(16) What states and federal agencies may utilize the data in your computerized files by coding, interfacing and other devices relating to their own computers? None. (17) What security devices and procedures are utilized to prevent: (a) unauthorized access to the data file; and (b) improper use of the information? All information must be obtained through a disbursing office where records are maintained in a secured area. Information would be furnished only to the individual himself or to one having a vested interest in the information. (18) What formal or informal arrangement does the Treasury Department have with congressional committees for the authorizing and reviewing of new data banks and the clearance of new electronic or mechanized record-management techniques? Bureau officials appear annually at Congressional Appropriation Hearings at which data bank matters are discussed. (Last hearing was held May 6, 1971.) (19-A) Have any data programs or the development of other comprehensive records systems been discussed before other congressional committees by Treasury Department representatives? No. (B) Have any been specifically approved by Congress or congressional committees? No. (C) If so, would you please supply any available testimony, or citations to such hearings? Not applicable. Attachments There was only one attachment submitted with this part of the Treasury Bureau of Accounts response. DIVISION OF DISBURSEMENT ATTACHMENT 1 CREATION OF THE DIVISION The Division of Disbursement was established December 16, 1933, under the provisions of section 4 of Executive Order No. 6166, dated June 10, 1933. Section 4 of Executive Order No. 6166 as amended provides: "The function of disbursement of moneys of the United States exercised by any agency except United States marshals; the Post Office Department; the Postmaster General, the Board of Trustees of the Postal Savings System; and those disbursement functions of the War Department, Navy Department (including the Marine Corps), and the Panama Canal, not pertaining to departmental salaries in the District of Columbia is transferred to the Fiscal Service of the Treasury Department and, together with the Office of Disbursing Clerk of that department, is consolidated in a Division of Disbursement, at the head of which shall be a Chief Disbursing Officer. "The Division of Disbursement of the Treasury Department is authorized to establish local offices, or to delegate the exercise of its functions locally to officers or employees of other agencies, according as the interests of efficiency and economy may require. "The Division of Disbursement shall disburse moneys only upon the certification of persons by law duly authorized to incur obligations upon behalf of the United States. The function of accountability for improper certification shall be transferred to such persons, and no disbursing officer shall be held accountable therefor." (Note following 5 U.S.C. 124-132) Various Executive Orders postponed the effective date of Section 4 "insofar as not already effected prior to ***". Each of these orders contained a provision that the changes therein delayed might be made sooner effective by order of the Secretary of the Treasury approved by the President. The bracketed portions of Section 4 quoted above represent the amendatory provisions. Executive Order No. 6728, dated May 29, 1934, revoked Section 4 of Executive Order No. 6166 insofar as it was applicable to the disbursing functions under the military departments, except those pertaining to departmental salaries and expenses in the District of Columbia. Reorganization Plan No. III, effective June 30, 1940, placed the Division of Disbursement in the Fiscal Service of the Treasury Department. Reorganization Plan No. IV, effective June 30, 1940, : provided for a permanent transfer of disbursement functions of U.S. Marshals to the Department of Justice and continued permanently in the Post Office Department the disbursement of Post Office funds. The Division of Disbursement provides disbursing facilities for all executive departments and establishments of the Government with the exception of the activities referred to above and certain Government corporations. In addition to a central office in Washington, D.C., and 18 regional disbursing offices in the continental United States the Treasury Department maintains other offices in outlying territories of the United States and in foreign countries. Subpart 2-Bureau of Accounts Miscellaneous Files Subcommittee Analysis The Bureau of Accounts reported two miscellaneous files. I. Index Title Description: (1) Purpose; (2) Contents Subjects A. Polish claims program (computerized).......... (1) Provides information necessary for issuing 5,500. payments to awardees under the program. (2) Claim number, name, address, amount of payment. B. Postal savings depositors (computerized). (1) Provides a record of unpaid postal savings 331,000. accounts that were transferred from the (2) Name, account number, post office where ac- II. Nature of Material Submitted The response of the Bureau of Accounts regarding its miscellaneous files was in general candid and complete. III. Comments A. Statutory Authority 1. POLISH CLAIMS PROGRAM.