SCIF intrusion by members of Congress

Question

Having some tangential experience with Sensitive Compartmented Information Facilities (SCIF) and how seriously they are taken, I was shocked to hear that one was stormed in Congress by people carrying cell-phones.

Wikipedia defines a SCIF thusly:

A Sensitive Compartmented Information Facility (SCIF; pronounced "skiff"), in British and United States military, national security/national defense and intelligence parlance, is an enclosed area within a building that is used to process Sensitive Compartmented Information (SCI) types of classified information.

As noted in this article "... bringing phones into the secure area was a potential felony."

Is it correct that is it a felony to bring cell phones into such a secure area in the normal case?

I have found this document which describes standards around SCIF construction and management: TECHNICAL SPECIFICATIONS FOR CONSTRUCTION AND MANAGEMENT OF SENSITIVE COMPARTMENTED INFORMATION FACILITIES

I've not, as of yet, been able to find anything that explains what laws apply to these facilities and what ramifications there are for violators.

According this article:

...while there are criminal statutes that would otherwise come into play here, it is not useful to discuss them here because, under the Speech or Debate Clause of the U.S. Constitution, a member of Congress cannot be criminally prosecuted for an action he or she takes as part of the individual’s legislative work.

There is no reference to which criminal statutes would apply, however.

Is this assessment correct that such actions could not be criminally prosecuted were they illegal?

The above image is purported to be from the incident.

Alex Mooney made a recording inside the SCIF that he then published on Twitter here.

Answer 1

It is unlikely that it is a felony to enter a SCIF with a cell phone (or thumb drive, Apple Watch, fitbit etc). The felony clout comes from the non-disclosure agreement which references Sections 793, 794, 798, 952 of Title 18 and Section 783(b) Title of Title 50 -- gathering and disclosing information is a felony. A non-exhaustive reading of the relevant chapters of the US Code does not provide any evidence of a felony charge relatable to phones and SCIFs.

There is a federal law against knowingly entering or remaining in any restricted building or grounds without lawful authority to do so. This includes

knowingly, and with the intent to impede or disrupt the orderly conduct of Government business or official functions, obstructs or impedes ingress or egress to or from any restricted building or grounds

which protects against intrusion of

a building or grounds so restricted in conjunction with an event designated as a special event of national significance

The courts would almost certainly hold the recent event to be a non-justiciable political matter.

Answer 2

The main protection for a SCIF is that it has a air gap to prevent data from being leaked. It is assumed that the computers in the SCIF could be compromised, so the air gap is essential.

It has been proven that the flickering from an LED light for a hard disk drive can hijacked to transmit encoded data. That flickering is not perceptible by the human eye, but can be picked up by cell phone cameras. https://www.pcworld.com/article/3173371/a-hard-drives-led-light-can-be-used-to-covertly-leak-data.html

Bringing cell phones into a SCIF certainly has the potential to be a treasonous act.