INITIATIVES TO DEAL WITH LEAKS

• Document Type: CREST
• Collection: General CIA Records
• Document Number (FOIA) /ESDN (CREST): CIA-RDP94B00280R001200030003-0
• Release Decision: RIPPUB
• Original Classification: C
• Document Page Count: 16
• Document Creation Date: December 22, 2016
• Document Release Date: March 23, 2009
• Sequence Number: 3
• Publication Date: January 10, 1983
• Content Type: MEMO

Approved For Release 2009/03/23: CIA-RDP94B0028OR001200030003-0
DIRECTOR OF CENTRAL INTELLIGENCE
Security Committee
SECOM-D-007
10 January 198
NOTE FOR: Members, DCI Security Committee
FROM:
SUBJECT: Initiatives to Deal with Leaks
airman
Attached for your review and comment is a draft of recommendations to the
DCI concerning leaks based upon our special meeting of 5 January 1983. Your
prompt review and comment upon this draft would be most appreciated. As you
know, the DCI has asked for our input by the middle of January; therefore, I
must hear from you in time to finalize the draft by the end of this week.
Thank you for your cooperation.
Attachment
cc: C/UDIS w/att
Rpara-Approved For Release 2009/03/23: CIA-RDP94BOO28OR001200030003-0 _ _ le
 Approved For Release 2009/03/23: CIA-RDP94BOO28OR001200030003-0
DRAFT
SECOM-D-006
7 January 1983
MEMORANDUM FOR: Director of Central Intelligence
VIA: Deputy Director of Central Intelligence
Director, Intelligence Community Staff
SUBJECT: Initiatives to Deal with Leaks
1. Action Requested: Your review and approval of the attached terms
of reference on Community initiatives to deal with the problem of unauthorized
disclosures of classified intelligence information.
2. Background: On 22 December 1982, you asked for an early meeting of
the Security Committee to address initiatives to combat leaks that would be
supported by the Community and to prepare terms of reference to implement
them.
3. Current Status: SECOM met on 5 January 1983 in response to your
tasking. Initiatives supported by all Community agencies represented on the
SECOM are summarized at Tab A. Draft terms of reference to implement the
agreed initiatives are at Tab B.
4. Recommendation: That the DCI approve the attached draft terms of
reference for initiatives to deal with leaks of intelligence.
Regraded offs al item nnl v uhon
Approved For Release 2009/03/23: CIA-RDP94B0028OR001200030003-0
 Approved For Release 2009/03/23: CIA-RDP94BOO28OR001200030003-0
? ?
SUBJECT: Initiatives to Deal with Leaks
CONCUR:
Director, Intelligence Community to ate
Deputy Director of Central Intel igence
Director of Central Intelligenc
Approved For Release 2009/03/23: CIA-RDP94BOO28OR001200030003-0
 Approved For Release 2009/03/23: CIA-RDP94BOO28OR001200030003-0
SUBJECT: Initiatives to Deal with Leaks
Distribution:
Orig - Return C/SECOM w/att
1 - DCI w/att
I - DDCI w/att
1 - ER w/att
1 - D/ICS w/att
I - ICS Registry w/att
1 - C/UDIS w/att
Approved For Release 2009/03/23: CIA-RDP94BOO28OR001200030003-0
 Approved For Release 2009/03/23: CIA-RDP94BOO28OR001200030003-0
TAB A
Approved For Release 2009/03/23: CIA-RDP94BOO28OR001200030003-0
 Approved For Release 2009/03/23: CIA-RDP94BOO28OR001200030003-0
? OFFICIAL USE ONLY
COMMUNITY-SUPPORTED JNITIATIVES ON INTELLIGENCE LEAKS
DCI Security Committee members unanimously support the following
initiatives within the Intelligence Community to deal with the problem of
unauthorized disclosures (leaks) of intelligence:
1. Continue to seek White House action on the Willard Report.
Current Status: Awaiting White House/NSC action. Judge Clark
is believed to have signed off on a National Security Decision
Directive substantially similar to that recommended by the Willard
Report. The draft is believed to have been sent to Presidential
advisors for review prior to submission to the President.
2. Seek enactment of a statute to criminalize unauthorized disclosure of
classified information by government personnel.
