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Researchers Design Bot To Conduct National Security Clearance Interviews
meghan elizabeth (3689911) writes Advancing a career in the U.S. government might soon require an interview with a computer-generated head who wants to know about that time you took ketamine. A recent study by psychologists at the National Center for Credibility Assessment, published in the journal Computers and Human Behavior, asserts that not only would a computer-generated interviewer be less "time consuming, labor intensive, and costly to the Federal Government," people are actually more likely to admit things to the bot.
Eliza finds a new job.
That's good, now tell me about your mother Dave...
How does that make you feel?
...that believe in magic, like the Polygraph test being "scientifically" valid.
The researchers concluded, in so many words, that national security clearance interviews can totally be outsourced to a computer-generated agent. That’s not an empty recommendation: The NCCA grew out of the Department of Defense Polygraph Institute and is still responsible for “lie detection” training for all branches of government. It's also tasked with developing new technologies for credibility assessment.
Them interviewing us? Always thought it would be the other way around.
SJW's don't eliminate discrimination. They just expropriate it for themselves.
From the Vice article, this sounds a lot like a robotic polygraph - the article directly mentions using "electrodes to measure cardiographic and electrodermal responses".. which is essentially what a polygraph does. I can't imagine that a robot will be any more effective at applying baseless pseudoscience than a human would - in fact, I wouldn't be surprised if the number of people who have their careers ruined due to a failed polygraph is higher with the robot than with a human "interpreter".
Wouldn't it be much more efficient to just eliminate the polygraph altogether?
Sounds more like M-M-M-Max Head-Head-Headroom, to me.
Holden: You're in a desert, walking along in the sand, when all of a sudden you look down...
Leon: What one?
Holden: What?
Leon: What desert?
Holden: It doesn't make any difference what desert, it's completely hypothetical.
Leon: But, how come I'd be there?
Holden: Maybe you're fed up. Maybe you want to be by yourself. Who knows? You look down and see a tortoise, Leon. It's crawling toward you...
Leon: Tortoise? What's that?
Holden: [irritated by Leon's interruptions] You know what a turtle is?
Leon: Of course!
Holden: Same thing.
Leon: I've never seen a turtle... But I understand what you mean.
Holden: You reach down and you flip the tortoise over on its back, Leon.
Leon: Do you make up these questions, Mr. Holden? Or do they write 'em down for you?
Holden: The tortoise lays on its back, its belly baking in the hot sun, beating its legs trying to turn itself over, but it can't. Not without your help. But you're not helping.
Leon: [angry at the suggestion] What do you mean, I'm not helping?
Holden: I mean: you're not helping! Why is that, Leon?
[Leon has become visibly shaken]
Holden: They're just questions, Leon. In answer to your query, they're written down for me. It's a test, designed to provoke an emotional response... Shall we continue?
Can you make smoke come of it by saying that everything you say is a lie?
Obviously we don't want to be a culture all about draconian punishments that last forever. But that presents a real conflict. Suppose for a brief moment that you have a slot for one honors student in a scholarship situation that holds great promise for an applicant. You have two of the most perfect applicants that you will ever see and both have wonderful credentials that are far above any reasonable expectations for any student. Yet one student had a minor arrest for being drunk while in the ninth grade. Isn't it fair to take the student with the perfect record? And what does it say about us if we allow a situation in which the less than perfect sometimes do better than those who are unblemished in any way? The problem is that we have very few people with stellar accomplishments and perfect social histories and they deserve the highest rewards whereas we have all kinds of people that have had a serious problem or two along the way who also may have great talents. Shouldn't we always strive to help the best the most? This line of though usually gets me some hate mail.
How does it deal when I ask it what ketamine is?
So when an idiot gets clearance, there is no one to blame? Remember the finger pointing after Snoden (not that he's an idiot) No more of that blame game with this! Problem solved.
"Are you now or have you ever been a member of the Communist Party of the United States..."
