I'm definitely opposed to GAK, but the conspiracy theory approach to considering what it means to employ people with SECRET clearance may be getting a bit paranoid.
From working at an organization that did a lot of government work, my understanding of the process of clearing employees is this:
-certain tasks require knowledge or access that must be restricted -you have to have a high degree of trust in the people doing those tasks -people with money troubles, out-of-control addictions, skeletons in the closet, and histories of "troubles" are prime targets for subversion -doing a clearance check (in theory) eliminates the possibility that these people will be blackmailed/bribed into revealing their secrets Not that this stuff always works in practice, considering that Aldrich Ames was an alcoholic with money troubles who then turned up with a lavish lifestyle, and no one he worked with noticed until it was pretty much too late. The point is, if you want to keep your organization's systems secure, you need some mechanism to do so. Security clearance is one way; banks and other financial institutions do other things (like finger prints, background checks, etc.) My big question is, do any of the companies providing Internet services, or Internet software, or digital commerce services/software, employ any of these security mechanisms on their employees? Comments or (preferably) references to actual practices? -Pete Loshin pete@loshin.com