Documents / Report
This September 2025 information paper from the All-domain Anomaly Resolution Office (AARO), part of the U.S. Department of War, explains how UAP-related information is classified and declassified. It says UAP imagery is often classified to protect the platform, location or methods used to capture it, and that only the originating office can declassify it. The paper describes the review steps and DOPSR clearance, and notes that records are being transferred to NARA. It states that AARO has found no evidence of extraterrestrial beings or technology.
UNCLASSIFIED UNCLASSIFIED 2 Figure 1: A screenshot from 2:53 of the video titled “Al Taqaddum Object” (popularly known as “the jellyfish video”), available to view online at https://www.dvidshub.net//video/960331/al-taqaddum-object. Why is so much UAP-related information classified? Classification is a mechanism the U.S. Government uses to safeguard sensitive information related to national security. For the Department of War, this sensitive information could include military objectives, locations, and capabilities, as well as vulnerabilities and intelligence sources and methods. For example, if an F-35 fighter jet pilot uses the aircraft’s camera to take an image of an ordinary object (a soda can, for example), that image could be classified for reasons other than the subject of the image (here, the soda can) and instead due to the use of the fighter jet’s camera. The image could contain information that meets the standards for classification due to its relationship to a sensitive capability that is itself classified. For instance, the raw image may include information about the resolution, metadata, or other sensitive information that could be used to deduce that camera’s capabilities and limitations. If an adversary were to combine this information with other information about the aircraft, that adversary might be able to draw conclusions about how to elude detection by those aircraft because that adversary would now better understand the capabilities of the F-35’s sensors. (UNCLASSIFIED) (UNCLASSIFIED)
Report, from the aaro collection. The PDF is mirrored here; the original link is above. 4 pages are in the text index: search them above, or from the library's search.