IMPACT OF EXECUTIVE ORDER (EO) 12065 ON OCR

• Document Type: CREST
• Collection: General CIA Records
• Document Number (FOIA) /ESDN (CREST): CIA-RDP86-00674R000300080016-2
• Release Decision: RIFPUB
• Original Classification: K
• Document Page Count: 10
• Document Creation Date: December 19, 2016
• Document Release Date: March 30, 2006
• Sequence Number: 16
• Publication Date: July 24, 1978
• Content Type: MF

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24 July 1978
MEMORANDUM FOR: Director of Central Reference
FROM : OCR Classification Task Team
SUBJECT : Impact of Executive Order (EO) 12065 on OCR
1. We have reviewed Executive Order 12065 in relation to its
impact on OCR, and in some cases on NFAC. This memorandum addresses
the issues in the Order that we feel need further consideration, and
clarification in a CIA Implementing Directive. They are outlined
below along with summaries of the pertinent sections of the Order to
which they refer.
A. Section 1-4: Duration of Classification, p. 28952
1. According to paragraph 1-401, material classified
under the provisions of EO 12065 will be automatically
declassified six years from the date of original
classification unless:
a. It must remain classified for a longer period
of time for reasons of national security or
b. Because it was provided by a foreign government.
Information falling into categories (a) and (b) above
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SUBJECT: Impact of Executive Order (EO) 12065 on OCR
require declassification review 20 and 30 years
respectively after the date of original classification.
Does this requirement prohibit the use of
the current stamp "Declassify on Date Impossible
to Determine?"
Can a waiver of the requirement for automatic
declassification after six years be obtained for
OCR products?
Does the 30-year limit on declassification
review of foreign government information apply to
foreign intelligence documents that have been
assigned a classification life span of more than
30 years by the government of origin?
B. Section 1-5: Identification and Marking, pp28952-28953
1. Paragraph 1-501 lists the information that must be
marked on a document at the time of original classification,
namely,
(a) the identity of the original classification
authority;
(b) the office of origin;
(c) the date or event for declassification review;
and
(d) one of the three classification designations.
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SUBJECT: Impact of Executive Order (EO) 12065 on OCR
? What abbreviations will be used to cite
this data?
Will the markings be preprinted and, if so,
in what form?
Will employee numbers or personal names
be used?
2. Paragraph 1-502 sets forth the requirements for
annotating the reason(s) and authority for classification
of information beyond six years. It indicates that
reason(s) for classification beyond six years must be
stated "in narrative form..."
? Will OCR, NFAC or Agency standardized explanations
be developed?
? What form will their narrative explanations
take?
3. Paragraph 1-503 of the Executive Order specifies
that administrative controls such as "Official Use Only,"
"Limited Official Use," etc. cannot be used to identify
classified information.
Will Intelligence Community agencies be able
to continue use of internal administrative or
dissemination controls and, if so, how binding
will they be?
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SUBJECT: Impact of Executive Order (EO) 12065 on OCR
(If controls continue to be used, those which are
authorized must be cited in a CIA Implementing
Directive.)
4. Paragraph 1-504 specifies that documents must be
clearly marked to indicate which portion(s) [i.e.,
paragraph(s)] are classified and which are not.
? Will dissemination controls or administrative
markings be included as part of the paragraph
classifications?
? Where will the markings be placed---at the
beginning or end of the paragraph?
? Will the markings be abbreviated and
standardized in CIA or NFAC?
? Is it necessary to classify each paragraph
of a report separately, if all of the paragraphs
have the same classification?
Can a waiver to paragraph classification be
granted for biographic reports?
(Biographic reports are often classified because, in
their entirety, they represent the US Government's
official assessment of foreign officials and not be-
cause any one word, sentence or paragraph alone is
classified. To require OCR analysts to judge each
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SUBJECT: Impact of Executive Order (EO) 12065 on OCR
paragraph separately could lead to (1) poorly
constructed reports in which the analyst attempts to
put all classified information into the same.para-
graph(s); (2) the abandoning of ideas/judgments
entirely because they fall between the classified
and unclassified criteria.)
C. Section 1-6: Prohibitions, p. 28953
1. According to paragraph 1-604, references to
classified reports (i.e., document titles) cannot be
classified unless the references themselves warrant
classification.
Issues for Consideration:
This provision could have an impact on OCR's AEGIS/
RECON system if literally adhered to. We recommend that a
CIA Implementing Directive specify that expansions of
document titles through the addition of keywords, etc,
constitute abstracts and that abstracted titles used in
CIA's information processing activities must be classified
(and/or controlled) at the same level as the documents
themselves.
