THE CONCEPT OF EQUIVALENT PROTECTION

The protection afforded classified information must meet the requirements of the National Industrial Security Program Operating Manual (NISPOM), which generally describes the administrative and physical security requirements for processing and storing the various levels and categories of classified information. The Department of Energy (DOE) provides supplemental instructions and clarifying detail in our directives, as well as mandating additional protections for certain especially sensitive information. For most Secret and Confidential information, the protections involve General Services Administration-approved security containers or, for so called open storage, a vault or vault type room. (The vault type room is the DOE implementation of the “closed area” found in the NISPOM, as modified to create a common design that may be used for storage of information and/or Special Nuclear Material.) Notwithstanding the flexibility included in the vault type room specification, certain weapons production activities involve physical configurations that cannot practically conform to the vault or vault type room specifications. To deal effectively with such situations, the DOE has included in its newest information security manual, DOE Manual 470.4-4A, Information Security Manual, the concept of equivalent protection. This concept allows a site to demonstrate that the total security envelop provided for a given asset gives protection at least equivalent to one of the standard storage configurations prescribed for the same level and category of information. The requirements associated with equivalent protection will be described, as will the guide explaining in more detail how the concept is to be applied. The presentation will include some specific examples.