President Barack Obama recently issued an executive order aimed at improving controls and sharing of classified information across the federal government, saying that the primary responsibility for this rests with individual agencies that use classified networks.
The order calls for these agencies to “designate a senior official to oversee classified information and sharing” within the agency, ensure compliance with policy and standards, and to initiative insider threat detection and prevention programs.
The executive order follows an interagency review of federal classified information policies and practices stemming from the 2010 disclosure of classified information by WikiLeaks, which allegedly received the sensitive data from Bradley Manning, an Army private.
The administration said it has already begun moving out on creating an interagency Insider Threat Task Force to find ways to disrupt insider threats.
Other directives included in the order include: the creation of a Classified Information Sharing and Safeguarding Office within the Program Manager for the Information Sharing Environment to provide a full-time focus on sharing and safeguarding classified national security information; creating a Senior Information Sharing and Safeguarding Steering Committee to coordinate interagency efforts and ensure accountability for information sharing and safeguarding policy and standards; and having senior representatives at DoD and the National Security Agency jointly act as the executive agent for Safeguarding Classified Information on Computer Networks to develop technical safeguarding policies and standards and conduct assessments of compliance.