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Fed Goes Hunting For Malcontents

Posted by Soulskill on from the are-you-now-or-have-you-ever-been-julian-assange dept.

snydeq writes "The wake of State Department document leaks to WikiLeaks may have the unhappy rousted from government agencies' 'privileged insiders' ranks, thanks to a recent memo from the US OMB asking agencies to spell out their strategies for minimizing insider risk. 'It's likely that federal contractors and government suppliers will also find themselves responding to this list of questions (PDF) and the central issue of preventing the unauthorized disclosure of sensitive and classified materials. In a key section of the memo, the OMB requests information on whether organizations are measuring the "trustworthiness" of their employees and whether they use a psychiatrist or sociologist to measure the unhappiness of an employee as a measure of trustworthiness.'"

3 of 193 comments (clear)

  1. Ignore the real problem by sheepofblue · · Score: 5, Insightful

    They are ignoring the real problem. Why did this guy have access to all of that? Why was the data not walled off some? Seems he had the ability to access and download data that was irrelevant for his job and THAT was the issue that made this such a problem.

    1. Re:Ignore the real problem by space_jake · · Score: 5, Insightful

      The thought the real problem was they did some shit they didn't want people to find out about and then buried it. Sounds like the solution to the problem is, don't be a douche.

  2. Re:Doesn't Figure by ultranova · · Score: 5, Insightful

    Someone who expresses unhappiness with government policies is likely to be security risk when it comes to government secrets. Conceptually, this is not a bad idea.

    Yes, it is. It means that someone who is unhappy will simply hide his opinions, which of course gives him more reasons to be unhappy: "I'll be fired if I don't toe the party line! I'm being oppressed!" And of course he's quite right, whether his original problem had any basis in reality or not. This means that not only does this not solve the problem, but will actually make it worse, as well as puts a chilling effect on freedom of expression.

    Yet another bright idea from our brave leaders worthy of a Dilbert Award.

    --

    Forget magic. Any technology distinguishable from divine power is insufficiently advanced.