{ "id": "2002-february-access-after-attacks", "slug": "2002-february-access-after-attacks", "url": "https://dwillis.github.io/uplink/article/2002-february-access-after-attacks.html", "year": 2002, "month": "February", "monthNum": 2, "headline": "Access after attacks", "kicker": "SPOTLIGHT: TERRORISM", "author_name": "Jennifer LaFleur", "author_title": "", "affiliation": "St. Louis Post-Dispatch", "summary": "Following the September 11 attacks, federal agencies have begun removing public databases and records from their websites citing security concerns, despite no explicit White House directive to do so. Attorney General John Ashcroft's memorandum backing these actions has raised concerns about restrictions on public access to government information protected under the Freedom of Information Act.", "keywords": [ "security", "transparency", "government" ], "topics": [ "Government & Politics", "Data & Databases", "Public Safety" ], "technologies": [ "World Wide Web" ], "full_text": "Just as federal agencies were beginning to develop useful Web sites, where more and more data was being made available, many agencies are now swiftly pulling databases from their sites.\n\nSince the Sept. 11 attacks, several federal agencies have removed public records and documents from their Web sites because of security concerns. In addition, some states have proposed rules that may limit access to public records.\n\nMuch of the information federal agencies handle is covered by the federal Freedom of Information Act, a law enacted in 1966 that requires government agencies to disclose records. Since then, Congress has amended the law to encourage, but not require, agencies to make commonly requested information available on their Web sites. Many responded to that call, but some are now beginning to rethink what they put online. Among them:\n\nThe Bureau of Transportation Statistics has discontinued public access to the National Transportation Atlas Databases and the North American Transportation Atlas. Environmental groups have used information from those sites to assess the impact of transportation proposals.\n\nThe U.S. Geological Survey has removed several reports relating to water quality.\n\nThe Office of Pipeline Safety has removed access to the pipeline mapping system, making the information available only to pipeline operators and government officials.\n\nThe Federal Aviation Administration has removed a link to enforcement data that includes security violations at the nation's airports. Several news organizations used the information for stories before the agency removed it from its site.\n\nThe Environmental Protection Agency has removed risk-management-plan records for chemical plants and other facilities that store and use chemicals.\n\nThe state of New Jersey has removed chemical information from its Web site.\n\nChilling message\n\nIn each case, the agencies cited the need to take precautions in the face of the terrorist threat. But it appears they are acting on their own. A White House spokesman said that it has issued no request for agencies to remove materials from their sites. But they have done it with the backing of U.S. Attorney General John Ashcroft. On Oct. 12, Ashcroft issued a memorandum to the heads of all departments and agencies in which he told agencies to carefully consider \"disclosure determinations\" under the FOIA.\n\nThe memo also states: \"When you carefully consider FOIA requests and decide to withhold records in whole or in part, you can be assured that the Department of Justice will defend your decisions unless they lack a sound legal basis or present an unwarranted risk of adverse impact on the ability of other agencies to protect other important records.\"\n\nThe memo \"sends a chilling message to the entire federal bureaucracy that they better think long and hard before they fulfill an FOIA request or they will be in trouble,\" said Charles Davis, executive director of the Freedom of Information Center, based at the Missouri School of Journalism in Columbia. \"If they want to deny it, the Justice Department is right behind them. In addition, it gives very little credit to the positive values of freedom of information.\"\n\nSecurity also was a concern for the FAA when the agency removed a file of enforcement records on Sept. 14 at the request of the agency's general counsel, according to FAA spokesman Paul Turk. But Turk noted that limited access to enforcement information is still available on the Web site; it lacks some of the details that were in the database.\n\nThose details are what Cleveland Plain Dealer reporter Beth Marchak says are so important. She used FAA enforcement data to examine the 1996 ValuJet crash in the Florida Everglades.\n\n\"You can't make intelligent decisions about safety unless you can look at these records,\" Marchak said. \"In the past, I've used the data to look at how FAA handles enforcement cases. They were settling cases for pennies on the dollar and a lot of cases were just being resolved with paper. People need to know that.\"\n\nNew security restriction\n\nAnother database routinely used by reporters to tell their readers and viewers that might be at risk from old, rarely inspected dams was the Army Corps of Engineers National Inventory of Dams. Now, when you go to crunch.tec.army.mil/nid/webpages/nid.cfm and click on MAP DISPLAY, you get a screen that says:\n\nPublic access to the National Inventory of Dams is currently restricted. Please contact the NID Pagemaster if you have any questions. Thank you.