Whoopsie, wrong questionnaire.
We used to have a Bill of Rights. Now, with the rights gone, all we have left is the bill.
... I could be pre-approved for head of the NSA.
It little behooves the best of us to comment on the rest of us.
See what you've done? No more contractor vetting. All those jobs ...
It little behooves the best of us to comment on the rest of us.
Does that mean the current interviewers can't pass the Turing Test either?
Earlier you said something about your Mother Russia.
Please go on.
>
In other words, it won't understand you, has a limited set of responses it knows how to deal with, and will piss people off.
And some fed (who had to wait around for your interview and strap you into the electrodes anyway) will come back to an apoplectic interviewee who is tired of the stupid machine because it doesn't understand nuance, inflection, or anything else. Which is precisely why trained humans do this job.
Tell you what though, I hear they have this really cool program which pretends to be a 13 year old speaking his non native language.
I just don't see this being anything more than a gimmick to get funding, and will never actually amount to anything in the near term.
Lost at C:>. Found at C.
It's pretty easy to program a gainsaying computer generated head. You could make it look like John Cleese...
Let me tell you about my mother. [blam!]
Someone who has used ketamine is not necessarily a drug addict, and it's the teetotalers you need to be wary of.
This is my signature. There are many like it, but this one is mine.
I've been part of two different interviews for security clearances. I have a friend who was a contractor conducting these background checks as well.
Most of the process is tedious BS, he quit the job after a while. He also thinks the out sourcing of gov workers to contractors greatly weakened the whole process (that shouldn't really be a surprise, should it?) Physically driving around most of his time with his office in a car was not a good use of time. The interviews I was part of asked the same sort of simple questions with simple answers that clearly were memorized by repetition.
The real work is verifying the answers people give by having multiple people confirm the simple answers that really are just purposed for verifying a few questions. In fact, I wondered if the whole process wasn't designed to be so simplistically stupid that the subjects would want to volunteer additional information. Anyhow these people drive incredible distances just to get simple answers from childhood friends etc. some of which the person being investigated supplied. I don't see how this expensive aspect of the process couldn't be automated and the poorer job the contractors do could also be automated and it would probably improve things.
The more sophisticated aspects should still be done the old fashioned way but given that most of these lower clearances are not a huge deal and even the higher ones must involve some of the same procedures this seems like a huge money saver.... as long as the more important parts of the process remain untouched...
None of this matters when the NSA outsources government jobs to contractors so an IT contractor gets access to information that previously only somebody within the agency would take many years of informal vetting to gain access to. Contractors simply don't give a rip so why you'd use them in such situations is beyond me (they are rarely cheaper and the risk is greater.)
I don't see why they can't do this with the Magic 8-Ball.
Schroedinger's Brexit: The UK is both in and out of the EU at the same time!
That's not how the logic behind those security clearance questions works. The reason they ask if you've used drugs, had an affair, or any other unmoral things is that if you have done those things you might be susceptible to blackmail. Some foreign agent comes up to you and says "I know you use drugs and can prove it. Sell us secrets or we'll tell on you and get you fired/jailed/etc.."
Or whatever.
...that's all I need, an avatar to browbeat me for an hour over my poor credit history that is partially due to my poorly-paid job working on a government contract.
Was wondering when we would start to make the technology.
Now when we crush a robot trying to kill us, the chase will never end.
Hurry up Twinkie! http://propaholics.wolfchasers...
*biddy biddy*
Sig. Sig. Sputnik
It is the level of detail they are asking for. When I had to do this test and admitted to smoking marijuana in high school I had to give details of every incident I ever used. No ball park figures, exact amounts. The whole thing went something like this:
Interviewer: "Have you used marijuana in the last 7 years?"
Me: "Yes."
Interviewer: "How much and When?"
Me: "What do you mean how much and when? Total? "
Interviewer: " I need everything, go back to beginning when did you start and how much did you smoke that day."
