The Justice Department needs a more complete staffing strategy for the management of classified information as well as a set of internal controls for other sensitive information, GAO has said.
It said while DoJ and the FBI have taken action on recommendations issued by the National Archives’ Information Security Oversight Office in July 2004 and April 2005, DoJ has yet to address staffing shortages.
The FBI, which makes up to 98 percent of DoJ’s classification decisions, has taken action on 11 of 12 recommendations including issuing security regulations governing its program and updating most of the classification guides that employees use to help them decide what information should be classified, according to GAO-07-83.
It said that while DoJ has taken action on five of 10 recommendations, including fixing problems with outdated and insufficient training, staffing shortages continue to place its program at risk because the program sets policy, provides training, and oversees classification practices department-wide.
The department said it lacks staff resources to address other shortcomings in training and oversight activities but has requested additional funds from an administrative account for fiscal 2007, according to the report.
