Further underlining the solidifying view by Congress that secrecy is unchecked within the executive, the Government Accountability Office (GAO) has released a report today (pdf) on information sharing and the universe of vague, largely unregulated "sensitive but unclassified" (SBU) information designations. According to the GAO, there are at least 56 different SBU categories (GAO examined 16 SBU categories within the Energy Department alone) and:
...most of the agencies GAO reviewed have no policies for determining who and how many employees should have authority to make sensitive but unclassified designations, providing them training on how to make these designations, or performing periodic reviews to determine how well their practices are working. The lack of such recommended internal controls increases the risk that the designations will be misapplied. This could result in either unnecessarily restricting materials that could be shared or inadvertently releasing materials that should be restricted. (emphasis POGO's)
Last month, Rep. Christopher Shays (R-Connecticut) held a hearing on secrecy where another similar GAO report (pdf) was unveiled, albeit one more narrowly focused on the Energy and Defense Departments' "Official Use Only" and "For Official Use Only" designations.
The White House issued a memo last December calling on agencies to standardize the hodge podge of SBU categories to facilitate information sharing across the government. Steven Aftergood, who runs the Project On Government Secrecy, wrote that because of the Administration's memo, "'sensitive but unclassified' is poised to become the government's largest single information control category."