Guest Commentary Classified programs need whistleblowers, too

By BY JESSELYN RADACK Minuteman Media

Posted: July 29, 2009 at 7 a.m.

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WASHINGTON — The Obama administration is proceeding with a Bush administration-devised plan to use the National Security Agency in screening government computer trafficon private-sector networks, with AT&T slated to be the test site. This classified pilot program, "Einstein 3," takes the two worst offenders from Bush's secret surveillance program and puts them in charge of scrutinizing all Internet traffic going to or from federal government agencies.

Supposedly, Einstein 3 is meant to protect government networks from hackers. But if the program is only meant to be an intrusion detection system, then why will it monitor outgoing communications? Earlier incarnations of Einstein - which have been deployed on a voluntary basis at 15 of the nearly 600 federal agencies, departments and Web resources in the United States - observe predetermined signatures (specific patterns of network traffic), but Einstein 3 would look at the content of e-mail and other messages sent over government systems as it scans for attacks.

Does this alarm anybody else? It should. One would hope that if abuses of this program occur, and the government starts looking where they shouldn't, someone on the inside might blow the whistle on the practice.

But that's the problem. National security employees - like Thomas Tamm, who first exposed the warrantless wiretapping scandal - enjoy no real whistleblower protections of any kind. Tamm had to divulge his findings anonymously, only recently coming out because he was suspected of being the inside source and the internal retaliation against him was so severe.

By no means are national security programs that raise huge questions of legality uncommon. First there was the detainee abuse scandal. Then there were the "extraordinary rendition" programs where the CIA moved enemy combatants to secret prisons in other countries - some of which allowed torture. And just recently, revelations have emerged about the CIA program aimed at creating "assassinationsquads" - a program that was kept from any congressional oversight (as required by law), allegedly at the behest of Vice President Dick Cheney.

These employees deserve protections, which is exactly what the text of a current bill in the House of Representative - the Whistleblower Protection Enhancement Act of 2009 - would do.

Now let's be clear - providing intelligence workers the opportunity to reveal national security programs to the masses is obviously improper. And that's not what the bill would do. This bill would protect those employees who report wrongdoing, corruption and illegality that they experience to authorized members of Congress, or designated officials within their agencies. If there is criminality going on, these employees are probably going to be the only witnesses. Keeping them gagged undermines democracy at its core.

And there's public support for federal whistleblower protections from the citizenry. In July, the Obama administration reached the end of its Open Government Initiative, which sought independent ideas (from the public) about methods the administration could employ to increase overall government transparency, public participation and public collaboration. What recommendation finished first? One that suggested the institution of strong whistleblower protections for federal employees. In fact, this choice blew away the competition, receiving twice as many endorsements as any other idea put forth by the public during the program - a total amount of 304 different ideas.

This debate should be over. National security employees who are witnessing gross abuse should be able to safely report to Congress behind closed doors. Anything less would be a return to Hoover's FBI.

Jesselyn Radack is homeland security director of the Government Accountability Project, a whistleblower protection organization.

Opinion, Pages 4 on 07/29/2009

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