Current Status: The DCI sent the Director, OMB, a draft bill
on this subject for advice on its compatability with the President's
program. The DCI draft bill is identical to the one recommended by
the Willard Report.
3. Establish and maintain a DCI leak data base for the Community.
Current Status: Funding is needed for a computerized,
Community-wide leak data base which would provide, for the first
time, data on the nature and scope of published intelligence
leaks. It could be used to analyze leaks for patterns or trends
which, if known, would support improvements in security programs
and/or better focused investigations. Information on leaks at
this time is fragmented and uncoordinated. What exists has
little or no utility.
Approved For Release 2009/03/23: CIA-RDP94B00280R001200030003-0
 Approved For Release 2009/03/23: CIA-RDP94BOO28OR001200030003-0
? OFFICIAL USE ONLY ?
4. Use specific issue polygraph examinations for leak suspects.
Current Status: The Willard Report recommends that the
Office of Personnel Management and other agencies with restrictive
policies on use of the polygraph be directed to amend their regu-
lations to permit adverse consequences to follow an employee's
refusal to participate in a polygraph examination directed at
determining responsibility for unauthorized disclosure. Such
examinations would be restricted solely and specifically to
questions concerning the leak under investigation.
5. Active participation in screening intelligence leaks for
investigation. The DCI should offer Justice the services of SECOM's
Unauthorized Disclosures Investigations Subcommittee (UDIS) to assist in
screening intelligence leaks to select significant ones most susceptible
to investigative resolution.
Current Status: The Willard Report suggests that SECOM
involvement in screening leaks would be useful for intelligence
matters. The DDCI asked that an earlier recommendation that the
DCI offer Justice the services of UDIS be pended until the White
House acts on the Willard Report.
6. The DCI should seek legislation to exempt intelligence data from
Current Status: Earlier initiatives died with the 97th
Congress. Nothing has been done to date to reintroduce this bill
to the 98th Congress. Much of the data in The Puzzle Palace is
said to have been obtained through FOIA requests.
Approved For Release 2009/03/23: CIA-RDP94BOO28OR001200030003-0
 Approved For Release 2009/03/23: CIA-RDP94BOO28OR001200030003-0
? OFFICIAL USE ONLY ?
7. The DCI should seek periodic reminders from the White House
cautioning senior officials about unauthorized comments on intelligence
matters.
Current Status: Judge Clark's 8 November 1982 memo (copy
attached) to Secretaries of State and Defense, Attorney General,
OMB Director, DCI and JCS Chairman is a good example. Occasional
similar comments by the President at Cabinet meetings would be
helpful.
8. The DCI should encourage Community agencies to publicize penalties
meted out to identified leakers as a means of building broad awareness among
Government personnel that leaks are damaging to the national security and
those committing them will be subject to severe sanctions.
Current Status: Little is being done, perhaps because there
is little to publicize. "On the rare occasiions that leaking
officials are identified, they often escape even administrative
sanctions" (Willard Report,-p. E-10). Within CIA, penalties meted
out to David Sullivan when he was identified as responsible for
unauthorized disclosures were publicized in the Washington post,
not in Agency channels.
9. Intelligence Community security components, in consultation with
public affairs officials, should study means of informing both government
personnel and the general public of the reprehensible nature of leaks of
classified intelligence.
Current Status: Media representatives openly boast of
publishing classified materials given to them by government
officials. The government, for its part, shrinks from actio* on
Approved For Release 2009/03/23: CIA-RDP94BOO28OR001200030003-0
 Approved For Release 2009/03/23: CIA-RDP94B00280R001200030003-0
OFFICIAL USE ONLY
the ground that admissions of the authenticity of the material are
even more damaging. The failure of such flagrant violations of
security to generate a sense of outrage is sympotomatic of general
apathy and lack of understanding of the consequences of these dis-
closures. Recent successes in mobilizing opinion to oppose the
transfer abroad of sensitive technology and, on a broader scale,
drunken driving, indicate that there is some hope that people can
be inspired to condemn willful disclosure of national security
information.
Approved For Release 2009/03/23: CIA-RDP94B00280R001200030003-0
 Approved For Release 2009/03/23: CIA-RDP94B00280R001200030003-0
W OFFICIAL USE ONLY V
There are other initiatives which could be taken to help deal with leaks,
but they are not supported by all SECOM members. These include:
1. Giving the FBI the primary responsibility for investigating leaks.
Though supported by the Willard Report, this proposal meets objections from
some departments as an infringement on departmental prerogatives and as use of
FBI resources on matters of relatively low priority.
