A burn bag is a security bag that holds sensitive or classified documents which are to be destroyed by fire or

pulping Pulp is a fibrous lignocellulosic material prepared by chemically, semi-chemically, or mechanically isolating the cellulosic fibers of wood, fiber crops, waste paper, or rags. Mixed with water and other chemicals or plant-based additives, pul ...

after a certain period of time. The most common usage of burn bags is by government institutions, in the destruction of

classified Classified may refer to: General *Classified information, material that a government body deems to be sensitive *Classified advertising or "classifieds" Music *Classified (rapper) (born 1977), Canadian rapper * The Classified, a 1980s American ro ...

materials. Burn bags are designed to facilitate the destruction process by not requiring the removal of the items to be destroyed beforehand and by indicating if the items require special procedures. Destruction via burn bags is considered superior to shredding, because shredded documents may be reconstructed. After the capture of the United States

embassy A diplomatic mission or foreign mission is a group of people from a Sovereign state, state or organization present in another state to represent the sending state or organization officially in the receiving or host state. In practice, the phrase ...

Tehran Tehran (; , ''Tehrân'') is the capital and largest city of Iran. It is the capital of Tehran province, and the administrative center for Tehran County and its Central District (Tehran County), Central District. With a population of around 9. ...

during the

Iran hostage crisis The Iran hostage crisis () began on November 4, 1979, when 66 Americans, including diplomats and other civilian personnel, were taken hostage at the Embassy of the United States in Tehran, with 52 of them being held until January 20, 1981. Th ...

, shredded documents were turned over for painstaking manual reconstruction, which revealed to Iran some U.S. operations, including spies.

Usage

In government institutions

Burn bags are generally associated with US governmental organizations like the

CIA The Central Intelligence Agency (CIA; ) is a civilian foreign intelligence service of the federal government of the United States tasked with advancing national security through collecting and analyzing intelligence from around the world and ...

and

NSA The National Security Agency (NSA) is an intelligence agency of the United States Department of Defense, under the authority of the director of national intelligence (DNI). The NSA is responsible for global monitoring, collection, and proces ...

, due to the classified nature of their work. Most other governmental organizations have some form of burn bag system to destroy documents deemed of a

Top Secret Classified information is confidential material that a government deems to be sensitive information which must be protected from unauthorized disclosure that requires special handling and dissemination controls. Access is restricted by law or ...

Secret Secrecy is the practice of hiding information from certain individuals or groups who do not have the "need to know", perhaps while sharing it with other individuals. That which is kept hidden is known as the secret. Secrecy is often controver ...

Classified Classified may refer to: General *Classified information, material that a government body deems to be sensitive *Classified advertising or "classifieds" Music *Classified (rapper) (born 1977), Canadian rapper * The Classified, a 1980s American ro ...

, or other similar nature. Burn bags are mostly used to satisfy destruction of articles pursuant under

Executive Order 12958 Executive Order 12958 created new standards for the process of identifying and protecting classified information, and led to an unprecedented effort to declassify millions of pages from the U.S. diplomatic and national security history. In 1995, ...

section 1.4, in part:

Classified information must fall under one of the following categories:
1.4 (a) Military plans, weapons systems, or operations;
1.4 (b) Foreign government information;
1.4 (c) Intelligence activities, sources or methods or cryptology;
1.4 (d) Foreign relations or foreign activities of the United States including
1.4 (e) Scientific, technological or economic matters relating to national security;
1.4 (f) United States Government programs for safeguarding nuclear materials or facilities;
1.4 (g) Vulnerabilities or capabilities of systems, installations, projects or plan relating to the national security; or,
1.4 (h) weapons of mass destruction

The order was subsequently replaced by

Executive Order 13526 Executive Order 13526 was issued on December 29, 2009, by United States President Barack Obama.

. Due to environmental concerns and the high value of

recycled paper The recycling of paper is the process by which waste paper is turned into new paper products. It has several important benefits: It saves waste paper from occupying the homes of people and producing methane as it breaks down. Because paper fibr ...

