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Plain Meaning
Joined: 18 Oct 2014
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 Posted: Sun Jun 14, 2015 5:15 am Post subject: 'Chinese' hackers have all the US secret data |
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Cyber-attacks linked to China appear to have resulted in the theft of security-clearance records with sensitive data about millions of American military and intelligence personnel
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Formally known as the Questionnaire for National Security Positions, the document requires that an applicant disclose everything from mental illnesses, financial interests, and bankruptcy issues to any brush with the law and major or minor drug and alcohol use. The application also requires a thorough listing of an applicant’s family members, associates, or former roommates. At the bottom of each page, a potential employee must submit his or her social security number. Given the questionnaire’s length, that means if you’re filling out this document, you will write your social security number over 115 times.
On Friday, it was revealed that all of the data on Standard Form 86— filled out by millions of current and former military and intelligence workers— is now believed to be in the hands of Chinese hackers.
This not only means that the hackers may have troves of personal data about Americans with highly sensitive jobs, but also that contacts or family members of American intelligence employees living abroad could potentially be targeted for coercion. At its worst, this cyberbreach also provides a basic roster of every American with a security clearance.
"That makes it very hard for any of those people to function as an intelligence officer,” Joel Brenner, a former top U.S. counterintelligence official, told the AP. “The database also tells the Chinese an enormous amount of information about almost everyone with a security clearance. That's a gold mine. It helps you approach and recruit spies."
What’s particularly stunning about this development is how quickly it grew into something so severe. Last week, officials estimated that the personal data of 4 million current and former federal employees had been compromised. Then that figure ballooned to as many as 14 million. |
It's done. The security versus privacy arguments about the US government's sweeping surveillance programs aimed at US citizens have been resolved; any data the US has on US citizens makes those US citizens far less secure, because such data is likely to fall into the hands of some (other) authoritarian regime.
Meanwhile, every American intelligence asset, and their mother, has been compromised. |
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Leon
Joined: 31 May 2010
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| Posted: Sun Jun 14, 2015 5:50 am Post subject: |
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| Almost makes me happy that I did not get hired for any of the federal jobs that I applied to. I have a halfway filled out sf-86 saved on my computer on the off chance that any job I get offered needs one, but am always a bit relieved that when they don't call me back and I do not have to go through a year of invasive investigation just to get a decent job with good benefits. I do know a lot of people with either clearances or in the process, and knowing the type of information that is asked for, the hackers have everything short of their bank info. I've always felt that the security clearance process and classification process is idiocy, but now it is a travesty. |
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Chaparrastique
Joined: 01 Jan 2014
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| Posted: Sun Jun 14, 2015 7:15 am Post subject: |
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| Formally known as the Questionnaire for National Security Positions, the document requires that an applicant disclose everything from mental illnesses, financial interests, and bankruptcy issues to any brush with the law and major or minor drug and alcohol use. The application also requires a thorough listing of an applicant��s family members, associates, or former roommates. At the bottom of each page, a potential employee must submit his or her social security number. Given the questionnaire��s length, that means if you��re filling out this document, you will write your social security number over 115 times. |
...But still easier than getting an E2 visa. |
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Leon
Joined: 31 May 2010
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| Posted: Sun Jun 14, 2015 9:09 am Post subject: |
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| Chaparrastique wrote: |
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| Formally known as the Questionnaire for National Security Positions, the document requires that an applicant disclose everything from mental illnesses, financial interests, and bankruptcy issues to any brush with the law and major or minor drug and alcohol use. The application also requires a thorough listing of an applicant��s family members, associates, or former roommates. At the bottom of each page, a potential employee must submit his or her social security number. Given the questionnaire��s length, that means if you��re filling out this document, you will write your social security number over 115 times. |
...But still easier than getting an E2 visa. |
I know this is a joke, but the security clearance process in the U.S. is a nightmare that often takes more than a year to process and isn't slightly comparable. |
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bucheon bum
Joined: 16 Jan 2003
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| Posted: Sun Jun 14, 2015 1:55 pm Post subject: Re: 'Chinese' hackers have all the US secret data |
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| Plain Meaning wrote: |
Meanwhile, every American intelligence asset, and their mother, has been compromised. |
Not to quibble, but no. The data had nothing on intelligence assets. The data could help China gain intelligence assets since now it has info that it could use to blackmail US government employees to obtain info/intelligence. |
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