White House: Old Computers Were Destroyed

(CBS/AP)  Older White House computer hard drives have been destroyed, the White House disclosed to a federal court Friday in a controversy over millions of possibly missing e-mails from 2003 to 2005.

The White House revealed new information about how it handles its computers in an effort to persuade a federal magistrate it would be fruitless to undertake an e-mail recovery plan that the court proposed.

"When workstations are at the end of their lifecycle and retired ... the hard drives are generally sent offsite to another government entity for physical destruction," the Office of Administration's Chief Information Officer, Theresa Payton, said in a sworn declaration filed with U.S. Magistrate Judge John Facciola.

It has been the goal of a White House Office of Administration "refresh program" to replace one-third of its workstations every year in the Executive Office of the President, according to the declaration.

Some, but not necessarily all, of the data on old hard drives is moved to new computer hard drives, the declaration added.

In proposing an e-mail recovery plan Tuesday, Facciola expressed concern that a large volume of electronic messages may be missing from White House computer servers, as two private groups that are suing the White House allege.

Facciola proposed the drastic approach of going to individual workstations of White House computer users after the White House disclosed in January that it recycled its computer backup tapes before October 2003. Recycling - taping over existing data - raises the possibility that any missing e-mails may not be recoverable.

At a House committee hearing last month, a computer expert who previously worked at the White House called the e-mail system "primitive" and said it was set up in a way that created a high risk that data would be lost from White House servers where it was being archived.

Under pressure to provide details about its computer system, the White House told the congressional committee that it never completed work that began in 2003 on a planned records management and e-mail archiving system. The White House canceled the project in late 2006 and says it is still working on a new version.

In the absence of a permanent archiving system, the White House has been archiving e-mails on White House servers since early in the administration.

The White House says it does not know if any e-mails are missing, but is looking into the matter.

It would be costly and time-consuming for the White House to institute an e-mail retrieval program that entails pulling data off each individual workstation, the court papers filed Friday state.

The White House said the judge's request that forensic copies of hard drives in use during the period of March to October 2003 be made, with the goal of finding any existing e-mail data, would be "draconian" as it would require expensive and time-consuming steps that would need to be outsourced to a third party.

The government said that CREW and the National Security Archives, the plaintiffs in the case, "simply can't justify" that the Office of the Chief Information Officer and the EOP

"incur significant time and resource expense on the mere possibility (however unlikely) that some useful material may be restored. Because the allegation of missing e-mail from archives is unconfirmed, because the allegation of missing e-mails from back-up tapes is conjectural, and because the computer workstations are unlikely to house significant, if any, relevant material the costs of a forensic copy process would far outweigh any speculative benefits."

Read the White House's response.
Read Theresa Payton's affadavit.

[twylacrat]

Why is it that the democrats HAVE to answer for everything in the world and the republicrumbs aren''t ever held accountable for a thing? This is the most secretive, dishonest, incompetant administration in this natiion''s history and they aren''t held responsible for any of their actions or decisions. Are our expectations sooooo low that we are willing to accept this?

[tomanyt]

Hard drives were removed for physical destruction!! Yeah right.

[tomanyt]

mocaIeo...Are you OK? Did someone hit you on the head? Is there someone we should call?

[killtheliars]

they need to keep up this investigation regardless of what the White House says. Even if it continues after they are out of office it needs to go on. Maybe there will be enough evidence to put them in prison. If not at least the stress might cause Cheney to have another heart attack and Bush to start drinking again. They deserve whatever happens to them

[thomas22ee]

Write, email, Pelosi? I''ll write to her after her news conference. Is there any response from anyone in congress? Whats Sen Clinton or Sen Obama have to say? Waxman! I thought he retired 5 years ago.

[Deltajoan]

Hey guys,

Send all the above comments to Nancy Pelosi at [e-mail] and tell her you want them all impeached and for her to PLEASE start it NOW! This should be the last straw!

[tucano2]

An MBA that doesn''t back up files?...WMD''s in the Middle East?...Of course our troops have body armor and their humvies have shielding...Katrina? "good job, etc.", ..there were no Illegal Aliens voting in Florida in 2000 or 2004...HEY THE GUY''s LIPS ARE MOVING, AREN''T THEY? WELL YOU OUGHT TO KNOW BY NOW WHAT THAT MEANS!

[sgtrds]

This is easily the most crypt and criminal administration in American history. The lot of them deserve to spend the rest of their pathetic lives bent over in a prison shower.

[besttyper]

Huckabee did the same things when he left the Ark. governor''s mansion. He used our Emergency Reserve fund to pay for it. Bush & Huck are of the same scheming political party so I''m not surprised a bit.

[observantx]

You mean someone destroyed evidence and there was an investigation going on?

How fvcking convenient.

Again.