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9th Circuit Says Feds' Security Checks At JPL Go Too Far
coondoggie writes with an excerpt from Network World which explains that the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals "this week ruled against the federal government and in favor of employees at NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory in their case which centers around background investigations known as Homeland Security Presidential Directive #12 (Nelson et al. vs NASA). The finding reaffirms the JPL employees claims' that
the checks threaten their constitutional rights. The stink stems from HSPD #12 which is in part aimed at gathering information to develop a common identification standard that ensures that people are who they say they are, so government facilities and sensitive information stored in networks remains protected."
At issue in particular: an employee's not agreeing to "an open ended background investigation, conducted by unknown investigators, in order to receive an identification badge that was compliant with HSPD#12" was grounds for dismissal.
Homeland Security Presidential Directive #12:
You do not talk about Homeland Security Presidential Directives.
...or something like that.
My other car is a 1984 Nark Avenger.
Sorry, but no. Federal employees do have rights, as the court has ruled. If the matter were settled, it wouldn't have ruled that way, would it?
We owe a great deal to those who brought this case.
There was a briefing where I work about the plan. If you failed the background check, you had no way of learning the reasons. Though you could technically appeal, what would have been the good of that had you not known why. What if it had been simply that you donated money to a certain person, or that your spouse was from a certain country, or a mistaken identity? The other problem was that it took so long to do the checks. Since the program had not started they had no idea, but it was thought that the new process would likely add 6 months to the already tedious process in place. To give you an idea I have had two background checks here. Once it took 4 months the other time 2 since I had already passed an earlier one. Soon we learned about the likely challenge from NASA employees and we waited it out. It has taken years to get this far and thankfully it looks like this overstepping is going to end. The other thing is that the dept I work for and the job I do has me doing absolutely nothing secret or anything of the sort that might need this level of background check. Every employee was going to need it.
The final point I want to add is that during the briefing it became clear that not only was this a terrible new big brother style of infringement but that there were companies that were going to make a fortune doing this. As an example we were going to have to get a new set of IDs and all the doors and computers would have readers in order to use them.
I'm not clear from the link, but it appears that the situation may only apply to to existing employees.
You are happily working at your established job and some presidential directive comes down that establishes that you need a background check to get your smart card needed to access the network and do your job.
Current employees are now offered the "choice" of submitting to a background check or lose their jobs. The court ruled rightly that this is a no go, but I suspect new employees have to agree to a background check before accepting employment.
That means that it's not really about the people being harassed and forced to undergo invasive searches (See 4th Amendment) finding another job. No. It's about their job being just fine, and the Federal government having to be reasonable with its searches and seizures. (Again, 4th Am.)
That's how it is in our country. If you don't like it, watch the door doesn't hit you in the ass on your way out, and remember to wipe your feet on the "good riddance to those who don't respect civil liberties" doormat.
E
The real crap was that JPL was going to "resign" employees who did not submit to or pass the new background checks, attempting to circumvent California law with regard to unemployment etc. There was never any question that would be struck down.
Can someone please tell me what things like that damn suitability matrix have to do with suitability to work? Such as sexual orientation, traffic tickets, bad checks, eviction, incest, and bestiality have to do with ability to Science?
http://hspd12jpl.org/files/Suitability_Matrix.pdf
What will likely happen is JPL will be forced to follow the law ith regards to termination, and NASA will enact reasonable guidelines to keep our nation safe (most of the research at JPL isn't even that secret. It's not like we built WMDs or bioweapons. We build science satellites and probes.) that do not go above and beyond the President's directive.
Disclaimer: I was an intern at JPL when this shit started to hit the fan two summers ago.
93rd rule of Slashdot: No matter how obvious my sarcasm is, my comment will be taken seriously by someone.
At one of hte protests I went to, one guy stood up to speak and basically said he was glad he had a top secret clearance because it meant he didn't have to have his privacy invaded like this. That's saying something.
Disclaimer: I was an intern at JPL two summers ago when this was starting to be a problem.
93rd rule of Slashdot: No matter how obvious my sarcasm is, my comment will be taken seriously by someone.
The report in the linked article from networkworld is not accurate. Quote from the article "The stink stems from HSPD #12 which is in part aimed at gathering information to develop a common identification standard that ensures that people are who they say they are, so government facilities and sensitive information stored in networks remains protected."
