Statement by the Department of Defense on the Release of Historical Navy Videos
The Defense Department’s April 27, 2020 statement authorizes public release of three previously circulating Navy videos, records their capture and unauthorized-release dates, states that release would not expose sensitive capabilities, and retains the observed aerial phenomena’s unidentified classification.
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Document Intel
Source status, provenance, and extraction context.
- Source / agency
- U.S. Department of Defense
- Type
- Press Conference
- Classification
- Unclassified
- Reference #
- —
- Published
- 2020-04-27
- Content Type
- text/html
- Pages
- 1
Structured Analysis
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The Defense Department authorized release of three unclassified Navy videos.
The Department of Defense has authorized the release of three unclassified Navy videos
The statement dates one video to November 2004 and the other two to January 2015.
one taken in November 2004 and the other two in January 2015
The department says the videos circulated publicly after unauthorized releases in 2007 and 2017 and had already been acknowledged as Navy videos.
after unauthorized releases in 2007 and 2017. The U.S. Navy previously acknowledged that these videos circulating in the public domain were indeed Navy videos.
The department says its review found that authorized release would not expose sensitive capabilities or systems or impede later investigations of military-airspace incursions.
the authorized release of these unclassified videos does not reveal any sensitive capabilities or systems, and does not impinge on any subsequent investigations
The stated purpose of release was to resolve public uncertainty about whether the circulating footage was authentic and whether additional material existed.
DOD is releasing the videos in order to clear up any misconceptions by the public on whether or not the footage that has been circulating was real
The Defense Department continued to characterize the aerial phenomena shown in the released videos as unidentified.
The aerial phenomena observed in the videos remain characterized as unidentified.
Chronology extracted from the document text.
Defense Department authorizes video release
The department publicly authorized release of the three unclassified Navy videos while retaining the unidentified characterization.
Additional Navy footage circulates after unauthorized release
The statement identifies 2017 as the second unauthorized-release year.
Two additional Navy videos recorded
The statement dates the other two released Navy videos to January 2015.
Navy video circulates after unauthorized release
The statement identifies 2007 as one of the years in which the footage entered the public domain through an unauthorized release.
First released Navy video recorded
The statement dates one of the three released Navy videos to November 2004.
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