If expanded.titles cannot be categorized as abstracts,
then future output from AEGIS/RECON.will require two listings
-- one for references which predate this order and one for
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references indexed after November 1978. A second software
package would have to be maintained to handle the classi-
fication of machine listings falling into the latter
category. It would have to include a field for title
classification in addition to the field for overall document
classification and all print formats would have to be
revised accordingly.
In addition to the software issue, we feel that there
is another potential impact on OCR if expanded document
titles cannot be considered as abstracts that automatically
carry the same classification as the document. When OCR
requesters ask for unclassified AEGIS/RECON references
under current procedures, only references to documents
which are unclassified appear in the listing. Under the new
order, an unclassified listing could contain both references
to unclassified documents and unclassified titles of
classified documents. In the later instance, then, further
sorting of the listing would be required to determine if it
contained documents with dissemination controls or classi-
fication levels for which the customer might not be cleared.
This sorting procedure could be accomplished through the
development of a. new software package that would create a
separate imput field for title classification. The new
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SUBJECT: Impact of Executive Order (EO) 12065 on OCR
field would then be added to AEGIS/RECON search strategies
to eliminate the need to prepare either more than one
listing or re-check all unclassified titles at output to see
whether the documents to which they refer are classified
at a different level than the titles.
On balance, it seems that little would be gained by
assigning a classification to a document title that is
lower than the overall classification of the document when
ultimately the requester may not have the proper clearances
to receive the document itself. With that reasoning,
recommend that OCR not undertake any project to develop
separate title classification indexing and retrieval
schemes since they appear to be extremely manpower intensive
and costly.
D. Section 2-3: New Material, p. 2894
1. Paragraph 2-302 could have a significant impact on
the declassification date assigned to biographic reports.
It specifies that "new material that derives its
classification from information classified under prior
Orders..." be reviewed for declassification 20 or 30
years from the date of original classification of the
source material.
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? When a report is based on multiple sources
that contain different dates for review for
declassification, which source should take
precedence in determining the date for
declassification review?
E. Section 3-3: Declassification Policy, pp. 28955-28957
1. This section of the Executive Order could have
considerable impact on OCR both in terms of service
from machine or manual files, as well as service from
the centralized document files. Because of the sticky
issues of notification and marking after downgrading or
declassifying information, it is our opinion that OCR
should be cautious in assuming the responsibility for
providing customers with material which accurately
:states its overall classification status.
We feel that it would be cheaper for OCR, if a
preprinted cautionary, notice to customers could be
attached to information provided in response to
reference inquiries. The notice would alert the customer
to the need for verification of any reference that is used,
including non-CIA references, against the the centralized
file of declassification or downgrading actions in either
of the DDA offices having responsibility for keeping
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SUBJECT: Impact of Executive Order (EO) 12065.on OCR
computerized records on Agency declassification actions,
i.e., Records Review Branch, ISAS, or Info and Privacy
Staff or with outside agencies, when required.
Since most analysts write from fairly
current source material, checking old records would
be required infrequently. It would be cheaper to
the Agency for analysts to check the declassification
status of older references when needed than
for OCR to try to get lists of reports from DDA and
try to: a) identify the records in OCR files (because
of poor source locator information in the DDA data
bases) and b) undertake a rather massive file check
and marking operation for documents which may never be
requested.
If we should attempt to mark OCR document
holdings, and particularly if we became responsible
for providing accurate declassification information
to customers, we must have accurate notification
from both CIA and non-CIA agencies. In view of the
problems associated with accurately documenting
sources, we recommend against OCR's undertaking
responsibility for marking any of its document
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SUBJECT. Impact of Executive Order (EO) 12065 on OCR
holdings, except OCR-produced reports, as a result of
declassification or downgrading actions.
F. Section 4-4 Reproduction Controls, p. 28958
According to paragraph 4-404, records must be maintained
to show the number and distribution of reproduced copies
of all Secret and Confidential documents with "special
dissemination and reproduction limitations". We feel
that these special controls and requirements should be
clearly defined and possibly standardized. Much con-
fusion could come from a literal reading of this paragraph,
resulting in time-consuming record-keeping for
reproduction of Secret and Confidential documents.
2. Many of the issues included in this memorandum impact on
the draft OCR Guidelines on Classification, prepared by the Task Team
in May 1978. We should wait to finalize those guidelines until some
of these issues are resolved.
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