FBI is losing track of classified and sensitive data, watchdog finds

The FBI needs to do a better job keeping track of electronic media slated for destruction and disposal at bureau facilities, according to an advisory memo from the Justice Department's Inspector General publicly released on Thursday.

The bureau isn't labeling and tracking internal hard drives with sensitive and even top secret national security information once they're removed from computers and servers, according to the memo from DOJ IG Michael E. Horowitz, and FBI officials aren't able to confirm when such drives were destroyed in accordance with bureau policy. Similarly, thumb drives, flash drives and floppy disks are also being handled in ways that don't comport with bureau policies.

"The lack of accountability of these media increases the risk of loss or theft without possibility of detection," Horowitz wrote.

The memo also notes that drives slated for destruction are often subject to insecure storage. In one instance cited by Horowitz, an open, unwrapped pallet holding internal hard drives extracted from bureau computers was stored for almost two years in a facility shared with other FBI functions including mail sorting and information technology acquisition. Almost 400 people including contractors had access to the pallet. 

"Both the FBI supervisor and contractor confirmed that they would not be aware if someone was to take hard drives from the pallets because these assets are not accounted for or tracked," Horowitz said.

The Office of Inspector General made three recommendations to the FBI about bringing its media storage methods in line with bureau standards. The FBI concurred with the recommendations, which were not detailed in the memorandum.