Me: " I don't know the day or exact amounts. I could guess total was an ounce or an once and a half total at most. But that is just a guess I have no idea. I wasn't keeping track."
Interviewer: "I need to know more. How much did you use a week."
Me; "It depends, it wasn't a consistent thing."
Interviewer: "I need to know details of amounts by at least by month or by week.
We spent nearly 45 minutes going week by week talking about how I smoked X amount each day/week/month to make a grand total of an ounce or an ounce and a half for my senior year of high school. The amount of details he wanted was ridiculous IMO. I wasn't trying to hide the fact I had used, whole person application and everything. But something as simple as the statement of: "Sometimes, I would smoke a bowl in high school." Turned into" "On the week of October 1st i smoked 0.1 grams of marijuana by pipe. The week of October 9th I smoked 0.3 grams of marijuana by pipe."
.... we call it "Voight-Kampff" :)
That's what the security process is about. They know they can never know everything but they can make an informed "best-guess". Someone who has engaged in illegal/immoral behaviors in a consistent manner over time is a risk. Someone who has never done anything and has references is less of a risk. Most people though have done stuff in HS and maybe college but no longer partake in said behaviors, this is documented, and an interview is conducted to make a risk assessment on the individual. If you are low enough on the scale then you get the clearance. As you deal with different clearances/jobs/roles there may be actual personality/behavior tests, etc.
For the US you can look this up, the manual is published and freely available.
Yes, yes, yes, the system can be gamed but that's a different topic.
This is simply one of the key technologies needed before our Robotic Overlords can take control of the planet.
In the story anybody had to take some automated interview to get any job in government (including running for elections). You figure out quickly that only certain 'types' of people fit the mold, which was intended from the start but had unfortunate side effects. Unfortunately they are not the kind of people who where needed. And it brings about the end of civilization... While some kind of ersatz tech government is still present but everybody starves.
Non-Linux Penguins ?
The threat of losing their job is moot if the employer won't fire them for it, and admitting that you used drugs bears no legal consequences outside of the statute of limitations, nevermind that there probably isn't enough evidence even if it wasn't,and you'd have to get a DA to prosecute someone with a security clearance.
Furthermore, that line of reasoning only works on people that could be blackmailed, which would suggest the best candidates are those that are openly deviants.
This is my signature. There are many like it, but this one is mine.
Given the state of artificial intelligence, the assertion that this function could be better performed by a bot speaks volumes about human risk assessment.
"What asteriod?"
When in college I was the first to successfully clear a 9 foot tall grafix bong. 340 cubic inches. Was awarded the bong as reward, want to try? Brought it in with a lampshade on the top, nobody said a thing.
Yes, I am bragging! Why do you ask?
John McAfee 'It was like that time I hired that Bangkok prostitute; to do my taxes, while I fucked my accountant'
And it was soul destroying. Why not just use bots instead of employees? You're serving corporations whose three ring binder mentality is essentially robotlike? But the thing is... robots don't really care! So you could just save yourself a lot of bother by not doing any of it!
The use of slang, street smarts, been part of a hidden culture, keeping that side of you hidden and having traveled the world might be seen as useful.
Or to pick out a person who is not part of that culture very quickly.
The other aspects is cash flow, law enforcement files and blackmail over things you might have done to enjoy that expensive activity.
It really depends on what part of the gov found you or who you face in the interviews.
Some are deeply devout teetotaler other staff might be more world wise and want people who can fit in around the world.
Signals intelligence at home facing blackmail vs an understanding of human intelligence in the field globally.
Domestic spying is now "Benign Information Gathering"
I welcome the robot HR overlords.
Besides, I expect complete failure to manifest as; "People with integrity and conscience" accidentally being placed in positions of power within 3 letter agencies. It's better than outsourcing the job.
Just look at how well the robotic parole officer worked out for Matt Damon in Elysium.