
6 December 1974
MEMORANDUM FOR THE RECORD
SUBJECT: SAFE Briefing for Dr. Anthony Oettinger
1. On 6 December 1974, Dr. Anthony Oettinger, Harvard
University, formerly the manager for Harvard's computers and
once a member of the PFIAB KNOX Panel, was briefed in some
detail on Project SAFE.
2. Subsequent to the briefing, at a lunchtime discus-
sion with and me, Dr. Oettinger STAT
made the following points: SAFE is a nigh-risk operation
because it involves the assembly of large quantities of
hardware and complex functions in a manner that, to his
knowledge, has not been successfully attempted elsewhere.
He suggested that the top Agency management should clearly
recognize that SAFE poses a state-of-the-art challenge.
SAFE also represents a considerable risk in that a goodly
amount of "front end" money may be spent before it is possible
to determine that SAFE will be as great a success as has
been initially advertised. The area of the risk, again, is
in providing the inter-related assembly of complex machinery
necessary to provide the reliability, variety of functions
and support to the number of users explicit in SAFE.
3. On the other hand, Dr. Oettinger was almost poetic
in his praise for the efforts by the SAFE project team to
understand the needs of the customers and the functions
which would have to be provided in order to support those
needs. His comments on the SAFE overview committee and its
proposed membership was that they can provide "pontifical"
comments, as he has done, but they cannot help us in building
the system nor in lowering the risks.
4. Dr. Oettinger's attitude has reversed itself 180
degrees since his KNOX Panel days when he complained that
the Agency was not taking advantage of the power of modern
technology to facilitate and improve the manner in which we
Approved For Release 2006/02/01 : CIA-RDP80BO1495R001200140009-8
 Approved For Relse 2006/02/01 : CIA-RDP80B01495R09r'1~00140009-8
SUBJECT: SAFE Briefing for Dr. Anthony Oettinger
do our work. He is in favor of proceeding with SAFE but
only with clear recognition that parts of it may not pan out
precisely as described and that there is a risk, undefined,
that the whole thing may fail simply because the state-of-=
the-art is not yet up to the demands that are being built
H. C. EISENBEISS
Director, Central Reference Service
Distribution:
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Approved For Release 2006/02/01 : CIA-RDP80BO1495R001200140009-8