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Interviewing with the NSA
George Maschke writes "'Interviewing With an Intelligence Agency (or, A Funny thing Happened on the Way to Fort Meade)' is a humorous and entertaining account of one man's recent experience seeking employment with the National Security Agency (NSA). But this story, newly posted to the Federation of American Scientists website, is also one with a serious message. Written under the pseudonym 'Ralph J. Perro,' it includes discussion of the job interview, psychological testing, polygraph, and background investigation. It will be of interest to anyone contemplating employment with a federal intelligence agency."
A while back there was an opening in the CIA for an assassin. These highly classified positions are extremely difficult to fill, requiring an extensive background check, training, and testing before candidates are even considered for the position. After reviewing several applicants and completing all the checks and training, the field was narrowed to the three most promising candidates. The day came for the final test, which would determine which of equally qualified candidates, would get the job.
The final candidates consisted of two men and one woman. The men administering the test took the first candidate, a man, down a corridor to a closed door and handed him a gun saying, "We must be completely assured that you will complete your assignments and follow instructions regardless of the circumstances. Inside this room you will find your wife, seated in a chair. Take this gun and kill her." The man, looking completely shocked said, "You can't be serious! I could never kill my wife." The CIA man said, "Well, then, you're obviously not the man for the job. Take your wife and go home."
They brought the next candidate in, the other man, and repeated the instructions. This man took the gun, walked into the room and closed the door. However, after five minutes of silence, the door opened and the man handed the CIA tester the gun, saying, "I just couldn't do it. I couldn't kill my wife. I tried to pull the trigger but I just couldn't do it." The CIA man said, "Well, then, you're obviously not the man for the job. Take your wife and go home."
Then they brought the woman down the corridor to the closed door, handed her a gun, and said, "We must be completely assured that you will complete your assignments and follow instructions regardless of the circumstances. Inside this room you will find your husband, seated in a chair. Take this gun and kill him." The woman took the gun, walked into the room, and before the door closed all the way, the CIA men heard the gun start firing. One shot after another, for thirteen shots, the noise continued. Then all hell broke loose. For the next several minutes, the men heard screaming, cursing, furniture crashing and banging on the walls; then suddenly, silence. The door opened slowly and there stood the woman.
She wiped the sweat from her brow and said, "You guys didn't tell me the gun was loaded with blanks! I had to beat him to death with the chair!"
The Army reading list
Sample application question:
Which of the following words does not belong with the others?
"Federal, Intelligence, Agency"
Don't RTFA, it's a PDF...
how long until
Lie detectors are not effective. This is just being used to scare people into thinking they can't lie. I really wish more people knew more about psychology....
That's my name, and I recently interviewed for a job with the NSA. I'm sooo dead.
A friend of mine recently got a job at GCHQ, which is a bit like the British version of the NSA. You ought to see the number of forms he has to fill in... background info, more personal details than you can possibly imagine, and they're going to background check all of it. He put me down as a character reference, I might end up writing an essay about how trustworthy he is and getting inteviewed myself, and I'm not even the one applying for the frickin job!
Just wondering, but is it legal to post this sort of information? I would believe that this is classified to some sort of level, since the NSA doesn't want wannabee-feds to prepare for the (psychological-) tests. Makes sense he/she uses an pseudonym indeed, but is it really that way?
In need of reliable and affordable server monitoring?
And here's Slashdot, linking directly to a glaring example of #3. I don't know why exactly this guy decided to write up an experience and procedures which they tell you at the door are secret, but I know that the government isn't going to take too kindly to this web site giving Al Queda what is nearly a HOWTO document for infiltrating the NSA. I think we all remember the last time the Secret Service had to delete content from Slashdot. I hope the administrators have the good sense to pull this before the men with the folding uzis visit again.
If guns kill people, then CmdrTaco's keyboard misspells words.
I interviewed with the NSA for a co-op when I was in college. It went great and I wanted to work for them, but I failed the polygraph. Not once, but twice. That would be fine if I was actually lying, but I told them all the bad things I had EVER done and I still couldn't pass. It said I was lying when I answered that I hadn't been involved in espionage, taken drugs, or committed major crimes. That was my first experience of what a confessional must be like. They called me back and offered to fly me out again to try and pass the polygraph, but I passed. That experience made me lose all confidence in the supposedly all-powerful polygraph test. It's a farce and it's about as effective as reading tea-leaves.
I interviewed with the NSA. Government jobs have their advantages... In any case, as someone who wanted to get a Ph.D. and be a scientist (an now I'm about 3/4 of the way there), I decided against it because anything I ever wanted to publish after the fact would be subject to government sensors due to the clearance you must have to work for the NSA. I declined the initial offer they made (the one before they do the expensive background investigation) so I didn't go through any of the harder core testing or background checks.
