NYTimes.com Article: U.S. Tightening Rules on Keeping Scientific Secrets

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U.S. Tightening Rules on Keeping Scientific Secrets

February 17, 2002

By WILLIAM J. BROAD

The Bush administration is taking wide measures to tighten

scientific secrecy in the hope of keeping weapons of mass

destruction out of unfriendly hands.

Last month, it began quietly withdrawing from public

release more than 6,600 technical documents that deal

mainly with the production of germ and chemical weapons. It

is also drafting a new information security policy, to be

released in the next few weeks, that officials say will

result in more documents' being withdrawn. It is asking

scientific societies to limit what they publish in research

reports.

" We're working hard for a set of guidelines so terrorists

can't use information that this country produces against

us, " Tom Ridge, the director of homeland security, said in

an interview. " This will have to be a dynamic process. " He

added that scientists were being closely consulted on any

new guidelines.

But critics say the most extreme steps proposed could make

it impossible for scientists to assess and replicate the

work of their colleagues, eroding the foundations of

American science. They fear that government officials eager

for the protections of secrecy will overlook how open

research on dangerous substances can produce a wealth of

cures, disease antidotes and surprise discoveries.

" It comes down to a risk-benefit ratio, " said R.

Rich, president of the Federation of American Societies for

Experimental Biology. " I think the risk of forgone advances

is much greater than the information getting into the wrong

hands. "

The federal reports already withdrawn, once sold freely to

the public, include not only declassified ones from the

1940's, 50's and 60's but also modern ones that were

previously judged to contain nothing that had to be kept

secret. Experts say the sweeping withdrawal has few if any

precedents.

R. , deputy administrator of the federal Defense

Technical Information Center, the Pentagon agency that has

custody of the reports, said panels of scientific experts

would be assembled to see whether the documents should once

again be made available to the public or perhaps

reclassified as state secrets.

The expert panels, he said, will determine " if we need

major, minor or no revisions " to security guidelines.

Mr. added that he did not know when such deliberations

might be completed or decisions made over the fate of the

6,600 withdrawn documents.

Since Sept. 11, the administration has sought to clamp down

on the flow of information on several fronts. In October,

for example, Attorney General Ashcroft told federal

officials that the Justice Department would support them if

they resisted freedom-of-information requests. But science

has now become the leading edge of the crackdown.

For instance, the White House has asked the American

Society of Microbiology, the world's largest group of germ

professionals, based in Washington, to limit potentially

dangerous information in the 11 journals it publishes,

including Infection and Immunity, The Journal of

Bacteriology and The Journal of Virology.

One White House proposal is to eliminate the sections of

articles that give experimental details researchers from

other laboratories would need to replicate the claimed

results, helping to prove their validity.

" That takes apart the whole foundation of science, "

M. Atlas, president-elect of the society, said of omitting

methods. " I've made it reasonably clear that we would

object to anything that smacked of censorship. They're

discussing it, and I wouldn't rule out them doing

something. "

He added that he was surprised by the number of his

colleagues in academia who seemed willing to discuss

publishing limits. " I think it undermines science, " he

said.

Abigail Salyers, the society's president, offered a more

pointed rebuff. " Terrorism feeds on fear, and fear feeds on

ignorance, " she said in a statement to appear in the March

issue of the group's magazine. The best defense against

anthrax or any infectious disease, Dr. Salyers added, is

information that can bolster public safety.

Experts say such issues are being debated at the National

Academy of Sciences, which advises the federal government.

Mr. Ridge said the critics were overreacting. " I can

understand their concern, but I'm not sure the alarm bells

should be rung just yet, " he said.

" Let's first do the work " of producing the new guidelines,

Mr. Ridge said. He added that the scientists " have to

remember what we're up against " : terrorism with exotic

weapons that could maim or kill millions of people.

Scientists and the White House have clashed before over the

flow of scientific information. In 1982, the Reagan

administration, eager to thwart Soviet spies, blocked the

presentation of about 100 unclassified scientific papers at

an international symposium on optical engineering in San

Diego. The move was loudly protested, and the

administration soon dropped such restraints.

Last fall, after five people died from anthrax spores

contained in letters, a new debate arose over the need for

curbs on information and materials that terrorists could

use to make weapons that are especially deadly. The main

worries centered on lethal germs, chemicals and

radioactivity.

The Bush administration, already a strong advocate of

federal secrecy, quickly pulled much information on arms

and national vulnerabilities from government Web sites. But

to the astonishment of many experts, it continued to permit

the sale of old federal documents that detailed the

government's research on and production of biological

weapons. The work was done between 1943 and 1969 and was

later renounced as Washington pressed for a global ban on

such weapons.

This year, critics called with new urgency for such reports

to be locked up. " It's just plain stupid to be making this

kind of sensitive information so readily available, " The

Sun-Sentinel of Fort Lauderdale, Fla., editorialized last

month.

Late last month the administration began withdrawing the

documents from sale, officials said. Researchers stumbled

upon the gaps while trying to obtain reports from the

National Technical Information Service, an arm of the

Commerce Department in Springfield, Va., that sells

military and other kinds of federal documents.

" It's amazing, " said Lesko, the author of more than

100 books based on federal information. " Everything that's

being asked for is classified. " He added that the

government might be overreacting. " If it's been out there

for 40 and 50 years, " he asked, " how are they going to stop

it? "

Cheryl Mendonsa, a spokeswoman for the Commerce Department,

said that 6,619 documents had been pulled from circulation

as of Thursday and that the figure would rise as new

candidates were identified for security review. " The

process is ongoing, " she said.

After requesting a withdrawn document, visitors to the

service's Web site see the message: " Selected product is

not available for online ordering. "

Current federal policy generally bars the reclassification

of formerly secret documents, but the Bush administration

is considering an executive order that would permit it.

Garfinkel, who recently stepped down as director of

the government's Information Security Oversight Office,

said the scale of the withdrawal was large by historical

standards and unusual because all the documents were

already in the public domain.

He added that attempts to obtain the reports would still be

possible under the Freedom of Information Act, but that

" purposeful delays " would be likely until federal officials

decided on the new classification levels.

Dr. Atlas of the American Society of Microbiology, who is a

dean at the University of Louisville, said he was skeptical

of the recall's merit. " Either the reports crossed a line

they shouldn't have, " he said, " or they've just removed

information that would help the advancement of science. "

Dr. Rich of the Federation of American Societies for

Experimental Biology, who is a dean at the medical school

of Emory University, was more supportive. Papers about

making weapons of mass destruction, he said, should be

promptly removed from public circulation.

But Dr. Rich cautioned that the benefits of basic research

far outweighed any risks. He cited an example. Publishing

an article on the bioengineering of viruses related to

smallpox might look dangerous, he said. But such open

research could greatly advance work on vaccines meant to

battle a variety of ills, including the human

immunodeficiency virus.

" There is very little that comes out of university labs

that could conceivably be considered sensitive, " he said.

" So to set up any kind of blanket policy that would require

general pre-review of scientific publications would be

extraordinarily cost-ineffective and would stifle the

communication of important research findings. "

http://www.nytimes.com/2002/02/17/politics/17SECR.html?ex=1015479740 & ei=1 & en=4c7\

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