2. Regulating press contacts - Also supported by the Willard Report,
this proposal is viewed by some as too difficult to enforce and as not worth
the media and political controversy it would engender.
nccT rT AI 1-ec nut v
Approved For Release 2009/03/23: CIA-RDP94B00280R001200030003-0
 Approved For Release 2009/03/23: CIA-RDP94BOO28OR001200030003-0
TAB B
Approved For Release 2009/03/23: CIA-RDP94BOO28OR001200030003-0
 Approved For Release 2009/03/23: CIA-RDP94BOO28OR001200030003-0
? OFFICIAL-USE ONLY 19
TERMS OF REFERENCE
INTELLIGENCE LEAK INITIATIVES
PURPOSE:
1. This effort, undertaken at the request of the Director of Central
Intelligence, identifies initiatives supported by the DCI Security Committee
to reduce the incidence of unauthorized disclosures of classified intelligence
and information pertaining to intelligence sources or methods.
BACKGROUND:
2. Unauthorized disclosure of classified intelligence ("leaks") is part
of the larger and perennial, problem of leaks of classified information that
has' plagued every Administration since at least the nineteen-fifties. In
1959, the incidence of intelligence leaks prompted formation of the DCI
Security Committee to seek solutions. Leaks have evaded solution and have
become an increasingly troublesome problem. There is ambivalence about them
at senior levels. On one hand, leaks are condemned because they foreclose
policy options and/or jeopardize national security. On the other hand, well-
placed leaks can be used to advance a parochial interest, or discredit the
programs and policies of a political or bureaucratic competitor.
3. A penetrating study of the leak problem was done in the spring of
1982 by an interagency group convened by the Attorny General at the request of
the Assistant to the President for National Security Affairs. This study, the
Willard Report, was sent to the President by the Attorney General. It was
endorsed by the DCI, who has consistently sought White House approval of the
report's recommendations.
Approved For Release 2009/03/23: CIA-RDP94BOO28OR001200030003-0
 Approved For Release 2009/03/23: CIA-RDP94B00280R001200030003-0
4P U
SCOPE:
4. Practicable initiatives to deal with leaks divide into legislative
proposals and administrative measures. None of them can be implemented mean-
ingfully without building and maintaining a supportive climate as was done
successfully in promoting the need for a program to halt the transfer abroad
of sensitive U. S. technology. A key factor in an effort to popularize
opposition to leaks is to be able to show that they significantly harm the
national security. This will require retrospective damage assessments of at
least some leaks to show harmful results, such as lost or diminished collec-
tion capabilities, diplomatic damage, narrowed or lost policy options, etc.
A separate and distinct effort will be necessary - damage assessments are
usually done so soon after leaks that damage can only be broadly hypothecated.
The SECOM Chairman has asked the CIA and NSA members of the Committee to
conduct such retrospective damage assessments in-house for certain categories
of HU?INT and SIGINT leaks respectively. DCI encouragement of this effort
would help overcome the natural reluctance of agencies to share sensitive data
with others, even under stringent security constraints. If information
developed from this effort can be sanitized, it can then be used to help build
broad understanding by non-intelligence personnel that leakers are self-serving
persons with little regard for the national interest. They are not in the same
category as whistleblowers, who call attention to fraud and corruption. It is
essential that this distinction he clearly drawn, as the media have worked hard
to make the two synonymous. So long as leakers are portrayed by the media as
patriotic. and columnists can boast in print about the classified documents
Approved For Release 2009/03/23:C IA- R-D P94-BOO280 R001200030003-0
 Approved For Release 2009/03/23: CIA-RDP94B00280R001200030003-0
? OFFICIAL USE ONLY W
they are disclosing without any adverse reaction from the public or the govern-
ment, there is little hope for progress in stopping the hemorrhaging of
classified intelligence.
5. National policy support is essential to any meaningful action to
constrain leaks. White House approval of the Willard Report would contribute
substantially to this supportive effort. SECOM members unanimously support
further DCI requests to the White House for favorable action on this report.