/. but no wonder that the government always screws up!!
A close friend is one of the Caltech (technically, he is a contractor at JPL) employees who sued the Federal government. Caltech manages the JPL labs for the federal government. After 9/11, the Bush administration passed this directive to subject federal employees and contractors, working on sensitive and non-sensitive matters to the same invasive background checks. These background checks do not have a set standard or criteria for evaluation, are not disclosed and can affect your employment (read termination). This means that if someone who knows you, when interviewed, says he/she thinks you did pot, that's it, you can be terminated.
To subject federal employees and contractors who are working on confidential/sensitive projects is one thing although still not fair but it is completely unfair to subject employees or contractors working on non-sensitive projects to such arbitrary background checks.
As they say, devil lies in the details. The presidential directive itself does not require background checks. What is requires is that all employees and contracts, irrespective of the nature of work, have to be issued a standard identification card for entering federal facilities. Sounds fair, right? The rub is that to be issued this card, you must pass the background check. So by mandating a standard identification card, the government has mandated all employees and contractors be subjected to background checks. And this is what this group of 30 or so JPL/Caltech scientists are protesting.
On top of all this, these background checks are labour intensive because they require federal agents to interview people who know you and collect personal information about you. Another friend who worked for PG&E waited 3 months to enter the facility he was supposed to work at because the feds could not finish his background check soon enough. Imagine if thousands of other employees or contractors are subjected to this new directive? The quality of these checks is directly proportional to the number of federal agents who do this work and we all know that the number of experienced federal agents is not going to quadruple overnight. So the end result is going to be dilution in the quality of these checks which then defeats the intent and purpose of these checks.
Phew!! My longest post on
http://www.latimes.com/news/printedition/opinion/la-oe-rutten6-2009jun06,0,7067783.column
... sodomy ... incest ... abusive language ... unlawful assembly." It also said homosexuality could be a security issue under some circumstances."
"As The Times noted in January of last year, the government demanded that the scientists fill out questionnaires on their personal lives and waive the privacy of their financial, medical and psychiatric records. The government also wanted permission to gather information about them by interviewing third parties. At one point, JPL's internal website posted an "issue characterization chart" -- since taken down -- that indicated the snoops would be looking for a "pattern of irresponsibility as reflected in credit history
You are happily working at your established job and some presidential directive comes down that establishes that you need a background check to get your smart card needed to access the network and do your job. Current employees are now offered the "choice" of submitting to a background check or lose their jobs.
As I pointed out when this was posted on the NASAwatch website, the actual presidential directive, HSPD-12, is a directive that says government identification cards (including NASA IDs) should have pictures and be difficult to forge. Nothing more. The presidential directive does not say anything about requiring an invasive background check including checking medical, financial, and other personal background information along with a blank authorization to check any records at all. Nothing.
The whole thing about background checks was a stealth policy change that was slid into the new ID regulations by the OPM. It has nothing to do with HSPD-12, and most particularly it was not authorized by presidential directive.
http://www.geoffreylandis.com
Most of what JPL does is completely completely non-sensitive. Keep in mind this crap only applies to employees /not/ working on sensitive material, there is a different system in place for those on sensitive stuff.
93rd rule of Slashdot: No matter how obvious my sarcasm is, my comment will be taken seriously by someone.
I read that PDF - when was it written, 1955? Carnal knowledge? Sodomy? What?
I work on Naval vessels, and that requires a NATO security clearance. That's because - surprise - they don't want just anybody looking at the weapons systems. Some of that stuff is of vital importance to the military. THey want to keep it there and not give the bad guys leverage on me. The idea is that if I participate in one of those activities and Someone From Asia finds out, they might pop over to my house for a visit.
"Hey, Beardo. It sure would be a shame if your boss found out about your DUI... or that carnal knowledge. Can you copy document 1992FITH-559G for me? It's not even Classified. Anyway, see you tomorrow."
It seems antiquated at best, but there's SOME logic to what they're going for. I'm not saying it's current, but it's the Federal Government. They move S.L.O.
(The W. is in processing and will be sent after approval from the joint committee on W approval.)
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ECHELON is a government program to find words like bomb, jihad, plutonium, assassinate, and anarchy.