Detailed floor plans of this summer's G8 summit are no longer on the Internet after federal officials scrambled to remove them when informed that the files were publicly available on-line.
But G8 organizers faced a barrage of criticism yesterday after The Globe and Mail revealed that details about the Alberta location where the world's most powerful leaders will gather had been on the Web for seven weeks.
"It is stupid, it is stupid," Ehud Sprinzak, an expert on counterterrorism, said from Israel. "I've never encountered anything like it."
In the House of Commons, Public Works Minister Don Boudria said that the layout of buildings to be used for the summit was always public knowledge. He dismissed concerns raised by opposition critics and other observers that terrorists could exploit the centimetre-by-centimetre description of the rooms. "That kind of fear-mongering is totally unnecessary," Mr. Boudria said.
Federal officials reacted swiftly on Wednesday night when alerted to the Web posting.
Public Works and Government Services asked the administrators of Merx, owned by a subsidiary of the Bank of Montreal, to stop granting requests for the G8 files.
The Merx site, at http://www.merx.com, normally offers details about government-contract opportunities until bids close. The deadline is April 18 for bids on the G8 tender Rental of Conference Systems.
Public Works spokeswoman Fran Gershberg said the documents were removed initially because the RCMP wanted to examine them. When it was decided there wasn't a security threat, the government did not post them again because it is too late for companies to start a successful bid on the project, she said. "As part of cleaning up the site, the decision was made not to bother putting it back up."
Using the Merx system for tenders was a natural choice for planners behind the meeting of the Group of Eight industrialized nations in Kananaskis on June 26 and 27. Federal, provincial and municipal governments post notices about contracts to the site when they need to make major purchases.
Officials said they are not sure who compiled a request for the conference's audio and visual equipment. The request appears to have originated with the Department of Foreign Affairs and International Trade, although it may have been written by a Public Works administrator.
RCMP Corporal Jamie Johnston said an officer assigned to summit security likely reviewed the plans before they were published. "We probably would have looked at it," Cpl. Johnston said, although he could not confirm that.
Cpl. Johnston said the 132 pages of tender documents, published on-line on Feb. 22, are unremarkable. They are largely a list of technical specifications and basic site maps that are easily accessible elsewhere, he said.
Details such as the positioning of the main plenary room could be guessed by anyone familiar with the hotels and mountain lodges in the area, he added. "This isn't critical information."
The RCMP will not alter its security arrangements because the information was published, he said, although plans may change for other reasons.
But international terrorism experts say the RCMP's nonchalance about the documents is strategic misinformation or betrays a poor understanding of modern terrorism.
They're alarmed that the documents show the exact position of chairs and tables where high-profile leaders such as U.S. President George W. Bush and British Prime Minister Tony Blair will sit.
"Clearly, to publish the location of where VIPs will be placed is just a nightmare," said Harvey Kushner, a counterterrorism expert at Long Island University in New York.
If the RCMP hadn't been alerted, experts said, the information could have given a major advantage to anyone who intends to attack the conference.
The schematics would tell terrorists which wall to hit with a short-range missile, for example, or where to plant a bomb, experts said. They also show which entrances might be susceptible to a suicide raid. Knowing the positions of a security station and a lounge for RCMP officers would help in planning a diversion, they said.
"The problem is easy enough to solve," said Chris Hellman, a senior analyst at the Center for Defense Information in Washington.
"You have to move the locations and you have to do it now."
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