When I interviewed (~1999, pre 9/11) it was pretty relaxed. None of the cloak and dagger, don't admit your are interviewing with the NSA stuff.... I pretty much called and explained I needed a flight for an NSA interview, a hotel for the interview, etc. No one ever told me not to talk about it, or keep it secret.
I did, however, sign a non-disclosure agreement that said I wouldn't talk about what I saw inside their facility (and thus I'm not), but that makes perfect sense.
Spell check? Why bother. That is what grammer/spelling Nazi freaks who waiste band width posting "spell right" are for.
Examine page 20.
What's wrong with this picture?
and here's a somwhat older story about the perils of applying for a security clearance from risks.d http://yarchive.net/risks/mongrel.html
Do you trust the pdf? Why is it a pdf? Is Adobe in league with the NSA? could the acroread you installed to replace the KGhostgview default KDE PDF reader because "the rendering is better" be backdooring your linux box right now, after you were insufficiently paranoid by clicking on the pdf link? Oh you fool. You fool. You're not even wearing your tinfoil hat to stop Scalar/Longitudinal EM wave interference with your brain!
Choice of masters is not freedom.
The extensive psychological testing of NSA would-be employees is a Good Idea. Remember that the major security leaks from the Mannhattan Project were government scientists who decided that it was their duty to humanity to hand nuclear secrets over to the communists. (We now know exactly who the commie spies were thanks to the declassification of old Soviet Union documents... None of the people McCarthy accused were on the list, but multiple scientists from Los Alamos were.)
They had contacted him, which was interesting, for I believe a "Field Op" position... but anyways, he didn't tell me much about it, but one of the questions they asked him, when hooked up to the lie detector was:
"Have you ever inserted your finger into your asshole for pleasure?"
The guy was straight faced and did not even show the slightest sign of thinking this question was odd or funny.
A couple other things he mentioned where much much interesting than that... but I don't know, after hearing it I haven't ever mentioned it to anyone (not even my wife)
Casual Games/Downloads
I think all articles from now on should carry a PDF warning, akin to the NYT registration warning.
@#@#$@ PDF plugin crashed Moz.
Sometimes I wish I was a plumber, then I'd know how to deal with other people's shit.
The Handwritten Questionnaire
The handwritten questionnaire asks for a lot of information already supplied on the security forms, such as:
Name, age, education, marital status, children (if any), etc.
The more interesting questions were (as best I can recall):
- Describe the relationship to your mother
- Describe the relationship to your father
- Describe your parent's relationship to each other
- Have you ever had psychological counseling? (when/how long, etc.)
- Have any relatives ever had psychological counseling?
- Have you ever attempted suicide?
- Have you ever had a substance abuse problem?
- Do you drink? If so, how many drinks per week? per day?
- When was the first time you drank alcohol?
- Have you ever had interpersonal issues at work? (e.g., work relationships)
- Have you ever had disciplinary issues at school/military?
- Have you ever been convicted of a misdemeanor/felony?
- Have you ever been questioned by the police/authorities? (N.B., this would appear to be the catch-all, in case
someone wasn't convicted)
- Do you have any relatives that were in trouble with police/authorities?
- Have you ever taken something that was not yours? (This may have been worded as something slightly different.
but this was the intent)
- Have you ever committed computer abuse? (N.B.: whether deliberate or not, I recall the term 'abuse' being left
unspecified, ostensibly leaving the door open for all sorts of self-reporting ranging from checking personal email at
work, to having used Napster/Morpheus etc., to writing viruses, hacking websites and stealing credit cards
numbers.)
- Have you ever been the victim of a violent crime?
- Have you ever clucked like a chicken? If so, did you scratch backward or frontward?
- Describe your relationships to chickens.
The last page had about 20 sentences for the applicant to complete. Some that I remember were...
- Men should ____
- Women should ____
- I get angry when/because ____
- Chickens should ___
Given the theme, I would hazard a guess that the other sentences were ones that touched on potentially strong
emotional reactions like "I most regret," "If I only could", "I won't" and things like that.
The Computerized Test
As close as I can remember, these were some of the actual questions on the test. (true/false)
- I would like the job of a forest ranger
- I hear voices in my head
- I read the crime reports in the newspaper
- I have a mortal fear of earthquakes
- I have neck/hand pain
- I usually know what's going on (with my circle of friends)
- People are out to get me
- I would like the job of a librarian/florist (I can't remember which one it was, and it might have been both)
- I often feel that I can't get out of bed
- If someone has their possessions stolen from their unlocked car they had it coming.
