Facebook Is Looking for Employees with National Security Clearances

No, it isn't. Empirically, based on my family's experience, no, it really isn't.

No, it is not an automatically disqualifying factor. However if you do not disclose in full, or they find something that doesn't match what you've disclosed, _that_ will disqualify you.

They care about leverage. Does it matter to you that nobody knows you did/do drugs? Then you are at risk of someone using that as leverage against you.

They look for patterns of behavior. Specifically how recent your negative behavior patterns are. Drug user 5 years ago but have been clean (without any indication otherwise) so long as there are no other negatives (debt beyond your means, domestic violence, etc) you’ll be fine. The more negative behaviors you’ve maintained, the more in the past it has to be.

It depends.

Selling is an automatic disqualifier (as you showed you are willing to commit a crime for money).

Past usage is not an automatic disqualifier, and shouldn't be a problem if it was years ago. Lying is an automatic disqualifier, if you get caught (and perjury if they decide to pursue).

However, it is of my opinion that you should only selectively share information, and only the information that they are likely to learn in background checks.

I had a security clearance about a decade ago, and know many others who received them and other who were denied. The ones who were completely honest were denied. However, this was also immediately after college, so there wasn't ten years of clean living in between. (This circle of friends also experimented with pretty much every substance available during college.)

Overview of the current rules.[1]

Getting cleared to CONFIDENTIAL is easy. SECRET involves a background check and filling out the SF-86 form [2].

In some ways, the higher clearances (TOP SECRET, SENSITIVE COMPARTMENTED INFORMATION) are easier. It's not a checklist thing at the higher levels. You get to discuss problems. There are long interviews, lie detector tests, checks of original records, and interviews of people in your past. The FBI used to do this work, but I think it's outsourced now. The current processing time for a TS clearance is about a year.

(It's been decades since I was in that world, but I've held clearances.)

[1] http://www.military.com/veteran-jobs/security-clearance-jobs... [2] https://www.opm.gov/forms/pdf_fill/sf86-non508.pdf

Admitting to some drug use is almost an asset. I don't drink. It's been more than 10 years since I even had a glass of wine. But such answers on a background check make you look like a recovering addict, which I am not. During my recent checks my references weren't asked about my reliability, only my "alcohol use". The investigators were obviously trying to see if I had lied about my not drinking. I would have been screwed had one of my references made a mistake, for example if they saw me carrying a glass at a party and erroneously assumed it was mine. Luckily that didn't happen. But had I instead lied and said that I drank a sixpack every weekend the investigators wouldn't have even bothered to check.

It's all about leverage. If your drug use could leave the possibility of someone have leverage they can use against you - yes you will be disqualified. IMO, security clearance investigations are not about finding out naughty things from your past simply to find them, they are just a search of "how vulnerable will this person be to being blackmailed?".

They want the list of people who can pressure you to be non-existant or incredibly small.

Nah... Just disclose it. I've done all the drugs. Well, many. Some of them in large quantities. Just be honest about it. They are going to find out and DQ you if you lie.

There are few things that automatically DQ you, for which you can't get a waiver - I guess, I never needed a waiver. Just admit all your drugs, whoring, improprieties, and deviant thoughts. They've seen worse.

Of course, admitting that means they leave you in a DB for years, keep the DB online, let it get breached, and then give you credit monitoring and a form letter.

What do you need a clearance for? Ideally, you are trying to get higher systems level information about security threats, balance points, environmental factors, groups that have been identified... If you have no use for the higher level information in your field then why even go for one? It's a stressful thing to keep, it's a really heavy responsibility, the consequences of betraying the clearance are devastating, and the whole point is that precious information is compartmentalized.

My understanding is that there are a lot of cranks who argue with interviewers and then get declined for a clearance, which is pretty much what you'd expect.

Being a libertarian will not disqualify you. There are specific questions about advocating for the violent overthrow of the US government, though. If you have done that, or have been associated with or are known to be sympathetic to people that have done that, that's grounds for disqualification for sure. But the acts that you or they did or were planning to do have to be illegal; just expressing a general political view is not disqualifying, at least for civilian jobs.

That said: getting a clearance is hugely expensive. It's not a thing you apply for. You apply for a job that requires one, and if you don't have one already, your employer gets you cleared on your behalf (if they're willing to foot the bill; if not, they only be looking to hire people who are already cleared). It's not something you can really do for fun, and in general you'd have to have accepted the kind of job that I would imagine someone with your views might not actually want.

You don't want to apply - all you will accomplish is drawing attention to yourself from an organization that you seemingly want nothing to do with. If you're not on "a list" now - you will be afterwards.

Being a libertarian won't disqualify you. Believing you have a right to unilaterally leak information, however, will.

Nah, only communists are auto-DQ'ed. Libertarianism would have no affect.

You mean, what if you’re a libertarian who hates the government so bad they want a job working for it all day? Probably more common than you think

Bravo. However, many of the threats we see today are brand new, expertise where everyone starts with 0 may be where we find ourselves for new threats.

It think it is an illusion to think we as individuals can just boycott Facebook. Facebook have become such an integral part of social life for many, that you not only exclude yourself from an web site by leaving it, but an important social institution not to mention years memories in text, pictures and film. Change must come from political action.

Weren't they also embedded in the Clinton campaign? As well as the Obama and Romney campaigns in 2012?

Haha "I was thinking about applying for a security clearance..." and the reply is "yes we know ... "

From the article: These types of employees are needed when private companies interact and share information back and forth with government agencies.

I'd guess VR (Oculus) applications

Skynet

Any random full stack engineer off the street could apply to any government contract, reply to RFPs, and bid on anything.

Everyone is already doing it. You can make $200,000+ a few years out of college as a software engineer if you go the TS-SCI clearance route, from any third tier state school. Oh look and now you can also apply to Facebook with that skillset and clearance.

A company with thousands upon thousand of full stack engineers getting work for full stack engineers? Wow sound the alarms lets speculate on what the contract is!

And yes, they probably also are trying to leverage their broad infrastructure for department of defense applications.

It wasn't that ambiguous. A government employee can have anything from a civilian clearance to a top secret clearance with whatever additional riders necessary to get them access to the information on that project.

Useful information, a red herring to determining how unique or nefarious facebook is here.