U.S. Government Leaks List of Civilian Nuclear Sites

A document entitled "The List of Sites, Locations, Facilities, and Activities Declared to the International Atomic Energy Agency" has been mistakenly published by the Government Printing Office (GPO) on its website. The 266-page document contains sensitive information about civilian nuclear programs in the United States and should have been submitted to IAEA later this year.

The confidential list was discovered during a routine review of the documents on the GPO website by Steven Aftergood, director of the Federation of American Scientists' (FAS) Project on Government Secrecy. Originally posted on the FAS website, the document has been picked up by whistle-blowing website Wikileaks.

"The IAEA classification of the enclosed declaration is 'Highly Confidential Safeguards Sensitive;' however, the United States regards this information as 'Sensitive but Unclassified.' Nonetheless, under Public Law 109–401, information reported to, or otherwise acquired by, the United States Government under this title or under the U.S.-IAEA Additional Protocol shall be exempt from disclosure under section 552 of title 5, United States Code," writes President Obama in the document.

GPO took the document down from its website after it learned of the leak from journalists, but the damage has already been done. The accidental disclosure seems to have been triggered by the volume of documents processed by the office. According to Network World, a GPO spokesperson noted that the file in question "was received by GPO in the normal process and produced under routine operating procedures."

The International Atomic Energy Agency is an organization co-coordinated by the United Nations (UN), which safeguards the enforcement of international treaties regarding nuclear programs. The declaration was to be submitted to the agency under a protocol between it and the United States signed at Vienna on June 12, 1998.

This is not the first time when the government or its contractors leak sensitive information. Back in January we reported that a New Zealand national found classified U.S. army files on a second-hand MP3 player, which he acquired for $18. Later that month it was revealed that back in 2005, the U.S. Consulate in Jerusalem auctioned old cabinets along with confidential and secret records.

In March blueprints and schematics of the presidential helicopter, "Marine One," were discovered being shared on a peer-to-peer network. The source of the leak has been traced back to the offices of a Bethesda-based defense contractor.