- I like/enjoy children
"Animal-relationship"-type questions (e.g., "I enjoy animals", "I don't enjoy animals", "I like hurting animals", "It
bothers me when I hear about animals getting hurt" etc.)
- I am totally insane and like to stand on tables and cluck like a chicken
A few previous questions might not have actually been on the exam or the handwritten portion, but you get the
point. The questions went on and on.
"Presidents can snort coke, sleep with subordinates and be alcoholics."
who are we talking about here? Clinton or JFK?
A friend of mine from India was recently trying to decide between two jobs, one with the US Government and one in the private sector. He was leaning toward the government job, because he enjoyed the work more, until he talked to a collegue who had just joined the NSA. She told us how the agency required her to report all of her international friends, and keep tabs on their meetings. She had to get special permission to travel abroad. He decided, on the spot, to take the job at the private company.
-- Give us your technology and we'll give you all the cow lips you want.
here's the interesting (or frightening) part. two weeks before he left for his new job, i had to send a bunch o sensitive data to some management type. so i called up our spook-to-be and said "point me to yr public key so i can send you this data pgp'd and yout can pass it on." his response?
"i don't have a public key. that cryptography stuff is a waste of time."
good luck national security association in all your future endeavors!
2 1337 4 u!
NSA: "Sir, have you at any time read or posted to Slashdot."
Interviewee: "Well, yes, I have."
NSA: "Arrest this man."
----
"Ours was a free culture. It is becoming much less so."-Lawrence Lessig
If they do manage to infiltrate the NSA, at least you can sleep at night knowing *somebody* at the NSA knows what al-Qaeda is up to.
The article said: "After the process was over, I was talking to one of my references - a veteran Silicon Valley software executive, and former manager of mine. My reference commented on what transpired "That's disappointing. If they can't hire you, I have no idea who they can hire. That process seems to be designed to retain only the most bland." This is VERY TRUE A quasi-good friend of mine is in the NSA. He doesn't drink (maybe 8 beers in his life) has never been drunk, no drugs, lived with parents for 3 years after college, parents do well financially (not rich, not poor), father was a state trooper (parents never divorced), only one sister (small, tight knit family), had never left the United States (except to Canada... once), commuted to college (lived at home), received good grades 3.8+, graduated in the top 3% of his high school class, religious, comes from a small town, well rounded (played sports, basketball coach for teens... I'm also sure he had an amazing credit history and glowing reviews from previous employers. Why would the NSA want to hire qualified people that may be a security risk when they can simply hire people 2-3 years out of college from the middle of nowhere and train them the way that they want them to be trained. What's more risky, someone that is 100% loyal and quasi-qualified or someone that is 100% qualified, but potentially a security risk. They also may have been stringing this guy along to see if he was an agent for another country. (PS, I sure hope they wouldn't hire someone that has the potential to post a 13 page auto-biography and post it on the net!)
Would you ever post sensitive documents on the internet?
There are relatively few things that disqualify you compared to what they ask you. The purpose of most of the questions and polygraph is that they get full disclosure of what you have done. They need to know all the skeletons in your closet, so they can't be used as blackmail against you.
Espionage often starts very simple. One instance I was told about was about a civilian consultant who asked a military person to buy them cigarettes at the Post Exchange (to avoid taxes). They worked together and the soldier didn't see anything wrong with helping the guy out. More purchases were made with the soldier accepting cash kickbacks on the savings.
This was used as leverage to get him to give them some information. The soldier thought the info was harmless and that this would get him out of it but really he was just more involved. From there it can just get worse and worse and he has more to hide.
The NSA doesn't really care that you tried pot 6 years ago as long as you're not trying to hide that fact. Someone that wants that fact hidden is a prime candidate for getting started down that slippery slope. It would probably start with something harmless, "Tell me what time so-and-so gets to work or I'll tell your entire church you smoked dope." If you're a neurotic person that needs to hide your past actions and pretend you were always the law-abiding, church goer that you are now then that may be perceived as a real threat that you'd go for.
t
WILL: Say I'm working at N.S.A. Somebody puts a code on my desk, something nobody else can break. So I take a shot at it and maybe I break it. And I'm real happy with myself, 'cause I did my job well. But maybe that code was the location of some rebel army in North Africa or the Middle East. Once they have that location, they bomb the village where the rebels were hiding and fifteen hundred people I never had a problem with get killed.
