Worth mentioning in detail although it was in tirk's earlier link to McCarthy's comment.
U.S. Code Title 18 - Part 1 - Chapter 37 - Paragraph
(f) Whoever, being entrusted with or having lawful possession or control of any document, writing, code book, signal book, sketch, photograph, photographic negative, blueprint, plan, map, model, instrument, appliance, note, or information, relating to the national defense, (1) through gross negligence permits the same to be removed from its proper place of custody or delivered to anyone in violation of his trust, or to be lost, stolen, abstracted, or destroyed, or (2) having knowledge that the same has been illegally removed from its proper place of custody or delivered to anyone in violation of its trust, or lost, or stolen, abstracted, or destroyed, and fails to make prompt report of such loss, theft, abstraction, or destruction to his superior officer—
Shall be fined under this title or imprisoned not more than ten years, or both.
You'll notice there is nothing in there about intent or security designation. Everybody who works with government, including contractors and suppliers, is responsible for protecting information they work with, regardless of whether it has a protective marking. Furthermore, to receive the clearance necessary to become SoS, he/she undergoes in depth training on document classification, transfer protocol and responsibilities of possession.
If a document, directive or memo isnt marked what must the person in control of that document, directive or memo presume it's classification to be?
Hint......it isn't declassified. It must be presumed to be the most sensitive until it is marked. Isn't that the standard that we should expect from such a high-level government official? Hell, I bet most folks here are more careful than that with their own jobs.
Click to expand...