-Chapter 21 of Title 22, U.S.C., has to do with settlement of international claims. Section 1627 provides for creation of special funds within the Treasury out of which payments to individual claimants are to be issued. Such a provision clearly necessitates the creation of files of the sort maintained under the Polish Claims Program. Therefore derivative statutory authorization justifies this data bank. 2. POSTAL SAVINGS DEPOSITORS. 39 U.S.C. 5228 (1966) provided for transfer of unpaid Postal Savings Deposits to the Secretary of the Treasury. (Section 5228 has since been omitted from the Code and now has the legal effect of a rule or regulation, according to the response.) Maintenance of individual records is clearly necessitated by the statute authorizing transfer of the fund. Derivative statutory authorization is, therefore, available. B. Subject Notification and Review 1. POLISH CLAIMS PROGRAM.-Notification is not provided per se; however, the voucher signed by the awardee prior to payment authorization has the obvious appearance of a mechanically prepared docu ment. According to the response, a subject individual is allowed to review, supplement, explain, or rebut material contained in his file. 2. POSTAL SAVINGS SYSTEM.-Because information in this data bank has to do with persons whose whereabouts are unknown, the matter of notification and access to subject individuals is, according to the response, inapplicable. C. Access by Other Agencies The responses state that other agencies are denied access to both files. However, given D.2 below, it seems reasonable that an agency could gain information if it were shown that such disclosure would aid in locating depositors. D. Public Access 1. According to the response, there is no access by outside parties to Polish Claims Program files. 2. POSTAL SAVINGS DEPOSITS.-Regulations permit that a list of depositors be provided outside parties". . . for the purpose of assisting Treasury in locating depositors." E. Security Precautions 1. POLISH CLAIMS PROGRAM. No guidelines have been published. The response asserts that no action can be taken by Computer Operations' personnel unless a request is received from an authorized Treasury official. 2. POSTAL SAVINGS DEPOSITORS.-Records are maintained of each inspection or use of records. No specific guidelines or procedures have been developed; even so, the response does indicate that action cannot be taken regarding Savings Depositors files ". unless a request is received by [from] an authorized Bureau employee.” F. Sources of Information 1. POLISH CLAIMS PROGRAM.-Information is supplied to the Treasury by the Foreign Claims Settlement Commission and individual awardees. 2. POSTAL SAVINGS FILES.-Information came originally from local post offices. IV. Evaluation Of the areas of interest to the subcommittee, access is the only matter that gives concern. Although access to parties other than those making routine use of files is restricted, procedures to assure adherence to the policy of nondisclosure are lacking. Agency Response The following Bureau of Accounts responses to the subcommittee's. October 15, 1971 request for replies to the subcommittee's standard questionnaire (see inside back cover), were prepared November 16, 1971. They were not received by the subcommittee until May 8, 1973. 2537... BUREAU OF ACCOUNTS, DIVISION OF FINANCIAL MANAGEMENT A. POLISH CLAIMS PROGRAM Date Response Prepared.-November 18, 1971 Class of File.-All Other Files File Control No.-07 File Medium.-Magnetic Tape National Security Classification.-None (1) Describe briefly the major categories of data on individuals presently maintained and stored under auspices of the Treasury Department and its agencies and the approximate number of subject individuals covered in each category. The Polish Claims, as adjudicated to Treasury by the Foreign Claims Settlement Commission was placed on computer tape in order to facilitate the annual payments to awardees. The Program contains the following data: (a) Claim number. (b) Awardee's name and address. (c) Annual payment. (d) Prior year unpaid amounts. The approximate number of payees in the Program is 5,500. (2) Under what statutory and administrative authority was each data bank established and for what purpose? Please supply copies of pertinent federal statutes, regulations and memoranda on which this authority is based and by which it is implemented. The authority, for the Polish Claims Program, is the International Claims Settlement Act of 1949, as amended (22 U.S.C. 1627, E.O. 6166, S4 (5 U.S.C. 901 nt)). The administrative authority to computerize payments is Treasury Department Administrative Circular 73, dated June 27, 1962. (3) Are Treasury Department controls, guidelines, or advice required by or offered to state officials and private individuals who either administer or who utilize