(rapid fire)
Now the politicians are sayin' "send in the Marines to secure the area" 'cause they don't give a shit. It won't be their kid over there, gettin' shot. Just like it wasn't them when their number got called, 'cause they were pullin' a tour in the National Guard. It'll be some guy from Southie takin' shrapnel in the ass. And he comes home to find that the plant he used to work at got exported to the country he just got back from. And the guy who put the shrapnel in his ass got his old job, 'cause he'll work for fifteen cents a day and no bathroom breaks. Meanwhile my buddy from Southie realizes the only reason he was over there was so we could install a government that would sell us oil at a good price. And of course the oil companies used the skirmish to scare up oil prices so they could turn a quick buck. A cute, little ancillary benefit for them but it ain't helping my buddy at two-fifty a gallon. And naturally they're takin' their sweet time bringin' the oil back and maybe even took the liberty of hiring an alcoholic skipper who likes to drink seven and sevens and play slalom with the icebergs and it ain't too long 'til he hits one, spills the oil, and kills all the sea-life in the North Atlantic. So my buddy's out of work and he can't afford to drive so he's got to walk to the job interviews which sucks 'cause the shrapnel in his ass is givin' him chronic hemorrhoids. And meanwhile he's starvin' 'cause every time he tries to get a bite to eat the only blue-plate special they're servin' is North Atlantic scrod with Quaker State.
(A beat.)
WILL (cont'd): So what'd I think? I'm holdin' out for somethin' better. I figure I'll eliminate the middle man. Why not just shoot my buddy, take his job and give it to his sworn enemy, hike up gas prices, bomb a village, club a baby seal, hit the hash pipe and join the National Guard? Christ, I could be elected President.
BH
Fools! They laughed at me at the Sorbonne...!
Anyone can beat a polygraph test. You don't need to be of a certain personality type. Once you understand the trickery behind the "test," it becomes a relatively simple matter to manipulate the outcome. See AntiPolygraph.org's free e-book, The Lie Behind the Lie Detector (1 mb PDF) for a full run-down.
George W. Maschke
AntiPolygraph.org
Can anyone explain the obsession the NSA seems to have with chickens? Or did the author just stick those in as a joke?
The test he's talking about in the article is called the Minnesota Multiphasic Personality Inventory (MMPI) II. It consists of 567 true/false questions (the original had 566). As you might suspect, it takes a while to answer them all.
The test is very thorough. The scoring process includes statistical analyses to determine how much you're lying and whether you're trying to "fake good" or "fake bad". There are also a large number of scales that report how likely you are to be an alcoholic, have some kind of schizotypal personality disorder or depression, levels of anxious/antisocial/obsessive behavior, etc., etc.
bytesmythe
Hypocrisy is the resin that holds the plywood of society together.
-- Scott Meyer
with what this person has said. I too went for an interview with one of our intelligence agencies and the process he describes is spot on.
I went through the 10+ page background information packet and even had to ask my dad for his naturalized citizen number! I couldn't explain why other than to say, "I need it for a form I'm filling out."
I drove down to the interview location and was told in my pre-interview packet to avoid urinating in the morning before I came down as there would be a urinalysis test. Let me tell you, it's darn near impossible not to take a piss in the morning even if you don't have anything to drink later than 8 pm the previous night.
I did stop on the way down because I knew I wouldn't make it but drank a load of water to hopefully help compensate. (not like I had any worry about what they might find mind you).
The tests on the first day were urinalysis, blood test, sight test, hearing test and after lunch the big one, polygraph. We got to watch a short video about how a polygraph works and what to expect and then one-by-one we were taken to a room for our exam.
The first of my two polygraphs was given by a woma who was polite but professional. We went over the questions she was going to ask so there was no confusion as to whether I understood them or not. In some cases where clarification was needed I wrote down why I was going to say what I eventually said. In my case a relative was working for the federal government and I did have a relative who was not a native-born or naturalized citizen.
While most people are anxious when taking a polygraph I can tell you I was completely bored and almost fell asleep a few times during the questioning. I had to fight to stay awake and resorted to looking at different spots on the wall in front of me.
The two funniest parts of the whole situation were these: initially when she asked me baselining questions she told me I had given excellent responses. Exactly what she needed. Then, after the round of questions was over she walked in front of me and told me, "You're lying. These are the worst readings I've ever seen from anyone."
I had to really fight not to smirk, smile or laugh and finally ended up saying I don't know what she's reading but I answered everything truthfully. She said she'd let me alone for a while to "think over what I had said" and walked out of the room. What did I do? I closed my eyes and rested myself.
When she came back in the second funny thing happened. As she standing there with a cup of coffee in her hand she proceeds to tell me I'm lying again, all the while she's yawning her head off. Again I had to force back a smile and repeated that I was truthful in my answers.
She gave a second round of questions (I was able to stay awake more easily) and was once again told I was giving bad readings. Thus endeth my first day.
