Before Prosecuting, Investigate the Government • Hacker News Board

Re: Before Prosecuting, Investigate the Government

#101

Post by malandrew » Thu, Jun 13, 2013, 6:18 AM UTC

JumpCrisscross wrote: post #87

We may have a decent time looking at NSA employees' trading histories for suspicious activity. They are a large, secretive organisation populated by smart people who have access to privileged information and who operate on the assumption of immunity. If you could channel public fury over Libor, TBTF, etc. at the NSA it would give the Obama administration even less of a platform to stand on.

This is interesting. I wonder if we could audit the entire holdings of any NSA agents, investigating any portfolios with unusual gains.

Re: Before Prosecuting, Investigate the Government

#102

Post by mseebach » Thu, Jun 13, 2013, 1:43 PM UTC

JumpCrisscross wrote: post #87

We may have a decent time looking at NSA employees' trading histories for suspicious activity. They are a large, secretive organisation populated by smart people who have access to privileged information and who operate on the assumption of immunity. If you could channel public fury over Libor, TBTF, etc. at the NSA it would give the Obama administration even less of a platform to stand on.

Insider trading investigations generally work by looking for unusual trading patterns, especially prior to large market movements. So any NSA employee who's had substantial gains from classified information in his possession would already have been investigated by the NSA.

Security clearances, especially TS ones, come with very elaborate requirements that I'm certain would include a requirement to disclose that you're being investigated by the SEC. Even if it doesn't (or the employee decides not to disclose it), I'd be surprised if there wasn't some exchange of data between the SEC and the clearance authorities. Since trading in the public markets based on classified information constitutes a leak, you wouldn't keep your clearance for long.

Re: Before Prosecuting, Investigate the Government

#103

Post by trotsky » Fri, Jun 14, 2013, 10:46 PM UTC

JumpCrisscross wrote: post #87

We may have a decent time looking at NSA employees' trading histories for suspicious activity. They are a large, secretive organisation populated by smart people who have access to privileged information and who operate on the assumption of immunity. If you could channel public fury over Libor, TBTF, etc. at the NSA it would give the Obama administration even less of a platform to stand on.

disclosure of investments, assets and other sources of income is an annual requirement for everyone (or nearly) that works at these agencies. The forms are very thorough and clearly get examined carefully and checked against other sources - if you accidentally omit something it is very likely they will contact you about it. Except for some specialized jobs, this constitutes by far the most serious security review employees are regularly subject to. If anything it seems like those subject to the financial disclosures go out of their way to avoid anything that could even slightly be interpreted as a conflict of interest.

While I'm sure there are cases, I think the controls in place to guard against that kind of abuse are probably some of the most effective in government. More effective than polygraph programs to screen those moonlighting for a hostile party, for example.