The site was started in January by Frank Warren, a businessman and self-described "accidental artist" in Germantown, Md., who hit upon the idea of releasing secrets when he wrote one of his own on a postcard and mailed it off to himself.

Vanunu has acknowledged releasing Israeli nuclear secrets to a newspaper, but said he did it as a matter of conscience, to promote public debate on the program, and not as a spy.

As the night continues, the family releases secrets that cause fights but bring them closer in the end.

Firstly, you have to pay everyone's salary, which is probably going to be above that of a corporate code monkey due to the questionable legality and inherent danger of releasing national secrets.

Lt. Col. Richard Lehner of the Air Force, a spokesman for the organization, said that no one was accusing Dr. Postol of releasing secrets but that the antimissile office was taking steps to classify the letter and its appended reports.

Mr. Latell, who oversees the declassification of records and publishes scholarly historical papers under the C.I.A.'s auspices, said the agency was "very serious about openness" but had to be meticulous in releasing old secrets.

In 2005, a man was sentenced to four years in prison after firing a replica gun at a journalist during a staged deal for stolen copies of an unreleased Harry Potter novel, and attempting to blackmail the publisher with threats of releasing secrets from the book.

In early 2003, a federal judge threw out Dr. Schwartz's suit after deciding that going ahead would release military secrets that could hurt national security.