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| Home Front: Politix |
| Who holds security clearances (WaPo) |
| 2013-06-12 |
| [Nice graphic] Definitions: Top-secret: the most sensitive intelligence. Material, if made publicly available, would cause "exceptionally grave danger" to national security. Confidential/secret: material, if made publicly available, would be "prejudicial" to or cause "serious damage" to national security Numbers: Overall, 5 million hold either a top secret or confidential/secret clearance. Of these 3.6 million are federal employees, 1.1 million are private contractors, and 0.3 million have an indeterminate status. 1.4 million total hold a clearance to handle top secret material. Of these, 800,000 are federal employees, 500,000 are private contractors, and 100,000 had a status the government couldn't confirm. 3.6 million hold a confidential/secret clearance. Of these, 2.8 million are federal employees, 600,000 are private contractors, and 0.2 million have indeterminate status. |
| Posted by:Anguper Hupomosing9418 |
| #9 The poly is a complete and utter sham, designed to coerce you into confession, nothing more or less. I've read the Russian intelligence services train their people to fool the machine and therefore don't believe in 'em. And nice rant, btw. |
| Posted by: SteveS 2013-06-12 23:12 |
| #8 OK, I just put the Rant into Rantburg with that one Yes you did, OldSpook, and very throughly, too. |
| Posted by: trailing wife 2013-06-12 22:31 |
| #7 It's just ridiculous that one and a half million have "top" secret clearances. There are too damn many quote "secrets" and too many people with access. It's a way to keep the sausage-making away from those without the need to know. i.e. the citizens. What's not mentioned are the "name" clearances, where the real stuff lives. As with grade inflation, top secret doesn't mean much anymore, I guess. Sunset the whole "security" system and the Patriot Act, and start from scratch. |
| Posted by: KBK 2013-06-12 21:50 |
| #6 I did moke pot back in college a few times, found it boring, and it just made me hungry and want to go to sleep, never did see what the big attraction was Heh, yep. |
| Posted by: Glenmore 2013-06-12 19:22 |
| #5 But can you....bend spoons ? |
| Posted by: Besoeker 2013-06-12 18:09 |
| #4 The classification isn't nearly as important as the compartment and other caveats with the classification. And FYI, this guy was subject to a "Full Scope" (lifestyle) polygraph. Fat lot of good that did the government. I'm debriefed and out of that sort of thing for good now so no big deal, I dont face another poly or BI ever again. I dont have a need to know anymore, and further, given how things aree going, I 'm pretty sure I dont want the need to know. However ... (Rant coming on, feel free to skip it) I've had SSBI with the periodic reinvestigations and accompanying full scope polygraphs. And in all honesty, you can beat a poly - either training, or else be pathological enough that you believe your own lies. Even though I've passed all of my full scope polygraphs over the years, I've always hated them, and pretty much discount anything about them. They are crap, producing false positives and false negatives. Its pseudoscience and garbage. I know of at least one person who failed her poly and it cost her the job, yet absolutely no way it should have happened (hint: it was about sexual stuff, and she was a victim of childhood sexual abuse, so she triggered hard on some of the questions). Whats as bad as false positives is that the polygraph give a false sense of security, which means there is less and less of the more expensive old-fashioned counterespionage, and preventative measures - those are things that really work. And FYI, I have "beat" a polygraph (after a bit of training from a retired spook friend of my father) just to demonstrate to a friend of mine in CI that it could be done. I fooled his associate on an issue that I had already been truthful about on my real polygraphs regarding "recreational" marijuana use (which occurred well back in the previous century). And this wasn't some dime-store setup, it was at an offsite "contractor" office that does work for the military and three letter agencies, a few years ago - nice setup, all the feeds into a computer, and they even had the "butt pad" that detects people doing the old "sphincter clench" trick. I answered directly and clearly with a complete lie "No,, I have never smoked marijuana". "No I have never used marijuana" "No I have never tried marijuana", "No I have never experimented with marijuana", "No, I have never seen marijuana being used" ... no hedging, etc.. complete and utter lies, yet they never detected them. For the record, I did smoke pot back in college a few times, found it boring, and it just made me hungry and want to go to sleep, never did see what the big attraction was. And they did detect a lie that was a false positive because I projected one for them on a question of my own choosing, spontaneously diring the interview. "No I have never been arrested for a felony" (I never have, yet I was able to make it look like I was lying - something that would cost a person thier clearance). The poly is a complete and utter sham, designed to coerce you into confession, nothing more or less. The fact that it takes a "skilled" polygrapher to "detect" a lie shows that its pretty much not scientific, otherwise you could have a computer flag it. OK, I just put the Rant into Rantburg with that one... to hell with polygraphs, do proper security work and put in proper counterespionage precautions instead. |
| Posted by: OldSpook 2013-06-12 18:00 |
| #3 Top Secret obviously means "not that secret at all" then. |
| Posted by: Bright Pebbles 2013-06-12 13:56 |
| #2 ..and he's on first. |
| Posted by: Procopius2k 2013-06-12 13:22 |
| #1 Of course he does. He's the primary scientific adviser to UNIT! |
| Posted by: Rob Crawford 2013-06-12 12:50 |