Re:Did the Intercept bungle the NSA leak?
by scottLobster on Tuesday June 06, 2017 @05:52PM
(#14501735)
Why would there be? Pluribus doesn't issue security clearances, the customer agency (in this case the NSA) does. It would be up to the NSA to do any additional background checks/vetting/polygraphs regarding security clearance for any contractors. Working for a contractor/switching jobs is hardly suspicious activity, so the NSA would have no reason to investigate her. Likewise Pluribus had no reason to be suspicious, so the most they'd do beyond the standard corporate background check is call up the NSA to confirm her clearance was active. At the end of the day even the NSA doesn't have the resources to be constantly vetting 100,000+ employees and contractors.
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Re:Did the Intercept bungle the NSA leak?
by fnordfnordfnord on Tuesday June 06, 2017 @08:36PM
(#14502789)
No, a contractor like Pluribus wouldn't issue the clearance, but they'd surely verify that the clearance exists and is valid. That seems like a good time to generate a cursory once over of the applicant's clearance. OTOH, since the IC is in the growth hacking phase these days maybe they don't want to do anything to slow down the money train.
How about applying machine learning towards vetting social media wrt people with TS and >TS clearance?
I have great name for this start-up, Minority Report...or maybe just boring old Palentir.
Re:Did the Intercept bungle the NSA leak?
by fnordfnordfnord on Tuesday June 06, 2017 @08:39PM
(#14502807)
I was about to say, Palantir's been done.
Lots of people with TS clearances hate Trump, but most aren't going to ruin their lives just because the president is an asshole. You'd end up ruining a lot of careers and chances are you'd never stop a single leak.