The second day was composed of my second polygraph, a booklet of questions (Do you care what happens to yourself?) and finally the meeting with the psych doc.
My second polygraph was with a man who was slightly more pleasant to deal with who, when asking me how things went the previous day, was told, "Apparently I gave the worse readings the previous examiner had ever seen".
We went through the same process of reading over the questions beforehand and then answering. At one point late in the process he asked, "What are you doing?"
I was puzzled and asked what he meant and once again was told I was giving bad readings. I certainly wasn't nervous though I was very relaxed. He came over and adjusted the blood pressure sleeve on my arm (I have small upper arms) and back we went with the questioning.
The only real difference between the second exam and the first was that in the second exam I could see the two-way mirror to my right at about the 1 o'clock position (so obviously was being watched) whereas on the first day it was behind me.
At the end of the second exam the examiner st
The author alludes to the part about the chickens being a joke.
George W. Maschke
AntiPolygraph.org
I was in the USAF from 1977 to 1982 in the Electronic Security Command (nee Security Service and called something else now). Though we were technically DOD personnel, all of our tasking came through the NSA and that's who we reported to and through to other agencies. My last station was at Fort Meade. Life was exciting working the Soviet problem from northern Japan and later China, Vietnam and parts of the Indian Ocean from the Philippines.
Without going into specifics, I'll say that their methods of checking someone out were very thorough. They didn't bother with polygraphs because they know as well as anyone how unreliable they are. But a highschool friend's dad happened to be an investigator who did part of my background check and the amount of crap they dug up was astounding. Some of it was stuff that I didn't know about myself before then.
Looking back, I'm almost surprised that I got the TS/SCI clearance based on their criteria (special compartmented intelligence is only one step below 'eyes only' and strictly 'need to know'). But nearly all of us took our work and the need to keep secrets very seriously. 'Gig talk' in a bar would cost you a round.
What is the deal with people on slashdot not wanting to read PDF files? Why do we need warnings that a link is to a PDF?
It's certainly not about standards compliance (Slashdot generating incompliant HTML 3.2 code anyone?) And, it's not about supporting patent encumbered file formats (GIF instead of PNG, multiple articles on MP3 players)
So tell me, honestly. Why do people have such a hard time with PDFs?
Overrated / Underrated : Moderation
As someone pointed out to a previous poster with a similar comment:
FBI: Federal Bureau of Investigation
CIA: Central Intelligence Agency
NSA: No Such^W^WNational Security Agency
Pionar intelligence would be an oxymoron, or just a plain moron.
Norris/Palin 2012
Fact: We deserve leaders who can kick your ass and field dress your carcass.
The "Analysys" section of that NSA interview document is definitely interesting, sort-of playing on the "AH HA! Made you look!" way of getting info out of people. Has anyone had similar experiences with lie detectors (that they're willing to admit)?
Trolls lurk everywhere. Mod them down.
...seeing his tendency to reveal confidential material, I can understand why they rejected him ;-P
:)
Seriously, a great read. I had to laugh out loud many times
..the ones I had while interviewing for developer position at Six Flags few years back. Go figure.
My wife has been interviewed multiple times by the feds as some of her friends applied for jobs in the Justice Department. The above comment is exactly right. "Experimentation" with recreational drugs, and lots of other "bad acts" are not automatic disqualifications. Deceit is a definite disqualification.
We have one friend who was convicted of a felony count of child abuse and still got a job working in the field for the FBI. She had been either shot or stabbed (I can't recall) by a minor during a robbery. The (brilliant) judge sentenced the minor to counseling and she was required to go to one of these counseling sessions and describe to the perp how she felt being attacked. The kid laughed in her face, at which point she took off her shoe, lept accross the table, and started beating him with the shoe. This resulted in here being convicted of child abuse. The FBI agent doing the interview actually laughed at the circumstances.
A long time ago as I graduated from college I had exactly 2 job offers, one from Mitsubishi and one from the US DOD. Now being 6'6" and the Mitsubishi job was 50% travel to Japan, I feared that I was a gaijin as they come and that I wouldn't survive as business class hotel occupant, I took the DOD job. So I began the waiting for all the clearance paperwork and process to start and clear. At least at this time you could begin working on unclass stuff while waiting for the background investigation and all the other stuff. I never had to do a polygraph, but I did have the security interview. I was 23 at the time and had grown up in a pretty conservative, Christian midwestern household (e.g. church on Sunday, I was an Eagle Scout, no trouble with the law except a speeding ticket etc.). To the government spooks this screamed plant - They asked me repeatedly if I had used drugs (nope), Are you sure? You can tell us it's ok?, Have you ever had an extramartial affair? (I was single at the time) Do you have deviant sexual habits etc etc. Answering those questions truthfully just increased their skepticism. Eventually it was over and I went back to working on my unclassified work (which tended to be keeping myself busy with make work and crossword puzzles). They were also very concerned that I had gone to E & W Germany, Austria and Czechoslakia on a high school german club trip. Three months later they granted my clearence. The work was completely unintersting (and they couldn't tell me much about the job during the interview since it was all classified). Within a year I had found a better job in the private sector and never looked back. I believe part of the reason the job was classified was so they could hide the costs in a budget. The total cost to the US taxpayer was approx $75k for my salary and background check costs. The applicant is better off getting denied a clearance.
