DOD Personnel Clearances: Delays and Inadequate Documentation Found for Industry Personnel
Published: 2007-05-17T00:00:00

Fast Facts:

Highlights:
section_title: Why GAO Did This Study
paragraphs: Individuals working for the private industry are playing a larger role in national security work conducted by Department of Defense (DOD) and other federal agencies. As of May 2006, industry personnel held about 34 percent of DOD-maintained personnel security clearances. The damage that the unauthorized disclosure of classified information can cause to national security necessitates the prompt and careful consideration of who is granted a security clearance. Long-standing delays in determining clearance eligibility and other challenges led GAO to designate the DOD personnel security clearance program as a high-risk area in January 2005 and again in GAO's January 2007 update of the high-risk areas. In February 2005, DOD transferred its security clearance investigations functions to the Office of Personnel Management (OPM) and now obtains almost all of its clearance investigations from OPM. The Office of Management and Budget (OMB) is responsible for effective implementation of policy relating to determinations of eligibility for access to classified information. This testimony addresses the timeliness of the process and completeness of documentation used to determine eligibility of industry personnel for top secret clearances in January and February 2006. This statement relies primarily on GAO's September 2006 report (GAO-06-1070).
section_title: What GAO Found
paragraphs: GAO's analysis of timeliness data showed that industry personnel contracted to work for the federal government waited more than 1 year on average to receive top secret clearances, longer than OMB- and OPM-produced statistics would suggest. GAO's analysis of 2,259 cases in its population showed the process took an average of 446 days for initial clearances and 545 days for clearance updates. While the government plan has a goal for the application-submission phase of the process to take 14 days or less, it took an average of 111 days. In addition, GAO's analyses showed that OPM used an average of 286 days to complete initial investigations for top secret clearances, well in excess of the 180-day goal specified in the plan that OMB and others developed for improving the clearance process. Finally, the average time for adjudication (determination of clearance eligibility) was 39 days, compared to the 30-day requirement that began in December 2006. An inexperienced investigative workforce, not fully using technology, and other causes underlie these delays. Delays may increase costs for contracts and risks to national security. In addition, statistics that OMB and OPM report to Congress on the timeliness of the clearance process do not portray the full length of time it takes many applicants to receive a clearance. GAO found several issues with the statistics, including limited information on reinvestigations for clearance updating and failure to measure the total time it took to complete the various phases of the clearance process. Not fully accounting for all the time used in the process hinders congressional oversight of the efforts to address the delays. OPM provided incomplete investigative reports to DOD, and DOD personnel who review the reports to determine a person's eligibility to hold a clearance (adjudicators) granted eligibility for industry personnel whose investigative reports contained unresolved issues, such as unexplained affluence and potential foreign influence. In its review of 50 investigative reports for initial clearances, GAO found that that almost all (47 of 50) cases were missing documentation required by federal investigative standards. Moreover, federal standards indicate expansion of investigations may be necessary to resolve issues, but GAO found at least one unresolved issue in 27 of the reports. GAO also found that the DOD adjudicators granted top secret clearance eligibility for all 27 industry personnel whose investigative reports contained unresolved issues without requesting additional information or documenting in the adjudicative report that the information was missing. In its November 2005 assessment of the government plan for improving the clearance process, GAO raised concerns about the limited attention devoted to assessing quality in the clearance process, but the plan has not been revised to address the shortcomings GAO identified. The use of incomplete investigations and adjudications in granting top secret clearance eligibility increases the risk of unauthorized disclosure of classified information. Also, it could negatively affect efforts to promote reciprocity (an agency's acceptance of a clearance issued by another agency) being developed by an interagency working group headed by OMB's Deputy Director.

section_title: Letter
paragraphs: I am pleased to be here today to discuss the Department of Defense’s  (DOD) personnel security clearance program and problems that continue  to negatively affect that program. We have testified on clearance-related  issues in three prior hearings that this Subcommittee has held since  January 2005 when we first placed DOD’s security clearance program on  our list of high-risk government programs and operations. To facilitate an  understanding of our recent findings on private industry personnel who  applied for top secret clearances, I would like to first provide some  information about the clearance process and events that have occurred  since we placed DOD’s program on our high-risk list.
