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The mental gymnastics involved in having a high security clearance.

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Re: The mental gymnastics involved in having a high security clearance.

#11
I used to be in the intelligence field, and I held a top secret SCI clearance for about five years.

What most people don't realize about classified information is that it's not the information itself that's so sensitive; it's the means via which such information is acquired that must be protected. If this were not so, targets could simply sidestep our intelligence collection vectors.

I rarely dealt with any classified information that was interesting or surprising. It's mostly stuff you would expect. The technologies and methods used to acquire a piece of intelligence were always more interesting than the intelligence itself.

Re: The mental gymnastics involved in having a high security clearance.

#12
post #2

Well, this sure puts a different spin on the arrogance of the US Government. The new Aristocracy, those with "clearances", receive and can act on information that the rest of us can't be allowed to have. The Fed's "We just know better than you" attitude probably derives directly from this secret pool of knowledge. But why would you divide up information into 15 or 20 categories? I bet that even at "Top Secret" levels…

Think of it like this: if one person only knows part of a system, they can only reveal so much about it. 15 people might know the entirety of one system, but individually they don't know enough to be a threat. This idea can be stretched out to cover entire levels of security clearance and information (as it does).

It also makes it more difficult for them to collaborate and conspire without the coordination of those above.

Re: The mental gymnastics involved in having a high security clearance.

#13
post #3
post #2

Well, this sure puts a different spin on the arrogance of the US Government. The new Aristocracy, those with "clearances", receive and can act on information that the rest of us can't be allowed to have. The Fed's "We just know better than you" attitude probably derives directly from this secret pool of knowledge. But why would you divide up information into 15 or 20 categories? I bet that even at "Top Secret" levels…

I'm sorry, I've read your comment twice, and I have no idea what you're talking about. Perhaps you could write out your conspiracy theory in more easily digestible points?

You're having a hard time finding the conspiracy theory because there isn't one. bediger simply called the government arrogant, along with worries that people are making decisions without enough info.

Re: The mental gymnastics involved in having a high security clearance.

#14
A side note to the content of the article, which was interesting, but I couldn't zoom the text.

I'm using Chrome, and when I zoomed in, the pictures, headers and footers all grew appropriately, however the text remained a constant size.

I'm not sure how they managed that, but it makes for a terrible user experience when you want (or need) to increase the font size to make it more readable.

Re: The mental gymnastics involved in having a high security clearance.

#15

A side note to the content of the article, which was interesting, but I couldn't zoom the text. I'm using Chrome, and when I zoomed in, the pictures, headers and footers all grew appropriately, however the text remained a constant size. I'm not sure how they managed that, but it makes for a terrible user experience when you want (or need) to increase the font size to make it more readable.

Looks like it's -webkit-text-size-adjust: none; that's inhibiting the zoom.

Re: The mental gymnastics involved in having a high security clearance.

#16
There's a flip side to this as well: as a voter, I don't know what information my elected leaders have when making decisions.

In theory, with a small amount of secrecy needed to make diplomacy and security function, this makes sense. The problem is that it's not actually working in practice. There are so many un-elected people who have jobs for life and also the ability to classify broad swaths of information that the incentives are all set to increasing amounts of classified data. There's no correction mechanism. In theory, you'd have Congressmen aggressively using their oversight powers to correct the system. In practice, elected officials are mostly in for life (or as long as they choose) and are easily manipulated by the system. In fact, they don't want anything to do with making tough decisions. The more things are secret, the less they have to worry with those nagging voters giving their opinions about things. I read about intelligence oversight committees being told they don't have clearance to see things and it just blows my mind: our entire system of using force rests on civilian oversight. Thousands have died because civilians have made mistakes with information they've be given -- and that's the way it is supposed to work. Somehow we've forgotten all about this critical principle.

As an example, I'll pick a topic where you guys can all call me fuzzy-headed: UFOs. I pick this topic because of its ludicrous nature. Heaven help me if I were to pick something that was diplomatically sensitive and start hammering on it. I've been studying sightings and evidence as a hobby for many years, and based on credible eye-witness testimony I'm comfortably convinced that the United States government knows a lot more about intermittent atmospheric phenomenon than they are letting on. Why? I don't know. Why not a little more openness? I don't know. What part of this information is being used by my elected officials to make decisions? Again, I don't know.

This leaves the door open for all kinds of crazy speculation. It's an insane way for a democracy to treat its citizens. Yet this is just par for the course. All I did was pick a way-out example. Laugh off my UFO example if you wish, but for every thing like that there is a thousand other things that drive public policy -- and you and I will never know about them. Taken to this level, it is a very unstable way to maintain consent of the governed.

Not only does it make it impossible for an elected official to take advice, it makes it impossible for voters to make reasoned and educated judgments about the actions of officials. Secrecy corrupts everything it touches. That's why it must be aggressively minimized.

Re: The mental gymnastics involved in having a high security clearance.

#17

I used to be in the intelligence field, and I held a top secret SCI clearance for about five years. What most people don't realize about classified information is that it's not the information itself that's so sensitive; it's the means via which such information is acquired that must be protected. If this were not so, targets could simply sidestep our intelligence collection vectors. I rarely dealt with any classifie…

Just to play up the intrigue, perhaps you don't know of the information or clearances being mentioned. ;) "...a person who didn't previously know they even existed."

Re: The mental gymnastics involved in having a high security clearance.

#18

I used to be in the intelligence field, and I held a top secret SCI clearance for about five years. What most people don't realize about classified information is that it's not the information itself that's so sensitive; it's the means via which such information is acquired that must be protected. If this were not so, targets could simply sidestep our intelligence collection vectors. I rarely dealt with any classifie…

The article spoke distinctly of security clearances that you don't even know exist. You probably didn't have those.

Re: The mental gymnastics involved in having a high security clearance.

#19

I used to be in the intelligence field, and I held a top secret SCI clearance for about five years. What most people don't realize about classified information is that it's not the information itself that's so sensitive; it's the means via which such information is acquired that must be protected. If this were not so, targets could simply sidestep our intelligence collection vectors. I rarely dealt with any classifie…

The article spoke distinctly of security clearances that you don't even know exist. You probably didn't have those.

Top Secret SCI ("secret compartmentalized information") isn't one clearance: each SCI has a codeword, and you get cleared individually for each one. That's probably what Ellsberg means by about to receive "15 or 20 special clearances", and what throwaway is referring to. It's not uncommon for TS-cleared individuals to be additionally cleared on at least one TS-SCI thing. Obviously codeword-classified information can vary in interestingness.

Re: The mental gymnastics involved in having a high security clearance.

#20
post #2

Well, this sure puts a different spin on the arrogance of the US Government. The new Aristocracy, those with "clearances", receive and can act on information that the rest of us can't be allowed to have. The Fed's "We just know better than you" attitude probably derives directly from this secret pool of knowledge. But why would you divide up information into 15 or 20 categories? I bet that even at "Top Secret" levels…

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