"NSA is now funding research not only in cryptography, but in all areas of advanced mathematics. If you'd like a circular describing these new research opportunities, just pick up your phone, call your mother, and ask for one."
My father once told me about a crew member he flew with in the U.S Air Force.
Note: My father was a Navigator on some of the "Looking Glass" flights during Vietnam.
Seems the man was up for promotion and needed to go through a background security check to get his grade increase. After filling out the stack of forms and giving the addresses of every relative, he sat back and waited for final approval and clearence.
After three months of no word, and finding that his C.O. was told to ground him until further notice, he felt he needed to call around to his relatives to find out what the problems were and to find out what, if anything was said.
Being from a very small town in the back hills country of the Ozarks, it took a little while to locate the troubles and find out what went wrong. The man finally got in touch with his own father and asked if Air Force Security had sent someone out to interview them. His father replied, "Yep. Them revenuers been sniffin 'round here askin all sorts of questions 'bout you. But don't worry none. We didn't tell them nothin!"
It took about an hour to straighten out his father and after asking his C.O. to re-submit the paperwork, he got his promotion in about a month.
-Goran
Carpe Scrotum - The only way to deal with your competition.
The Everything Graph would be called a pangraph, not just a polygraph...
For what you know he might have cleared this with the NSA in advance.
What's a more likely reason for the pseudonym is that he made very clear choices as to which information he think is acceptable to post, and that he don't want to enter into any discussion, or don't want people to try to trick him into revealing anything he shouldn't be revealing.
Writing under a pseudonym makes this a one way communication that is very restricted in scope. Apart from which specific tests they are using, the write up reveal very little that could be useful for anyone. And even that information would have little relevance, as someone intending to trick their way into an intelligence agency would presumably expect psychological profiling and be briefed on, or read up on, the most common tactics to handling them.
He also makes some assumptions on the interpretation, but fact is he don't KNOW the profile they are looking for, and hence can't reveal it - he doesn't even reveal his own profile so we don't even have a single data point of someone who was rejected.
He assumes they want someone that don't exhibit significant tendencies in any way on the test, but that's not necessarily correct. They obviously want someone "safe", but without knowing the details of the position it's hard to say anything more. They might be looking for a risk taker, and someone with moral inclinations that wouldn't give them a problem in massively invading peoples privacy (which is certainly a big part of NSA's work, at least outside the US). Hence being "bland" might be just as wrong as being a paranoid schizophrenic.
Frankly, while the paper was a good read, it didn't tell me anything that you couldn't likely find out or guess by looking at publicly available information and some social engineering to find people who might have been through the process and be willing to talk about it. If they felt they had a great need to keep any of this secret they'd been much more careful about it.
If I'd ever applied for a job like that, and I ended up with the "dentist chair" reaction to the polygraph, I would've screwed up exactly the same way as him - if I'm trying to stay still and calm my breathing subconsciously slows A LOT, and 20 seconds between each breath would certainly not be unusual (I tend to suddenly notice because I get out of breath)
I'd certainly be unhappy if I thought that was a reason for a rejected clearance - if I'd been prepared in advance I would have concentrated hard on breathing regularly, as I wouldn't see any point in trying to lie or evade questions (if I did go for an interview with the NSA, I'd expect them to figure out any lies by secondary means, and would assume that I should focus on ensuring that no dirty little secrets show up during interviews or other background checks without me having already disclosed it to them directly, so lying would be counterproductive), but I know it would be unlikely to be my natural reaction.
But apart from a few gripes relating to their personell policy, I didn't see any condemnation of the NSA, or of what they do - on the contrary.