, institutions that generate large amounts of classified material tend to securely desensitize their data in disintegrators with a 3/32" NSA/DOD approved top-secret screen. Even though the moniker "burn bag" is still very popular, rarely within the United States is classified material incinerated. Overseas military outposts and

diplomatic mission A diplomatic mission or foreign mission is a group of people from a state or organization present in another state to represent the sending state or organization officially in the receiving or host state. In practice, the phrase usually denotes ...

s frequently have emergency disposal procedures in place for the rapid burning of classified materials. These often include special burn bags with built-in

thermite Thermite () is a pyrotechnic composition of powder metallurgy, metal powder and metal oxide. When ignited by heat or chemical reaction, thermite undergoes an exothermic redox, reduction-oxidation (redox) reaction. Most varieties are not explos ...

charges.

Haz-mat usage

The term "burn bag" can also refer to bags that contain

haz-mat Dangerous goods are substances that are a risk to health, safety, property or the environment during transport. Certain dangerous goods that pose risks even when not being transported are known as hazardous materials ( syllabically abbreviate ...

protective gear after inspection of sources deemed hazardous.

In private businesses

Document destruction companies have rarely used burning in disposing of documents, mainly opting to shred material before disposal. However, due to the possibility that shredded material can be reconstructed, and recent increases in

identity theft Identity theft, identity piracy or identity infringement occurs when someone uses another's personal identifying information, like their name, identifying number, or credit card number, without their permission, to commit fraud or other crimes. ...

and

corporate espionage Industrial espionage, also known as economic espionage, corporate spying, or corporate espionage, is a form of espionage conducted for commercial purposes instead of purely national security. While political espionage is conducted or orchestrat ...

, some services have started to offer destruction by burning instead of disposal into

landfill A landfill is a site for the disposal of waste materials. It is the oldest and most common form of waste disposal, although the systematic burial of waste with daily, intermediate and final covers only began in the 1940s. In the past, waste was ...

s. The

waste-to-energy Waste-to-energy (WtE) or energy-from-waste (EfW) refers to a series of processes designed to convert waste materials into usable forms of energy, typically electricity or heat. As a form of energy recovery, WtE plays a crucial role in both wa ...

industry often offers a "secure disposal" service to allow businesses to use the waste-to-energy plants' municipal waste incineration units for sensitive material disposal. Services range from a basic drop-off at the facility to actually having a witness to the incineration process and issuance of a certificate of destruction.

In popular culture

* A burn bag is used prominently in the movie ''

Spy Game ''Spy Game'' is a 2001 action thriller film directed by Tony Scott and written by Michael Frost Beckner and David Arata. The film stars Robert Redford and Brad Pitt as CIA operatives entangled in a covert rescue mission during the final day ...

''. In it, the character Nathan Muir uses a burn bag to hide—and subsequently destroy—documents he was keeping from the CIA pertaining to his protégé, Tom Bishop. *A similar document destruction system (''sans'' burn bags) called the "

memory hole A memory hole is any mechanism for the deliberate alteration or disappearance of inconvenient or embarrassing documents, photographs, transcripts or other records, such as from a website or other archive, particularly as part of an attempt to giv ...

" is used in the

Ministry of Truth The Ministry of Truth, the Ministry of Peace, the Ministry of Love, and the Ministry of Plenty are the four ministries of the government of Oceania in the 1949 dystopian novel ''Nineteen Eighty-Four'', by George Orwell. The use of contradictor ...

(

Newspeak In the dystopian novel '' Nineteen Eighty-Four'' (also published as ''1984''), by George Orwell, Newspeak is the fictional language of Oceania, a totalitarian superstate. To meet the ideological requirements of Ingsoc (English Socialism) in O ...

: ''Minitrue'') in the

George Orwell Eric Arthur Blair (25 June 1903 – 21 January 1950) was an English novelist, poet, essayist, journalist, and critic who wrote under the pen name of George Orwell. His work is characterised by lucid prose, social criticism, opposition to a ...

novel ''

Nineteen Eighty-Four ''Nineteen Eighty-Four'' (also published as ''1984'') is a dystopian novel and cautionary tale by the English writer George Orwell. It was published on 8 June 1949 by Secker & Warburg as Orwell's ninth and final completed book. Thematically ...