\n\nThe most recent data on dams is still available online at a Stanford University data query site and from NICAR's data library.\n\nThose with concerns about access to government information don't discount the terrorist threat. But it requires balance with the public's right to know, says Gary Bass, executive director of OMB Watch, a nonprofit organization concerned with freedom of information issues.\n\n\"We live in an open society. Everything we put out carries a risk. Are we not going to announce where the next football game is?\" Bass said. \"The flip of that is we end up living in a closed system.\"\n\nOMB Watch has come under criticism itself recently for continuing to make risk-management-plan data available. Bass said such information is necessary for citizens and communities to know their risks.\n\n\"They could identify the names of these chemical companies, but if you go to the yellow pages you can do the same thing,\" he said.\n\nThe records also provide information about what effects an accident would have. \"It will say something like the plume would go 4.3 miles affecting X number of people, two child-care centers and a school,\" Bass said.\n\n\"If I were the parent of a kid in one of those child-care centers, I would want to know that. Doesn't OMB Watch have a responsibility to provide that information to the parents. If we don't do that, aren't we guilty of not doing everything we can to protect them?\"\n\nFor almost 14 years, Paul Orum, director of the Working Group on Community Right-to-Know, has used public records to try to make chemical plants safer for citizens and to make communities aware of their risks.\n\n\"We have pushed for many years for improved site security and hazard reduction at chemical plants,\" Orum said.\n\n\"There has been a great deal of complacency that has accompanied traditional secrecy in the industry. Environment groups and public interest groups have relied on the right to know to push government and industry to make changes as far as hazards.\"\n\nHaphazard actions\n\nBass also argues that much of the information was removed randomly without a clear directive. When he's asked agencies for the reasons behind their actions, he's gotten vague responses.\n\nAn e-mail response to Bass from the Department of Transportation's information services department said: \"Due to the attacks on September 11th, BTS and all other government agencies have had to re-evaluate the content available through our Web pages.\"\n\n\"We need to have a reasoned debate about this,\" Bass said. \"We shouldn't be acting precipitously to take things down.\n\nBass was particularly concerned about the phrase \"all other government agencies.\" He argues that much of these actions have been done without a clear plan.\n\n\"If there is a reasonable argument with reasonable benchmarks. I think we want to hear that and act accordingly. But until then I think in an open society public right to know has to prevail.\"\n\n\"Bin Laden doesn't need a click of a mouse to get this information,\" Bass said.\n\nPress for information\n\nIn the current atmosphere, reporters may have to be more diligent in their requests for public information.\n\nAgencies can't just deny a record without citing a specific exemption to FOIA or a state public records law, said Rebecca Daugherty, director of the Freedom of Information Service Center of the Reporters Committee for Freedom of the Press.\n\nAnd agencies can't simply invoke national security, Daugherty notes. \"If you're going to invoke national security, the records have to be classified. If it has been public before, they can't now reclassify it.\"\n\nDaugherty also said that reporters should appeal any denials they get and that organizations such as the Reporters Committee can help reporters write appeal letters. She also suggested that reporters ask for expedited review for their requests dealing with Sept. 11 and terrorism. Doing so puts those requests at the front of the line.\n\n\"They are probably going to be successful when they do because of the widespread interest,\" Daugherty said.\n\nDaugherty also emphasized the importance of covering public records issues at this time.\n\n\"I don't think the public has any idea how much information is being withheld from them,\" she said. \"Journalists need to challenge closures and write about them.\"\n\nJennifer LaFleur can be reached by e-mail at jlafleur@post-dispatch.com", "provenance": { "extracted_by": "anthropic/claude-sonnet-4-6", "extracted_at": "2026-07-05", "verified": true }, "similar": [ { "slug": "1992-january-news-and-observer-challenges-nc-for-access-to-public-information", "score": 0.248 }, { "slug": "2001-novemberdecember-airport-insecurity", "score": 0.235 }, { "slug": "2002-september-october-faa-withholds-data", "score": 0.235 }, { "slug": "2002-february-poor-airport-security", "score": 0.228 }, { "slug": "2002-september-october-data-access-year-after-attacks-files-still-guarded", "score": 0.221 } ], "html_url": "https://dwillis.github.io/uplink/article/2002-february-access-after-attacks.html", "json_url": "https://dwillis.github.io/uplink/article/2002-february-access-after-attacks.json" }