In United States law, the term Glomar response (aka Glomarization or Glomar denial) refers to a "neither confirm nor deny" response to Freedom of Information Act requests. There are two instances in which Glomarization has been used. The first is in a national security contexts, where to deny a request on national securities grounds would provide information that the documents or programs which the requester is seeking indeed exists. Glomarization is also used in the case of privacy, in which a response as to whether or not a person is or is not mentioned in law enforcement files may have a stigmatizing connotation.

Lower court precedent has thus far ruled the Glomar response to have potential merit, if the secretive nature of the material truly requires it, and only if the agency provides "as much information as possible" to justify its claim. Otherwise, the principles established in FOIA may trump claims to secrecy.

History

The Glomar Explorer was a large salvage vessel built by the Central Intelligence Agency

Central Intelligence Agency

The Central Intelligence Agency is a civilian intelligence agency of the United States government. It is an executive agency and reports directly to the Director of National Intelligence, responsible for providing national security intelligence assessment to senior United States policymakers...

 for its covert "Project Azorian" — an attempted salvaging of a sunken Soviet submarine

Submarine

A submarine is a watercraft capable of independent operation below the surface of the water. It differs from a submersible, which has more limited underwater capability...

. Aware of the pending publication of a story in the Los Angeles Times, the CIA sought to stop the story's publication. Journalist Harriet Ann Phillippi requested that the CIA provide disclosure of both the Glomar project and its attempts to censor

Censorship

thumb|[[Book burning]] following the [[1973 Chilean coup d'état|1973 coup]] that installed the [[Military government of Chile |Pinochet regime]] in Chile...

 the story, to which the CIA chose to "neither confirm nor deny" both the project's existence and its attempts to keep the story unpublished. This claim stood, and Phillippi's FOIA request was rejected, though when the Ford administration was replaced by the Carter administration in 1976, the government position on the particular case was softened and both of Phillippi's claims were confirmed.

The "Glomar response" precedent still stood, and has since had bearing in FOIA

Freedom of Information Act (United States)

The Freedom of Information Act is a federal freedom of information law that allows for the full or partial disclosure of previously unreleased information and documents controlled by the United States government. The Act defines agency records subject to disclosure, outlines mandatory disclosure...

 cases such as in the recent American Civil Liberties Union v. Department of Defense

American Civil Liberties Union v. Department of Defense

American Civil Liberties Union v. Department of Defense Case No: 04-CV-4151 , is a case in United States Federal Court wherein the American Civil Liberties Union sued the Department of Defense and the Central Intelligence Agency under the Freedom of Information Act for the release of still-secret...

, wherein Federal Judge Alvin Hellerstein

Alvin Hellerstein

Alvin K. Hellerstein is a senior judge of the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York and has been involved in several high-profile cases....

 rejected the Department of Defense

United States Department of Defense

The United States Department of Defense is the U.S...

 and CIA's use of the Glomar response in refusing to release documents and photos depicting abuse at Abu Ghraib prison.