Re: US Navy could be crippled by software backdoors.

fredfighter@spamcop.net wrote:
> Fred J. McCall wrote:
>> Andrew Swallow <am.swallow@btopenworld.com> wrote:
>>
>>
>> He knows no such thing. If the President shows a journalist a
>> classified document and the journalist looks, the journalist has
>> accepted responsibility under the US classified information
>> regulations.
>>
>
> Nonsense.
>
> Recall the Pentagon Papers case.
>
> If the President shows a journalist a classified docuement
> then the President has compromised the information therein.
>
> If the President has theauthority to declassify the document
> then no crime has been committed.
>
> Absent an intent, or at least a willingness to compromise the
> information then the person, journalist or not, would have been
> briefed on procedures for handling classified information and
> would have signed a confidentiality agreement before being
> shown the information.
>
The prosecution can show that the document was not declassified.
No written order, no verbal order to the Holder of the document, no
change to the classification on the covers of the document and it was
returned to a secure cabinet. It is still classified.

Note the President may be the current top classification authority but
according to the Executive Order he is not the top declassification
authority.

Andrew Swallow
Received on Mon May 1 01:59:51 2006