When I was a senior in college in the early '80s (yes Im a fossil, get over it :-)) I interviewiewed with the NSA. It sounds like things haven't changed much. You first interviewed at the college (WPI in my case) and then they'd bring you down to Maryland for 2 days at some later point if someone found you interesting. You arrived at BWI and were picked up with a bunch of other college seniors by a gent in a van who was pretty clearly ex military (not a lot of folks with wicked short haircuts and that classic bodybuilder look in the early '80s). Everyone was taken to a hotel in Columbia Maryland. The first day was almost totally tests, the MMI (Michigan Multiphasic Indicator, the paper ancestor to the 500 question computer test), the same stupid questions about parents, and the interview with a psycholgist. Then some interviews at sites where people who were interested you interviewed you. This was almost the same as my interviews at Wang, DEC, Data General etc. but for one little difference. To get to the interviewers desk we had to go through an area where people were working on stuff that required clearance. The guy found a another person in the hall and had them stay with me. Then he went in and you could hear him saying, "Uncleared person coming through". He then came out and got me, as we walked through it cold be seen that most of the desks were clear of papers and the VT-100 clone terminals on a couple of the desks were powered off. Leaving 20 minutes later was a similar process. The second day was at FANNEX in Baltimore this had the dreaded polygraph. It was sureal to say the least. In the application you had to state what experiences you had had with illegal drugs. Unlike a recent president I had inhaled, and had listed my assorted miscreant behavior on the forms (actually needing a seperate sheet). This got me throuroughly questioned on the polygraph. Last thing was having finger prints done as part of the security clearance. I had worked a couple summers in delis and had (and have) a rather distinctinve scar on my left index finger from a cut cleaning a slicer. The young woman (20's?) in a naval uniform that took the prints looked at my left hand prints and said jokingly, "Don't commit any crimes or if you do don't do it left handed, they'll pick you up in a flash...". That was the only bit of humor (besides interacting with fellow interviewees) in the whole trip. Reading the paper it doesn't sound like they've changed much even the polygraph chair sounded familiar. The whole experience left me wanting to sing the chorus of "Alice's Restaurant" on the way out (and see if I couldn't coax it out of some of the others). Never did get an offer, but I can't say I'm disappointed now some 20 years later.
Just a thought but it seems to me they may have made the correct assessment. After his interview he seems to feel it's correct and necessary to divulge the entire hiring process for the world to see, after he's been told not too, that it's at least confidential if not a secret process (for proper reasons I imagine). I'm assuming he's done this out of anger or bitterness that he didn't pass. There was more than once his tone seemed to take that spin. Nevertheless, whatever his reason(s) for telling everyone, in my mind, they made a good call keeping him away from the real secrets. I'm in no way a flag waving zelot but I'm going to have side with the NSA on this one. -[d]-
but there are places in the government that require a degree of secrecy to maintain national security.
Why would security through obscurity work any better in government than in software? Honestly, if the interview is true, and the NSA is still using pseudoscientific crap like lie detectors, the Psychic Friends Network is probably more useful to national security. What a waste of tax dollars.
Make sure you remove your real name from the PDF document properties.
I never really knew about how a polygraph worked until I went to work for a company that does physiology equipment and software for research and education. On our website is a video of polygraph data (caution, 5 MB, windows media 9 format, 4 minutes). We don't make actual lie detectors...just educational stuff to illustrate the basic principles of their operation.
The video shows the kinds of body signals that are used in a polygraph that an examiner would look at to tell if someone's lying:
The text at the top of the video indicates what the person is doing when the red triangle appears above the data. They're a little blurred in the video, so I typed them below.
They start out with a list of tasks from simple to complex, illustrating how these three types of signals respond for things like talking and moderately difficult tasks (they wouldn't be used an an actual polygraph calibration). The 'questioning' period is at the end of the video and shows how these signals are used in a polygraph style situation.
The sequence of tasks at the top are
Can you tell if this subject lied on any of the questions? As you can see, a polygraph is definitely not a machine that can kick out a definitive "he's lying". The key to tricking a polygraph is learning how to control your mental state and bodily functions so that you just always reproduce the nice no-stress style signals (kind of like how athletes can pace their breathing to control heart rate).
Disclaimer: This comment is personal and not any kind of statement by my employer. I just think this stuff is interesting and wanted to share...and I'm definitely no pschyophysiology expert and not a polygraph examiner :-)
He did an MMPI-2 which has 567 questions (minnesota multi-phasic personality inventory - 2nd edition). The 5 factor model is from another test, the NEO-PI (Neo Five Factor Personality Inventory.
The MMPI was designed to compare people to statistically defined diagnostic groups (e.g. depressed, psychopath, manic), and later they figured out what those with characteristics of several groups were like (e.g. depressed and psychopath). The also have scales to detect faking in various ways.
The NEO-PI is based on factor analysis (more statistics) which boils down human orientations to the world into 5 main areas.
I'm not a professional therapist but graduated from many 12 step programs
-Turnip Onion --- Neither micro nor $oft. Linux is a fine tool.
