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Secrecy News -- 03/21/01
From: InfoSec News <isn () C4I ORG>
Date: Wed, 21 Mar 2001 23:51:42 -0600
---------- Forwarded message ---------- Date: Wed, 21 Mar 2001 13:08:15 -0500 From: Steven Aftergood <saftergood () igc org> To: secrecy_news () fas org Subject: Secrecy News -- 03/21/01 SECRECY NEWS from the FAS Project on Government Secrecy March 21, 2001 ** AN EXEMPLARY FOIA RULING ** SANDIA WAS-- OR WAS NOT-- HACKED ** NEW NON-LETHAL WEAPON WILL NOT "FRY PEOPLE" [I chopped out the other two stories since they didn't relate to information security. - WK] SANDIA WAS-- OR WAS NOT-- HACKED Sandia National Laboratory recently suffered a "major hacker incident," according to a March 16 article by Bill Gertz in the Washington Times. He cited anonymous "U.S. intelligence officials" to the effect that "hackers suspected of having links to a foreign government successfully broke into Sandia's computer system and were able to access sensitive classified information." See: http://www.washtimes.com/national/inring-2001316211918.htm But that story is "untrue," Sen. Pete Domenici told the Albuquerque Journal in a March 17 article. "My staff and I have been regularly briefed by Sandia, and I don't believe that's an accurate statement," Domenici said. See: http://www.abqjournal.com/scitech/279548scitech03-17-01.htm It is hard not to notice that a number of recent news reports purportedly based on classified information are turning out to be wrong, or at least are plausibly disputed. Another Washington Times story that appeared on January 3 reported, based on classified sources, that Russia had moved tactical nuclear weapons to the Baltic Sea port of Kaliningrad. This unconfirmed claim has been vigorously denied by senior Russian officials up to and including President Putin. The publication of possibly erroneous news stories involving classified information provides another reason not to try to criminalize the unauthorized disclosure of classified information to the news media, as some in Congress have proposed to do. Prosecuting such acts would have the undesired effect of publicly distinguishing the true from the bogus "classified" stories. ****************************** To subscribe to Secrecy News, send email to <majordomo () fas org> with this command in the body of the message: subscribe secrecy_news [your email address] To unsubscribe, send email to <majordomo () fas org> with this command in the body of the message: unsubscribe secrecy_news [your email address] Secrecy News is archived at: http://www.fas.org/sgp/news/secrecy/index.html ___________________ Steven Aftergood Project on Government Secrecy Federation of American Scientists http://www.fas.org/sgp/index.html Email: saftergood () igc org ISN is hosted by SecurityFocus.com --- To unsubscribe email LISTSERV () SecurityFocus com with a message body of "SIGNOFF ISN".
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