[ConservativeTreehouse] Details Surface of FBI Record System Containing “Prohibited Access” Files, Exclusively Controlled by 7th Floor FBI Officials
As previously noted, Senate Judiciary Chairman Chuck Grassley released some of the FBI investigative files related to a congressional referral of Nellie Ohr for false testimony to congress. Within the Grassley release the declassified FBI investigative notes show that Trump-Russia files were compartmentalized, allowing control over access to them by the FBI Director and FBI Deputy Director.
The 7th floor level classification within the FBI’s Sentinel record-keeping system was previously unknown, and now people are starting to ask questions about what other information may be filed yet invisible due to the classification designation of “Prohibited Access.”
The Sentinel record-keeping system allows FBI officials and investigators to review and research the status of investigations both past and current. The Sentinel system is also the information system that is searched for responsive documents to legal cases and FOIA inquires. The Sentinel system contains all the information used by the FBI.
Within the Sentinel system there are “Restricted Access” files that are used to control who can view the file information. The FBI official can see the file but cannot access the information within it without a higher clearance level. However, now people are discovering there is a “Prohibited Access” designation that makes the file invisible to searches or queries and is controlled by the FBI Director and FBI Deputy Director.
Margot Cleveland is asking some good questions about how the use of the “Prohibited Access” designation may circumvent the FBI’s legal requirements (brady material) and FOIA searches. [SEE HERE] However, I would also note this approach hides information not only from congress and from the public, but also from the Executive branch itself. The DNI wouldn’t even know what information exists.
Additionally, we can expand the overall issue to highlight this same approach at work in various other governmental agencies. This is one of the reasons I refer to the agencies within government more aptly as information “silos.”
The same “secrecy filtering” system outlined in the FBI Sentinel system, “restricted access” (visible but needing a higher clearance) vs “prohibited access” (totally invisible) exists in other govt systems.
The NSA, DHS and CIA contain the same issue, information hidden and kept secret. This is the core reason I have historically called them “silos.”
The same ‘what the heck’ realization encountered with the FBI file keeping, as noted by the Grassley revelations, extends far beyond the FBI.
This is also why I have said the Intelligence Community has created a “caste system” within the surveillance and information space.
Now do you see why elements of the IC, and by extension their political enablers, were going bananas about DOGE access?
Simmer on it for a moment, because it gets worse.
Right now, like right now while you are reading this, the same framework is being applied to the DHS surveillance network, where “restricted access” and “prohibited access” (invisible) are being applied to PEOPLE.
Our government, via Palantir, is currently building the domestic identity surveillance system, where every identity will be stored. However, within the storage, and by extension the parameters of the surveillance search results, there will be people who are defined by placing their identity in the “prohibited access” category.
Great job realizing the secrecy ramifications of the issue within the FBI and their exploitation therein. Now extend that realization to the ramifications for us of other silos doing the same.
I was told in August 2020 that the FBI investigative file into James Wolfe leaking the Carter Page FISA application, is in the “prohibited access” tier of the FBI because it outlines Senate Select Committee on Intelligence Vice-Chairman Mark Warner participating and directing the leak. That was how/why SSCI Security Director James Wolfe was never charged with leaking a TSCI classified file.
Is the President of the United States really in charge of the executive branch, when the agencies can easily hide information from him?
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