DOD is responsible for about 2.5 million security clearances issued to  servicemembers, DOD civilians, and industry personnel who work on  contracts for DOD and 23 other federal agencies. Individuals working for  the private industry are playing an increasingly larger role in national  security work conducted by DOD and other federal agencies as a result of  an increased awareness of threats to our national security stemming from  the September 11, 2001, terrorist attacks and increased efforts over the  past decade to privatize federal jobs. As of May 2006, industry personnel  held about 34 percent of DOD-maintained personnel security clearances.
As with servicemembers and federal workers, industry personnel must  obtain security clearances to gain access to classified information, which  is categorized into three levels: top secret, secret, and confidential. The  level of classification denotes the degree of protection required for  information and the amount of damage that unauthorized disclosure could  reasonably be expected to cause to national defense or foreign relations.  For top secret information, the expected damage that unauthorized  disclosure could reasonably be expected to cause is “exceptionally grave  damage;” for secret information, it is “serious damage;” and for  confidential information, it is “damage.”
DOD’s Office of the Under Secretary of Defense for Intelligence (OUSD(I))  has overall responsibility for DOD clearances.  Two offices are responsible  for adjudication (eligibility determination to hold a clearance) for industry  personnel. The Defense Industrial Security Clearance Office (DISCO)  within OUSD(I) is responsible for adjudicating cases that contain only  favorable information or minor issues regarding security concerns (e.g.,  some overseas travel by the individual). The Defense Office of Hearings  and Appeals (DOHA) within the Defense Legal Agency is responsible for  adjudicating cases that contain major security issues (e.g., an individual’s  unexplained affluence or criminal history), which could result in the denial  of clearance eligibility.
Long-standing delays in determining clearance eligibility and other  clearance challenges led us to designate DOD’s personnel security  clearance program as a high-risk area in January 2005 and continue that  designation in the updated list of high-risk areas that we published in  2007. In February 2005, DOD transferred its security clearance  investigations functions to the Office of Personnel Management (OPM)  and now obtains almost all of its clearance investigations from OPM,  which conducts about 90 percent of all federal clearance investigations.  Other recent significant events affecting DOD’s clearance program have  been the passage of the Intelligence Reform and Terrorism Prevention Act  of 2004 (IRTPA) and the June 2005 issuance of Executive Order No.  13381, Strengthening Processes Relating to Determining Eligibility for  Access to Classified National Security Information. IRTPA included  milestones for reducing the time to complete clearances, general  specifications for a database on security clearances, and requirements for  reciprocity of clearances (the acceptance of a clearance and access  granted by another department, agency, or military service). Executive  Order No. 13381 assigned the Office of Management and Budget (OMB)  responsibility for the effective implementation of a uniform, efficient,  effective, timely, and reciprocal policy related to determinations of  personnel eligibility for access to classified information.
In June 2005, OMB’s Deputy Director of Management was designated as  the OMB official responsible for improving the process by which the  government determines eligibility for access to classified national security  information. One of OMB’s efforts to improve the security clearance  process involved taking a lead in preparing a November 2005 strategic plan  to improve personnel security clearance processes governmentwide. In its  February 2007 annual IRTPA-mandated report to Congress, OMB noted  additional improvements that had been made to the clearance process  governmentwide. For example, OMB indicated that it had issued  reciprocity standards, OPM had increased its investigative workforce to an  estimated 9,367 total staff in efforts to reach an earlier goal of having 8,000  full-time staff, and agencies had dramatically increased the use of OPM’s  Electronic Questionnaires for Investigations Processing (eQIP) system to  reduce the time required to get a clearance by 2 to 3 weeks. The report  also identified several challenges associated with accessing records  repositories.
In requesting our past work, you have expressed concern about the  negative consequences of untimely, inadequate, or inconsistent  investigations and adjudications. This testimony summarizes our earlier  work that examined those issues and supplements other clearance-related  reports that we have issued since originally placing DOD’s personnel  security clearance program on our high-risk list (see the list of Related  GAO Products at the end of this statement).  It addresses two questions:  (1) How timely are the processes used to determine whether industry  personnel are eligible for top secret clearances? and (2) How complete is  the documentation of the processes used to determine whether industry  personnel are eligible for top secret clearances?