''. *Burn bags are featured in the works of many military and espionage authors. The works of

Tom Clancy Thomas Leo Clancy Jr. (April 12, 1947 – October 1, 2013) was an American novelist. He is best known for his technically detailed espionage and military science, military-science storylines set during and after the Cold War. Seventeen of ...

and W. E. B. Griffin feature them prominently. * In an episode of ''

The West Wing ''The West Wing'' is an American political drama television series created by Aaron Sorkin that was originally broadcast on NBC from September 22, 1999, to May 14, 2006. The series is set primarily in the West Wing of the White House, where t ...

'' ("

Let Bartlet Be Bartlet "Let Bartlet Be Bartlet" is the 19th episode of ''The West Wing'' and first aired on NBC on April 26, 2000. In the episode, a White House insider writes a memo that attacks President Bartlet for his ineffectiveness in making bold decisions due t ...

"),

Josh Josh is a masculine given name, frequently a diminutive (hypocorism) of the given names Joshua or Joseph, though since the 1970s, it has increasingly become a full name on its own. It may refer to: People A–J *Big Josh, stage name for America ...

asks Mandy if she's ever heard of a burn bag relating to a memo which is critical of the President. *The July 5, 2007 installment of the

Garry Trudeau Garretson Beekman Trudeau (born July 21, 1948) is an American cartoonist best known for creating the ''Doonesbury'' comic strip. Trudeau won the Pulitzer Prize for Editorial Cartooning in 1975, making him the first comic strip artist to win a ...

Doonesbury ''Doonesbury'' is a comic strip by American cartoonist Garry Trudeau that chronicles the adventures and lives of an array of characters of various ages, professions, and backgrounds, from the President of the United States to the title character, ...

'' comic refers to Vice President

Dick Cheney Richard Bruce Cheney ( ; born January 30, 1941) is an American former politician and businessman who served as the 46th vice president of the United States from 2001 to 2009 under President George W. Bush. He has been called vice presidency o ...

burn-bagging lawyers who have written secret legal opinions. * In the movie '' American Made'', a burn bag is used by C.I.A. employees to disassociate any connection with the main protagonist,

Barry Seal Adler Berriman "Barry" Seal (July 16, 1939 – February 19, 1986) was an American commercial airline pilot who became a major drug smuggler for the Medellín Cartel. When Seal was convicted of smuggling charges, he became an informant for the Dru ...

. *In the

Showtime Showtime or Show Time may refer to: Film * ''Showtime'' (film), a 2002 American action/comedy film * ''Showtime'' (video), a 1995 live concert video by Blur Television Networks and channels * Showtime Networks, a division of Paramount Global w ...

series ''Billions'' season two finale "Ball in Hand", Bobby Axelrod uses a burn up box instead of a burn bag to destroy evidence of his involvement in

securities fraud Securities fraud, also known as stock fraud and investment fraud, is a deceptive practice in the stock or commodities markets that induces investors to make purchase or sale decisions on the basis of false information.Argo In Greek mythology, the ''Argo'' ( ; ) was the ship of Jason and the Argonauts. The ship was built with divine aid, and some ancient sources describe her as the first ship to sail the seas. The ''Argo'' carried the Argonauts on their quest fo ...

'', about the

, the Americans in their embassy in Iran tried to burn their embassy documents in a furnace but it malfunctioned and they had to use a

paper shredder A paper shredder is a mechanical device used to cut sheets of paper into either strips or fine particles. Government organizations, businesses, and private individuals use shredders to destroy private, confidential, or otherwise sensitive do ...

References

Notes

Sources

Government sites
Department of Energy Office of Administration Headquarters Waste Disposal ProgramNOAA Office of Security Education Refresher Briefing
( Microsoft Office PowerPoint Presentation
HTML version
Non-government sites

Everything2 definition
{{DEFAULTSORT:Burn Bag Bags Classified information Waste collection