...is that it tends to select the same types of individuals and screen out the 'outliers' on the curve. Government work is no different than any other type of work in that it takes all types of personalities and people to get results. Would Abraham Lincoln have been able to pass the screening? What about Douglas MacArthur? Thomas Jefferson? Teddy Roosevelt? Bill Gates? Bill Clinton? In all of these cases, the answer is 'probably not.' Instead, the process tends to select rather bland and reasonable personalities who are attracted to the idea being a small part of a powerful whole. While these types of people can be helpful to any organization, they are not, by themselves, sufficient to accomplish great things. Hence, we end up with government agencies that are hopelessly outclassed in their collective thinking by foreign elements who are antagonistic to our national goals and eventually, we have to pay in our national blood to recover the situation. This pschological/background/profile screening stuff for employees of sensitive government agencies mostly began around the time of World War II and it has not been a good thing IMO.
I interviewed for a co-op position up here in Canada with the feds that required a pretty high security clearance level. Think Canada's NSA.
:), how often do you look, how much money do you spend on it, what do you do when looking at it (duh :), do you watch with other people, do your friends/s.o. know of your fetishes, etc, etc, etc.
15 page background info to fill out, security interview, polygraph, the whole works. The interview was really, really bizarre. They basically want to know every bad/weird thing you've ever done, so you're pretty much baring your soul to these people.
What amused me the most, though, was when he asked if I had ever looked at pornography (who hasn't). And if I still do (who doesn't).
Well! You'd think I just admitted to killing Kennedy. What followed was probably 10 minutes solid of questions relating to it: What kind do you like (and he broke down into specific categories, some of which *I've* never even heard of, and I click on random Slashdot links all the time
I walked out of that room after 3 hours feeling like I had just run a marathon. To be honest, the whole thing left a bad taste in my mouth, and I ended up taking another job in the private sector. But it bugs me - the feds basically have every little thing about me on file. Would suck if our government decided to be less than ethical, now wouldn't it?
Looking back on it, it was an interesting experience, and while I have nothing to hide (the "worst" thing I've ever done is summed up in my nick) it's still unsettling. I now understand a lot better why privacy as a value in and of itself is a GOOD thing.
I kinda regret going through the process now, but *shrug*.
Endless arguments over trivial contradictions in books written by ignorant savages to explain thunder in the dark.
Even before I saw a few sample questions, I had a hunch, but that's got to be the test the NSA it using. I've taken it myself, and anyone who has taken it will immediately recognize it... a bunch of questions like "I am afraid of doorknobs".
You'd wonder what they could possibly learn from this. Well, a lot. The full name of the test is the Minnesota Multiphasic Personality Inventory. The test was originally developed in the '30, and has been continually refined since. It even scales to what degree you're attempting to fake the results, and whether you were trying to fake "good, bad, or neutral".
It wouldn't surprise me if a favorable MMPI result was the single most important factor in getting a security clearance.
Point out to them that Internet Explorer is available for free download, then sit back and watch the fun.
GCHQ Quantum Insert installed. If only our tongues were made of glass, how much more careful we would be when we speak
If you were a government agency and someone applied for a job with you who was making three times as much as you could pay him in the private sector would not be suspicious of their intentions? This guy obviously was only trying to get in to satisfy his curiousity. He wanted to wonder the halls of Fort Meade and get a pick at the secrets within. This is exactly the type of people they dont want I would think.
I walked, said, "Shrink...
"I wanna Kill!
"I Wanna Kill!!
"I Wanna KILL!
"Eat dead, burnt bodies.
"I wanna see blood and gore and guts and veins in my teeth.
"I WANNA KILL"
And I started jumpin' up and down, yellin' "KILL! KILL"
An' he was jumpin up and down with me, an' we was both jumpin' up and down, yellin', "Kill, KILL...!"
And the Sergeant came over, said "That's our boy," pinned a medal on me an' sent me on down the hall.
I didn' feel too good about it.
And you, madam, are very ugly. In the morning, I shall be sober.
In the R/I technique, the examinee is asked a series of relevant questions (Did anyone direct you to seek employment with this agency?) mixed with irrelevant ones (Is your name _________________?). The polygraph operator asks the question series several times in different orders. If the examinee shows consistent, specific, and significant reactions to a particular relevant question each time it is asked, no matter the order in which it is asked, deception is inferred and the subject will be interrogated in an attempt to extract a confession/admission.
This technique has no scientific basis whatsoever, however. For further reading, see Chapter 3 of The Lie Behind the Lie Detector, available free from AntiPolygraph.org.
George W. Maschke
AntiPolygraph.org