By Cliff Montgomery – July 30th, 2010
Federal officials in 2009 charged taxpayers a record $9.93 billion to pay for the classification of activitiesperformed by both government and industry, according to a federal study released in June.
Said more boldly, U.S. taxpayers paid nearly $10 billion last year to be kept ignorant of what federal officialsand private business people did in our name.
This record-high cost of secrecy entailed the charges incurred from protecting classified data in both industryand government, according to the study released by the Information Security Oversight Office (ISOO).
Classification-related activities include more than the mere act of classification. They also entail all actionsnecessary to ensure secrecy: Guards and systems to provide a physical security for the classified data, asecurity clearance network for employee oversight, computer security for secret digital information, and soforth. All of that produces a hefty price tag.
“The agencies also reported a modest, but welcome increase in spending on declassification programs,”declared ISOO Director William Bosanko in a transmittal letter to President Obama.
The American Spark must point out that 2009’s official cost of classification did not include the secrecycharges racked up by either the CIA or the massive Defense Department intel agencies.
These most secretive of U.S. intelligence agencies declare that the very cost of their secrecy is classified.
Such a fact clearly limits the authority of the ISOO’s report on the total cost of American secrecy. Still, thisstudy may provide firm evidence that more government activities are being kept from the U.S. citizen than everbefore.
