May 5, 2000 - 02:04 PM

Two More Laptop Computers Are Missing at State Department By Barry Schweid The Associated Press

WASHINGTON (AP) - The State Department has discovered two more laptop computer to be missing. One was signed out to a senior official, Morton H. Halperin, the assistant secretary of state for policy planning. Spokesman Richard Boucher said the computers were found to be missing during an inventory ordered after the unexplained disappearance in February of a laptop computer containing highly classified information.

Boucher said only the computer that disappeared in February was known to have classified material in it.

Suggesting other equipment may be missing as well, Boucher said, "Once we have completed that inventory, we'll tell you how many computers we've got and which ones are missing and which ones are not."

The chairman of the House Permanent Committee on Intelligence told The Associated Press, meanwhile, that "there is not sufficient awareness, or sufficient attention, to security" at the State Department.

"There is an arrogance - we know better, we don't have to do anything about it," said Rep. Porter J. Goss, R-Fla.

Secretary of State Madeleine Albright testified at a closed committee hearing Thursday. Goss said he did not include her in his description.

In fact, he said, "it is far to characterize the secretary of state as being in complete agreement" that insufficient attention was paid to classified material.

Goss did not provide details of her testimony; rules of the committee prohibit that. He said, though, that "she used the word 'appalled.' The fact that she was willing to fix things and go forward is very good news."

On Wednesday, Albright, furious about recent security lapses, delivered a strong plea to department employees for greater vigilance to protect secret material.

New security measures are likely to be adopted, including tightened restrictions on where visitors with building passes may go.

Albright has told principal supervisory personnel to stress the importance of security to their staffs. In addition, annual refresher security briefings will be intensified, with mandatory attendance for all appropriate department employees.

Officials have said the first missing laptop contained large quantities of documents about arms proliferation issues and highly sensitive information about sources and methods of U.S. intelligence collection.

Earlier, a bugging device was found in a conference room.

http://ap.tbo.com/ap/breaking/MGIX2GH4W7C.html

-- Martin Thompson (mthom1927@aol.com), May 05, 2000

Answers

Not all computers in secure areas have password controls

By BARRY SCHWEID The Associated Press 5/5/00 6:46 PM

WASHINGTON (AP) -- Some of the computers at the State Department used for classified material are not equipped with passwords and other security features, a senior U.S. official said Friday.

Describing the computers as of the "off-the-shelf" variety, the official said he did not know whether a laptop computer discovered missing in February from the department's Bureau of Intelligence and Research had the devices.

The department confirmed Friday that two other laptop computers had disappeared, but only the one that vanished in February is known to have contained secret information.

The official, speaking on condition of anonymity, said the areas in which computers containing classified information are used are themselves secure and the computers are not supposed to be removed.

The problem, he said, is that someone got into the secure area of the bureau who should have not been there. And, he said, it is the way the area is secured, not what is on the computers, that provide security.

Entry into secure areas are carefully logged, the official said.

Disclosure that some computers are not equipped with protective devices was the latest twist in the State Department's security situation and tensions between Congress and the department.

The chairman of the House Intelligence Committee complained Friday about what he called "an arrogance" at the department over security lapses. The legislator suggested the department call in experts to make changes.

Excluding Secretary of State Madeleine Albright from his blistering attack in an interview with The Associated Press, Rep. Porter J. Goss, R-Fla., said, "There is not sufficient awareness, or sufficient attention, to security" at the department.

Goss said the department would be wise to enlist the help of experts from outside the building in dealing with its security situation.

But State Department spokesman Richard Boucher said the job was in the competent hands of the Bureau of Diplomatic Security. "It's comprised not only of special agents who conduct investigation and provide dignitary protection, but also of very seasoned information and computer security specialists with many years of experience," he said.

Thus far, three laptop computers have been reported missing. Of the two newly announced computers, one had been signed out to a senior official, Morton H. Halperin, the assistant secretary of state for policy planning.

Boucher said the computers were found to be missing during an inventory ordered after the unexplained disappearance in February of a laptop computer containing highly classified information. That is the only one of the three laptops known to contain classified material, he said.

Suggesting other equipment may be missing as well, Boucher said: "I don't want to mislead anybody into thinking that we're saying there's only two others -- two unclassified machines missing. We're still in the middle of this inventory."

