Districts Rethink Availability of Data on School Security

By Sean Cavanagh and Kathleen Kennedy Manzo

The news was vague, possibly months old, and transmitted from halfway around the world, but it eventually arrived in school districts in Florida, Michigan, Oregon, and other states with the urgency of a fire alarm: A man detained in Iraq was found with computer disks containing information about crisis planning, emergency procedures, and possibly even floor plans for several U.S. schools.

Since those initial reports surfaced late last month, federal authorities have said that the intentions of the man, who apparently culled data from the Internet, may have been harmless.

But administrators whose schools were mentioned in the reports and security experts agree the incident underscores a challenge for districts across the country: knowing how and when to restrict access to information such as emergency procedures...