6. The Willard Report recommends Administration support for new legis-
lation to criminalize leaks by Government personnel. The DCI has submitted
to 0MB for political clearance a bill to do that. This initiative should be
pursued vigorously. Enactment of this bill would provide: a broadly under-
stood reason for fearing the consequences of a deliberate leak (government
officials are generally aware that no one has been successfully prosecuted
under current laws for leaking); and a means to try and convict willful leakers
without having to disclose even more classified information to prove damage.
It would also permit the FBI to be brought in early to investigate leaks as
criminal offenses, thereby obviating departmental objections to outside
investigators intruding on leak inquiries now seen as administrative matters.
7. Amendment of the Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) to exempt
intelligence from disclosure would indirectly aid efforts against leaks.
Such an exemption would help establish and maintain a climate of broad
recognition that intelligence information is to be kept within official
channels only. Consideration should be given to asking 0MB for political
clearance for a bill to be introduced to the 98th Congress to amend the FOIA.
8. Since Congressional action on the two items described above is likely
to take a significant amount of time, and could result in failure to approve
nr TrTAI rrKr Au1 V
Approved For Release 2009/03/23: CIA-RDP94B00280R001200030003-0
 Approved For Release 2009/03/23: CIA-RDP94BOO28OR001200030003-0
OFFICIAL USE ONLY
the bills, early action should be taken on administrative measures that can be
implemented within the Intelligence Community without new legislation. The
first of these would be for the DCI to offer the Attorney General the services
of SECOM's Unauthorized Disclosures Investigations Subcommittee (UDIS) to
assist Justice in screening intelligence leaks to select those which are both
significant and susceptible to resolution by FBI investigation. While this
.arrangement is suggested in the Willard Report, the offer of UDIS services is
not dependent on White House action on that report. Justice now screens all
requests for FBI investigation of leaks based on the experience and under-
standing of officials of Justice's Criminal Division. Presumably, they would
continue to screen such requests whether or not the Willard Report is approved
and implemented. From the Community's perspective, such screening would be
more effective if knowledgeable Community personnel (i.e., UDIS members) were
advising the Justice Department.
9. Our inability, on a Community basis, to quantify the leak problem or
accurately define its nature is a factor that has hindered past attempts to
deal effectively with leaks. Establishment and maintenance of a computerized,
Community-wide, intelligence leak data base would provide, for the first time,
a capability to identify patterns and trends and focus special attention where
it is needed. It could assist in the management of investigative efforts and
enhance the possibility of successful investigation. Such a data base would
be an appropriate service of common concern operated under the authority of
the DCI. It would be similar in concept to the centralized Community SCI
access register (4C System) which CIA expects to bring on-line in the spring
of 1983. Like the 4C System, it would restrict access to stored information
to the contributor and the data base manager, removing the objection that
Approved For Release 2009/03/23: CIA-RDP94BOO28OR001200030003-0
 Approved For Release 2009/03/23: CIA-RDP94B00280R001200030003-0
? OFFICIAL .USE ONLY ?
everyone would be able to see everyone else's leak records. No resources are
currently budgeted or programmed for the leak data base.
10. Senior officials need periodic reminders that they should not
comment on intelligence matters when they deal with the press or make public
addresses. Judge Clark's 8 November 1982 memorandum advising of the
President's policy prohibiting comment on intelligence matters was a
particularly helpful example. The DCI should seek additional reminders from
the White House at least semi-annually. Their impact would be heightened if
they could cite, in sanitized form, one or more current cases of indiscreet
statements which harmed the intelligence process or intelligence sources or
methods.
11. Two other items supported by SECOM members do not lend themselves to
action at this time. One of them, a Willard Report recommendation that
specific issue polygraph examinations be given to Government personnel who
have been specifically identified by inv,'stigation as likely suspects, is
dependent in part on White House action on the Willard Report. (Defense, CIA
and Justice now use the polygraph to varying degrees in such cases.) The
other -- publicizing penalties for identified leakers -- depends upon iden-
tifying and taking action against leakers, and making this fate known, in
depersonalized terms, as an example to others. Unless other recommendations
in this paper and the Willard Report are acted upon vigorously, it is unlikely
that leakers will be identified.
Approved For Release 2009/03/23: CIA-RDP94B00280R001200030003-0