Albright testified Thursday at a closed meeting of the House Permanent Committee on Intelligence.

Goss said Friday that Albright was "appalled" at the security situation. "It is fair to characterize the secretary of state as being in complete agreement" that insufficient attention was paid to classified material.

"The fact that she was willing to fix things and go forward is very good news," he said.

But carefully excluding Albright from his criticism, Goss said "there is an arrogance -- 'We know better, we don't have to do anything about it."'

Rep. Benjamin A. Gilman, R-N.Y., chairman of the House International Relations Committee, said, "We expect a full explanation from administration officials regarding these new lapses" at a hearing he called for next Thursday.

"While these new revelations may not mean that national security has been further compromised," he said, "it is clear that the State Department has a long road to travel before its security standards are even minimally adequate."

On Wednesday, Albright, furious about recent security lapses, delivered a strong plea to department employees for greater vigilance to protect secret material.

New security measures are likely to be adopted, including tightened restrictions on where visitors with building passes may go.

Albright has told principal supervisory personnel to stress the importance of security to their staffs. In addition, annual refresher security briefings will be intensified, with mandatory attendance for all appropriate department employees.

Officials have said the first missing laptop contained large quantities of documents about arms proliferation issues and highly sensitive information about sources and methods of U.S. intelligence collection.

Earlier, a bugging device was found in a conference room

http://www.oregonlive.com/newsflash/index.ssf?/cgi- free/getstory_ssf.cgi?a0756_AM_State-Security&&news&newsflash- washington

-- Martin Thompson (mthom1927@aol.com), May 06, 2000.

First there was one. Then two. Now 15 laptops.

State Department missing 15 unclassified laptop computers May 18, 2000 Web posted at: 8:03 PM EDT (0003 GMT)

By From CNN State Department correspondent Andrea Koppel

WASHINGTON (CNN) -- The State Department Thursday said 15 department laptop computers are missing, and warned its employees about their use of laptops.

"The use of laptop computers introduces a number of security threats to the Department of State and to every federal agency," wrote David Carpenter, Assistant Secretary of State for Diplomatic Security, in a three-page memo.

A senior State Department official confirmed that, after a recent inventory of 1,913 unclassified laptop computers, 15 "are unaccounted for," reported stolen or missing over the last 18 months.

"Today's technology enables laptop computers to store vast amounts of information," Carpenter said. "Laptop computers are a high-risk target for theft and require us to take special safeguards to protect them. The capabilities of laptop computers also create significant technical vulnerabilities. For example, infrared and modem capabilities can cause data to be transferred without the users' knowledge."

The memo directs each executive director at the department to finish a review, and report by June 2, the information on all unclassified laptops.

"It is imperative that laptops remain in control of the department," Carpenter said. "Losses of laptops must be reported immediately to executive directors. Laptops are high-value items and must be controlled as such."

State Department officials said most of the 15 missing laptop computers "were used in areas that normally do not handle classified information."

For example, one laptop was used at the State Department's National Foreign Affairs Training Center, where diplomats study foreign languages. Another laptop was used in the Bureau of Administration, described by one State Department official as "a non-sensitive, unclassified environment."

Some of the laptops were lost while department officials were traveling, officials said.

A few of the 15 may have been used in a classified environment, but the State Department insisted the laptops themselves contained no classified information. Officials said they are "following up."

The State Department did not rule out the possibility that more laptops could be missing; the inventory review went back only 18 months.

The State Department's security review was prompted after the news media reported the January disappearance of a laptop containing highly classified information from the Bureau of Intelligence and Research (INR), supposedly one of the most secure bureaus at the State Department.

The laptop held several thousand pages of "code word" documents on the sources and methods of what the State Department calls "proliferators" of weapons of mass destruction.

Following the report and subsequent congressional ire, Secretary of State Madeleine Albright ordered the security review. The report includes 43 recommendations, said several people who have seen it.

Carpenter's memo warns employees to label all laptops and reminds them that the "password policy applies to the laptop as well as the standard workstation."

The missing classified INR laptop did not have "password protection" and its raw data were "not encrypted," neither of which was needed, because the machine had been stored in a high-security room, the State Department said.

http://www.cnn.com/2000/US/05/18/missing.laptop/index.html

-- Martin Thompson (mthom1927@aol.com), May 18, 2000.