Security Clearance Jobs Blog

This week there was a flap over some contractor employees at the State Department looking at passport applications submitted by Barack Obama, Hillary Clinton, and John McCain without proper authorization. One of the issues raised was the propriety of using contractor employees in positions where they had access to sensitive personal data. In this case it seems only sensitive personal data they had access to was date and place of birth and social security number.

Consider the vast amount of personal data in the hands of contract background investigators: date and place of birth, social security number, telephone number, address, mother’s maiden name, place of employment, personal identifying information of spouse or cohabitant, comprehensive credit bureau report with complete account numbers, criminal history information, and information about past indiscretions. The same applies to contractor employees working as investigative case controllers and filing clerks.

It’s strange that after 9/11 the U.S. Government chose to replace all contractor security personnel at airports with federal employees, but used contractors to investigate their backgrounds to determine if they were eligible for employment. The government also uses mercenaries to protect government officials. Until 2006 OPM contract investigators were conducting security clearance investigations of other contract investigators and federal investigators. A conflict of interest? You bet. Some federal agencies are still doing this. Surprisingly the adjudication of security clearances is still considered “inherently governmental.”  But the conduct of security clearance investigations is not.

William Henderson

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According to the OPM Operational Goal Status for 2008, the following security investigation/clearance actions were scheduled to be completed on March 17, 2008:

1.    Develop a tiered investigative efficiency model for suitability and security clearance investigations.

2.    Develop requirements for expansion of Clearance Verification System as a single search system to increase utility of the data system across Government.

3.    Explore alternatives for continuous monitoring of persons in positions of trust, assess potential regulation changes, and propose FAR language to GSA for continuous monitoring of contractors.

4.    Assess and recommend Executive Order language to extend suitability to excepted service employees and contractors with staff-like duties.

5.    Develop policy for reciprocity of all suitability decisions at any level of investigations.

6.    Develop policy for reciprocity of all suitability investigations at any level of a tiered investigative model.

It seems odd that OPM is busy considering changes (items 1, 2, and 3) to the existing clearance system when the existing system may be scrapped in its entirety within the next 12 months and replaced by a new system currently being designed by DOD and DNI.  The time to develop these changes was last fall when DOD and DNI asked for recommendations.  Items 4, 5, and 6 appear to be in direct response to the President’s 5 February 2008 memo on Security Clearances and its new mandate to integrate suitability and security clearance processing (something DOD and DNI should have seen the need for last fall).

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Our popular series of Q&A regarding security clearances continues in this thread. Before you ask your question, please navigate to view threads one through three to see if your question has already been asked and answered. When asking a question, please include all relevant details to your case. Avoid using acronyms when possible, and do not publish your email address in your posting. Thanks

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