This statement relies primarily on GAO’s September 2006 report.  In  conducting our prior work on these two key questions, we reviewed laws,  executive orders, policies, and reports related to the timeliness and  completeness of security clearance investigations and adjudications for  industry personnel as well as servicemembers and civilian government  employees. Those sources provided the criteria used for assessing  timeliness and documentation completeness, and identified causes for and  effects from delayed clearances and incomplete investigative and  adjudicative reports. Additional insights about causes of and effects from  delayed clearances and incomplete investigative and adjudicative reports  were obtained from interviews with and documentary evidence from  personnel associated with a variety of government offices: OUSD(I),  DISCO, DOHA, other DOD adjudication facilities that make clearance  determinations for servicemembers and DOD civilians; DOD’s Defense  Personnel Security Research Center; the Defense Security Service’s  Training Academy that offers adjudicator training; and OPM.  Nongovernmental organizations supplying information on conditions,  causes, and effects included officials representing two of OPM’s  investigations contractors and technology associations whose member  organizations require clearances for their industry personnel. We also  reviewed the February 2007 annual IRPTA-mandated report to Congress  by the Security Clearance Oversight Group. For the timeliness question,  our analyses of conditions included a review of computerized data  abstracted from DOD’s Joint Personnel Adjudication System (JPAS) and  statistical reports on timeliness that OPM produced for DOD. The abstract  was for the population of 1,685 industry personnel granted initial top  secret clearances and 574 industry personnel granted top secret clearance  updates by DISCO during January and February 2006. The clearance  investigations for those 2,259 industry personnel were started at various  times prior to the adjudications. While we found problems with the  accuracy of some of the JPAS data, we determined they were sufficiently  reliable for the purposes of our September 2006 report. DOD and OPM  also supplied timeliness statistics for other periods, levels of clearances,  types of personnel, and agencies to provide us with a broader context with  which to interpret the timeliness statistics that we computed from the  JPAS database abstract. We addressed the completeness question with a  multiple-step process. We (1) randomly selected 50 cases from the  previously described population of 1,685 initially cleared industry  personnel, (2) obtained paper files of the 50 investigative and adjudicative  reports, (3) created a data collection instrument using federal investigative  standards and adjudicative guidelines to standardize our data gathering,  (4) sought experts’ comments to refine our instrument and process, (5)  coded data from the paper files, (6) had a second team member  independently verify the information that another team member had  coded, and (7) computed statistics to indicate the numbers of investigative  and adjudicative reports with various types of missing documentation. In  addition, two team members attended OPM’s basic special agent training  course to obtain an understanding of the investigative requirements as  promulgated by OPM, and two other members of our team took about 40  hours of online adjudication training. We performed our original work  from September 2005 through August 2006 in accordance with generally  accepted government auditing standards.
subsections: section_title: Background
paragraphs: To ensure the trustworthiness, reliability, and character of personnel in  positions with access to classified information, DOD relies on a  multiphased personnel security clearance process. Figure 1 shows six  phases that could be involved in determining whether to grant an actual or  a potential job incumbent a clearance. The three phases shown in gray are  those that are most transparent to individuals requesting an initial  clearance, and they are the three phases that were the primary focus of the  findings in this testimony.
section_title: Determining Top Secret Clearances for Industry Personnel Averaged More Than a Year, and Government Statistics Did Not Portray All Delays
paragraphs: At the time of our September 2006 report, our independent analysis of  timeliness data showed that industry personnel contracted to work for the  federal government waited more than 1 year on average to receive top  secret security clearances, and government statistics did not portray the  full length of time it takes many applicants to obtain clearances.  We found  delays in all phases of the clearance process that we examined, and  government statistics did not account for the full extent of the delays.  Delays in the clearance process may cost money and pose threats to  national security (see table 1).
subsections: section_title: Delays in Determining Eligibility Are Caused by Many Factors
paragraphs: As table 1 shows, industry personnel granted eligibility for top secret  clearances from DISCO from January to February 2006 waited an average  of 446 days for their initial clearances or 545 days for their clearance  updates. DOD may, however, have issued interim clearances to some of  these industry personnel, which might have allowed them to begin work  before they received their final clearances.  IRTPA requires that beginning  in December 2006, 80 percent of clearances be completed in an average of  120 days. Delays were found in each phase of the clearance process that  we examined:     Application submission. The application-submission phase of the  clearance process took an average of 111 days for the initial clearances  that DISCO adjudicated in January and February 2006 (see table 1). The  starting point for our measurement of this phase was the date when the  application was submitted by the facility security officer. Our end point for  this phase was the date that OPM scheduled the investigation into its  Personnel Investigations Processing System. We used this starting date  because the government can begin to incur an economic cost if an  industry employee cannot begin work on a classified contract because of  delays in obtaining a security clearance and this end date because OPM  currently uses this date as its start point for the next phase in the  clearance process. The government plan for improving the clearance  process noted that “investigation submission” (i.e., application  submission) is to be completed within an average of 14 calendar days or  less. Therefore, the 111 days taken for the application-submission phase  was nearly 100 more days on average than allocated. Several factors  contributed to the amount of time we observed in the application- submission phase, including rejecting applications multiple times because  of inaccurate information (as reported in an April 2006 DOD Office of  Inspector General report); multiple completeness reviews—the corporate  facility security officer, DISCO adjudicators, and OPM staff; and manually  entering data from paper applications if eQIP was not used.
