Conspiracy

By T.K. Randall
July 20, 2026

Image: AI-generated (Midjourney)

Just as disclosure seems to be gaining traction, the Pentagon is looking into a new way of concealing files from the public.

The Freedom of Information Act has proven instrumental in helping to hold the government to account by releasing declassified files to the public and opening up clandestine activities to scrutiny.

This could soon be set to change, however, due to new legislative proposals to introduce a new section of federal law that could undermine the entire idea of freedom of information.

Under this new legislation, the defence secretary will be able to effectively exempt information from release by classing it as "controlled unclassified information".

This would override the Freedom of Information Act, therefore making it possible to hide something from the public that would otherwise be freely available.

The official reasoning behind this is to conceal data that may reveal national defence vulnerabilities, but it could also be used to conceal just about anything.

As things stand, a designation of CUI does not effect whether something is available under the FOIA, but if this new law comes into force, this is very likely to change.

Quite a lot of material would become unavailable and there would be no obligation to ever release it.

"Controlled unclassified information is already very problematic because it's not very carefully defined and it's used to protect lots of different kinds of information," Greg Williams of the D.C. watchdog Project on Government Oversight told CBS News.

So are we about to enter a new era of restricted information ?

Only time will tell.

Source: CBS News

Tags: Pentagon