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Step Right Up and Get Your Top-Secret Clearances!

Top-secret" security clearances often are issued to individuals who instead should be flagged as potential security risks due to inconsistent and incomplete Department of Defense (DOD) personal background checks, according to a recent report from the General Accounting Office (GAO). When conducting background checks, Pentagon security officers frequently fail to collect or consider information -- including data on an individual's personal finances or criminal history -- that could signal a greater-than-average potential to be drawn into espionage activities.

The report reveals the lack of seriousness with which security threats are treated in some circles, in spite of ample recent evidence that spying didn't suddenly go out of fashion when the Berlin Wall came tumbling down. And though moles and traitors at the CIA and FBI get most of the ink and media attention, it's worth noting that 68 of the 80 federal employees or contractors convicted of spying between 1982 and 1999 were employed by the DOD.

A GAO review of Pentagon background checks in fiscal 2000 found that about one-third of the investigations failed to explore potentially important information about the applicants, including possible financial difficulties, unexplained wealth, instances of questionable personal conduct or ties to foreign countries.

As a result, the DOD has been unable to demonstrate that it fully considered all significant adverse conditions that might call into question an individual's ability adequately to safeguard classified information in granting eligibility for top-secret clearances, according to the GAO's report. In about 12 percent of the cases studied by the GAO, it found that top-secret clearances were granted to individuals without a proper vetting of background information that might indicate a security risk.

Amazingly, the DOD does not provide its security specialists with clear guidance or adequate training regarding the proper way to conduct background checks, according to the GAO. It is a shortcoming the Pentagon hopes to redress later this year by improving the peer-review process for its security specialists and with the September issuance of new guidelines for security-clearance background checks.

RELATED ARTICLE: Federal Employees Take Free Rides With Government Travel Cards

The Travel and Transportation Reform Act of 1998 was supposed to help "reform" government operations by requiring that federal employees traveling on business use government-issued credit cards, rather than personal cards, to cover travel expenses. According to the theory, issuing the new cards would help consolidate bookkeeping and allow the government -- which spent an estimated $4.7 billion on travel in fiscal 2000 -- to take advantage of huge discounts and rebates offered by charge-card companies when payments are made early and electronically.

But, as so often happens when chalkboard theory smashes head-on into real-world practice, the new system opened a Pandora's box of new travel-card abuse by federal employees. Now many of them are defaulting on their payments and misusing the cards for personal trips and expenses.

During recent testimony before the House Government Reform subcommittee on Government Efficiency, Financial Management and Intergovernmental Relations, officials from the General Services Administration -- which issues the cards -- indicated that federal employees and agencies were delinquent in paying more than $37 million in travel costs and expenses to credit-card companies. This is negating whatever savings the new system was supposed to bring.

But that figure likely is a conservative estimate, since other reports indicate that about 40,000 people at the Pentagon alone have defaulted on more than $53 million in travel-card charges. The Department of Defense and the Bank of America reportedly have reacted to the default rate by increasing late charges on offenders, deactivating some cards and reducing the credit limit on others, as well as garnishing the wages of cardholders with accounts more than 120 days past due.

But the problem probably is widespread. A probe at the Corporation for National and Community Service (CNCS) turned up eight employees who had used their travel cards for personal and improper expenses, such as family vacations and personal gifts -- including one employee who reportedly made more than $22,442 in personal charges on his government-issued charge card.

One of several factors that likely contributed to the abuse, according to the recent congressional testimony of CNCS Inspector General Alan Boehm, was the agency's issuing of travel charge cards to employees who have no reason to travel.