Investigation. Investigations for the initial top secret clearances of  industry personnel adjudicated in January and February 2006 took an  average of 286 days, compared to OMB’s 180-day goal for that period (see  table 1). During the same period, investigations for top secret clearance  updates or “reinvestigations” took an average of 419 days, almost one and  a half times as long as the initial investigations (no goal is given for  clearance updates or reinvestigations). The mandated February 2007 OMB  report to Congress noted that “Reinvestigation timeliness has not been  addressed, because the improvement effort focused on individuals for  whom initial security clearances are required to perform work.” Our  September 2006 report identified many factors that inhibited the speed  with which OPM can deliver investigative reports to DISCO and other  adjudication facilities. Those causes included backlogged cases that  prevent the prompt start of work on new cases, the relative inexperience  of the investigative workforce, slowness in developing the capability to  investigate overseas leads, and difficulty obtaining access to data in  governmental records.
Adjudication. DISCO adjudicators took an average of 39 days to grant  initial clearance eligibility to the industry personnel in our population (see  table 1). The measurement of this phase for our analysis used the same  start and stop dates that OPM uses in its reports, starting on the date that  OPM closed the report and continuing through the date that DISCO  adjudicators decided clearance eligibility. IRTPA requires that at least 80  percent of the adjudications made from December 2006 through December  2009 be completed within an average of 30 days. As of June 2006, DISCO  reported that it had adjudicated 82 percent of its initial top secret  clearances within 30 days.
Delays in any phase of the clearance process cost money and threaten  national security. Delays in completing initial security clearances may  have a negative economic impact on the costs of performing classified  work within or for the U.S. government. For example, in a May 2006  congressional hearing, a representative of a technology association  testified that retaining qualified personnel resulted in salary premiums as  high as 25 percent for current clearance holders. Delays in completing  clearance updates can have serious but different negative consequences  than those stemming from delays in completing initial clearance-eligibility  determinations. In 1999, the Joint Security Commission reported that  delays in initiating reinvestigations for clearance updates create risks to  national security because the longer individuals hold clearances the more  likely they are to be working with critical information.
section_title: OMB’s and OPM’s Timeliness Reporting Does Not Convey Full Magnitude of Delays
paragraphs: The statistics that OMB and OPM have provided to Congress on the  timeliness of the personnel security clearance process do not convey the  full magnitude of the investigation-related delays facing the government.  While our September 2006 report noted additional problems with the  transparency of the timeliness statistics, I will review our concerns about  five such issues: (1) limited information on reinvestigations for clearance  updating, (2) not counting the total number of days to finish the  application-submission phase, (3) shifting some investigation-related days  to the adjudication phase or not counting them, (4) not counting the total  number of days to complete closed pending cases, and (5) not counting  the total number of days to complete investigations sent back for rework.
Limited information on reinvestigations for clearance updating. In its  mandated February 2007 report to Congress, OMB acknowledged that  “reinvestigation timeliness has not been addressed,” but the findings from  our population of industry personnel (obtained using DOD’s, instead of  OPM’s, database to assess timeliness) indicated that clearance update  reinvestigations took about one and a half times as long as the initial  investigations. The absence of timeliness information on clearance update  reinvestigations does not provide all stakeholders—Congress, agencies,  contractors attempting to fulfill their contracts, and employees awaiting  their clearances—with a complete picture of clearance delays. We have  noted in the past that focusing on completing initial clearance  investigations could negatively affect the completion of clearance update  reinvestigations and thereby increase the risk of unauthorized disclosure  of classified information.
