The government is lagging far behind in declassifying its secrets, and the problem is getting worse as agencies create billions more electronic records containing classified information, according to a new report.

In a report released Wednesday, a joint presidential-congressional advisory group urged greater openness, a sore subject for a White House roundly criticized for secrecy.

The Public Interest Declassification Board said President Bush can take immediate steps.

For example, it said, the White House should retain the president's daily brief prepared by the CIA so historians, researchers and the public can eventually learn what the intelligence community has told the president.

Secrecy and the president's daily brief became a contentious issue in the work of the Sept. 11 commission. The White House aggressively resisted public disclosure of the secret documents, including one that focused on Osama bin Laden's intention to attack targets inside the United States.

The Aug. 6, 2001, daily brief the administration reluctantly released during the 2004 presidential campaign was titled "Bin Laden Determined to Strike in the U.S."

The board's report says the president could immediately create a national declassification program under the U.S. archivist to increase efficiency. Under the program, all federal agencies would report declassification decisions on a single computerized system.

White House spokesman Tony Fratto said it would be premature to comment on recommendations in the report, which has been sent to heads of government departments for review and comment.

More than a billion pages have been declassified since 1995, but the report says the government has not yet come to grips with what it will face in the future.

"Too little has been done with regard to ... the truly monumental problem looming on the horizon: the review of classified information contained in electronic records," the report says.

In addition, it said, the government will probably be unable to meet a Dec. 31, 2011, deadline for reviewing classified information on microfilm, microfiche, motion pictures and sound recordings.

In 1995, President Clinton signed an executive order declaring that records would be presumed declassified when they reached 25 years of age.

It was thought this would encourage agencies to declassify records in bulk. Instead, agencies hired personnel to review records.