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NSA Worried About Recruitment, Post-Snowden

An anonymous reader writes: The NSA employs tens of thousands of people, and they're constantly recruiting more. They're looking for 1,600 new workers this year alone. Now that their reputation has taken a major hit with the revelations of whistleblower Edward Snowden, they aren't sure they'll be able to meet that goal. Not only that, but the NSA has to compete with other companies, and they Snowden leaks made many of them more competitive: "Ever since the Snowden leaks, cybersecurity has been hot in Silicon Valley. In part that's because the industry no longer trusts the government as much as it once did. Companies want to develop their own security, and they're willing to pay top dollar to get the same people the NSA is trying to recruit." If academia's relationship with the NSA continues to cool, the agency could find itself struggling within a few years.

9 of 247 comments (clear)

  1. Yeah , well ... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Insightful

    Yeah, well it's not like people became disillusioned and angry after the lies started being shoveled wholesale down our throats after 9/11.

    And no, I don't mean conspiracy-nutjob-wacko theories, I mean the kind of stuff that is being lorded over the average joe and I feel like I can only talk smack about because I don't have a security clearance to be revoked.

    Call me crazy, but last time I looked in the help wanteds I started to get the feeling our society is divided into two halves: Those with above secret clearance, who live normal lives, and those without it, who are lied to and treated like animals.

    As a human being living in the US without such clearance all I can say is, you should be f***ing ashamed.

    1. Re:Yeah , well ... by gatkinso · · Score: 5, Informative

      Oh really? Having held such a clearance for years (I left that work about 5 years ago) I can tell you that the situation is in many ways reversed. Your very behavior is held hostage just so you keep your job. Want to try some weed while in Colorado? Want to go see the Great Wall of China (actually, you might get this approved)? Three beers at happy hour and get pulled over for speeding? Buy a house at the height of the housing boom and your spouse lose her job so it is foreclosed upon, or she gets sick and the medical bills pile up...

      All of these things can lead to your ticket being clipped.

      Besides - people act like a clearance is some magical thing that they have earned. Nothing is further from the truth. It simply means you have a clean police and financial record, and don't hang out with militants. All of the investigations and polygraphs boil down to determining that. You fill out the forms honestly, and wait for investigators to determine that indeed you did not lie on your application. Sometimes you sit in a silly little room over by BWI with weird cloud scenes on the florescent lights and answer the same questions while some polygraph examiner tries to upset you. Again, nothing that you have earned through hard work or being special, just that you waited out the process and didn't lie.

      --
      I am very small, utmostly microscopic.
  2. Why Shouldn't I Work for the NSA? by bill_mcgonigle · · Score: 5, Informative

    Unpopular even pre-9/11.

    --
    My God, it's Full of Source!
    OUTSIDE_IP=$(dig +short my.ip @outsideip.net)
  3. Boo hoo by dcollins117 · · Score: 5, Insightful

    If you lack morals to the extent you would consider working for the NSA you'll find it much more lucrative to sell your soul to Wall Street instead.

    1. Re:Boo hoo by DoofusOfDeath · · Score: 5, Insightful

      If you lack morals to the extent you would consider working for the NSA you'll find it much more lucrative to sell your soul to Wall Street instead.

      Wall Street is peopled with thieves, but the NSA is peopled with traitors. A person of marginal morality could work in Wall Street while turning down the NSA on moral grounds.

  4. My experience working for the NSA... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Interesting

    Technically I didn't work for the NSA, but I worked for a government contractor that did a lot of classified work for the NSA. If you can name a clearance level, I probably had it.

    Contrary to popular belief, the vast majority of the work the NSA does is concerned with foreign intelligence and surveillance. The part of the NSA that does domestic surveillance is relatively small and not nearly as intrusive as the tinfoil hatters want to believe.

    Still, all of the controversy recently made me think a lot about it and realize I'm not really comfortable being involved even in foreign surveillance. I don't want to be responsible for creating technology that will be used to track down and kill people, even if those people are enemies of the USA. Yes, I know foreign countries are spying on us just as much, but that isn't an excuse.

    So I quit that job, and I'll never again work on classified material. I've been much happier with my work lately.

    1. Re:My experience working for the NSA... by randalware · · Score: 5, Interesting

      I was in about the same boat, working for a sub contractor helping make things.

      The thing I was concerned about was, all the technology the we are/were using against foreign countries and terrorists are now being used against the population of the US.

      The NSA and CIA and it's immediate peers have a little common sense, but the Patriot act started a pipline of this intel to the FBI, State Police, Local police.

      Our local police have problem pepper spraying handicapped elderly people issuing a parking ticket and exessive use of tasers whil issuing regular traffic tickets
      Look at Ferguson MO, etc...

      Do we want morons like these with anymore information and power, the public needs to watch them, not the other way around.

      --
      This is my opinion based on what little I know and understand of the rumors and lies Thanks, Randal
  5. Re:NSA can recruit Patriots! by HiThere · · Score: 5, Insightful

    If you actually ARE a Greek, then this sense.

    If you believe in the values of the US Constitution, then Snowden is NOT a traitor (which is explicitly defined). And also his acts were in support of the Constitution, which is supposed to be the entire basis of the Federal government. That he revealed the current officeholders to be liars and oathbreakers is *not* a strike against him. I won't go into just how unconstitutional I believe the actions of the current and immediately prior government to be, but the only way they've been able to justify their actions are by requiring you to believe, essentially, that blue was yellow.

    --

    I think we've pushed this "anyone can grow up to be president" thing too far.
  6. Re:NSA can recruit Patriots! by dissy · · Score: 5, Insightful

    Snowden IS a traitor: (at least) of N.S.A., and his oath to them, exclusively, and also of U.S.A. inclusively

    How? Please be detailed.

    He upheld the laws of the USA, upheld his oath to the US government and the NSA.
    He violated no conditions of his oath what so ever.

    The NSA can not require someone to swear an oath to break the law and betray the US constitution in any legal sense - yet that's exactly what they tried to do.

    Breaking a promise to be a criminal does not make you a criminal.

    The oaths required from the DOE, DOD, and DOJ all explicitly demand you do not follow illegal orders, do not break laws without explicit exception, and to report to the higher authorities any illegal orders given - all of which Snowden did to the letter of the law and his oath.

    In short, if you demand I follow an order of yours, do not bitch and claim I'm a traitor to you when I do exactly as you demanded from me, because then everyone will see your demand and accusation as the bullshit it is.