this data-gathering program? Please supply copies of pertinent rules or advisory documents as issued by federal and state agencies. No one except the Bureau of Accounts uses the information that is in the Polish Claims Program. (4) For each category and each conglomerate of data, indicate its present state of computerization or other mechanization for access and retrieval as well as for evaluation and analysis. The present state of computerization is tape and information is retrieved by using the account number of the award as the input data. (5) Describe plans for further computerization or mechanization in each program. There are no plans for further computerization of the Polish Claims Program. (6) In what instances would each system be utilized? By what officials and by what agencies? Not applicable. (7) For each new data storage and processing program, please describe: (a) the advantages; and (b) the extent to which it permits correlating, common storage and multi-faceted analysis of data on a scale not hitherto available. None planned. (8) What specific subject areas concerning an individual's background, personal life, personality and habits are noted in each data program? The Program contains only the payee's name, address, the annual amount due and any unpaid prior year amounts on the award. (9) Has the Treasury Department and its component agencies developed comprehensive guidelines governing maintenance of any or all the various data systems, access to them, review and disclosure of material in them, and distribution of data to other agencies? If so, please supply copies. None applicable to this Program. (10-A) Is the subject individual or his representative notified of the fact that he is in the data bank? Not specifically. However, the payment application voucher provided to the awardee for signature prior to payment authorization is a document obviously generated by a mechanical process. (B) Is he allowed to review the data on record about him; to supplement his file; or to explain or rebut inaccurate material? Please describe the precise limitations on such rights for each restriction. Yes. (11) What aspects of the recorded data are available to other persons? Who, specifically? For what purpose? By what authority? None. (12) Is a record maintained of each inspection or use of the individual's record? No one has access to the program data except authorized Treasury employees. (13) For each data bank, please indicate how the information is collected, whether it is solicited from the individual, from third persons, or from existing records. All information was placed into the Program from existing records, as supplied to Treasury by the Foreign Claims Settlement Commission and individual awardees or their legal representatives. (14) What officials in your agency are responsible for determining the accuracy of information in the data bank? What provisions are made, procedurally, for deleting information found to be inaccurate or inappropriate, either on the initiative of the agency or on motion of the individual? Chief of the Claims Branch. All data change actions are initiated by the Claims Branch and forwarded to the Computer Operations Branch for program changes, with a computer printout being returned to the Claims Branch for review as to accuracy. (15) What other agencies have access to information or use of information in each data bank? None. (16) What states and federal agencies may utilize the data in your computerized files by coding, interfacing and other devices relating to their own computer? None. (17) What security devices and procedures are utilized to prevent: (a) unauthorized access to the data file; and (b) improper use of the information? No action can be taken by personnel of the Computer Operations unless a request is received from an authorized Treasury Official. (18) What formal or informal arrangement does the Treasury Department have with congressional committees for the authorizing and reviewing of new data banks and the clearance of new electronic or mechanized record-management techniques? Not applicable to this Program. (19-A) Have any data programs or the development of other comprehensive records systems been discussed before other congressional committees by Treasury Department representatives? Not applicable to this Program. (B) Have any been specifically approved by Congress or congressional committees? Not applicable to this Program. (C) If so, would you please supply any available testimony, or citations to such hearings? Not applicable to this Program. BUREAU OF ACCOUNTS, DIVISION OF FINANCIAL MANAGEMENT B. POSTAL SAVINGS DEPOSITORS Date Response Prepared.-November 18, 1971 Class of File.-All Other Files File Control No.-08 File Medium.-Magnetic Tape National Security Classification.-None. (1) Describe briefly the major categories of data on individuals presently maintained and stored under auspices of the Treasury Department and its agencies and the approximate number of subject individuals covered in each category. |