Not counting all days to finish the application-submission phase. OMB’s  February 2007 report noted that its statistics do not include “the time to  hand-off applications to the investigative agency.” The gray section of the  application-submission phase in table 1 shows some of the activities that  were not counted when we examined January and February 2006  clearance documentation for industry personnel. These activities could be  included in timeliness measurements depending on the interpretation of  what constitutes “receipt of the application for a security clearance by an  authorized investigative agency”—IRTPA’s start date for the investigation  phase.
Shifting some investigation-related days to the adjudication phase or  not counting them. In our September 2006 report, we raised concerns  about how the time to complete the adjudication phase was measured.  The activities in the gray section of the adjudication phase in table 1 show  that the government’s procedures for measuring the time required for the  adjudication phase include tasks that occur before adjudicators actually  receive the investigative reports from OPM. More recently, OMB’s  February 2007 report to Congress noted that its timeliness statistics do not  include “the time to … hand-off investigation files to the adjudicative  agency” and estimated this handling and mailing time at up to 15 days.
Not counting all days for closed pending cases. OPM’s May 2006  testimony before Congress did not indicate whether the timeliness  statistics on complete investigations included a type of incomplete  investigation that OPM sometimes treats as being complete. In our  February 2004 report, we noted that OPM’s issuance of “closed pending”  investigations—investigative reports sent to adjudication facilities without  one or more types of source data required by the federal investigative  standards—causes ambiguity in defining and accurately estimating the  backlog of overdue investigations. In our February 2004 report, we also  noted that cases that are closed pending the provision of additional  information should continue to be tracked separately in the investigation  phase of the clearance process. According to OPM, from February 20,  2005, through July 1, 2006, the number of initial top secret clearance  investigative reports that were closed pending the provision of additional  information increased from 14,841 to 18,849, a 27 percent increase. DISCO  officials and representatives from some other DOD adjudication facilities  have indicated that they will not adjudicate closed pending cases since  critical information is missing. OPM, however, has stated that other  federal agencies review the investigative reports from closed pending  cases and may determine that they have enough information for  adjudication. Combining partially completed investigations with fully  completed investigations overstates how quickly OPM is supplying  adjudication facilities with the information they require to make their  clearance-eligibility determinations.
Not counting all days when inadequate investigations are returned.  OMB’s February 2007 report stated that its statistics do not include the  time incurred to “return the files to the investigative agency for further  information.” OPM’s procedure is to restart the measurement of  investigation time for the 1 to 2 percent of investigative reports that are  sent back for quality control reasons, which does not hold OPM fully  accountable for total investigative time when deficient products are  delivered to its customers. In fact, restarting the time measurement for  reworked investigations could positively affect OPM’s statistics if the  reworked sections of the investigation take less time than did the earlier  effort to complete the large portion of the investigative report.
IRTPA establishes timeliness requirements for the security clearance  process. Specifically, it states that “each authorized adjudicative agency  shall make a determination on at least 80 percent of all applications for a  personnel security clearance pursuant to this section within an average of  120 days after the date of receipt of the application for a security clearance  by an authorized investigative agency.” IRTPA did not identify situations  that could be excluded from mandated timeliness assessments. Without  fully accounting for the total time needed to complete the clearance  process, Congress will not be able to accurately determine whether  agencies have met IRTPA-mandated requirements or determine if  legislative actions are necessary.
section_title: OPM Delivered Incomplete Investigative Reports, and DISCO- Adjudicated Cases Did Not Document All Clearance- Determination Considerations
paragraphs: OPM provided incomplete investigative reports to DOD adjudicators,  which they used to determine top secret clearance eligibility. Almost all  (47 of 50) of the sampled investigative reports we reviewed were  incomplete based on requirements in the federal investigative standards.  In addition, DISCO adjudicators granted clearance eligibility without  requesting additional information for any of the incomplete investigative  reports and did not document that they considered some adjudicative  guidelines when adverse information was present in some reports.  Granting clearances based on incomplete investigative reports increases  risks to national security. In addition, use of incomplete investigative  reports and not fully documenting adjudicative considerations may  undermine the government’s efforts to increase the acceptance of security  clearances granted by other federal agencies.
subsections: section_title: Almost All of the Sampled Investigative Reports Were Incomplete
paragraphs: In our review of 50 initial investigations randomly sampled from the  population used in our timeliness analyses, we found that 47 of 50 of the  investigative reports were missing documentation required by the federal  investigative standards. The missing data were of two general types: (1)  the absence of documentation showing that an investigator gathered the  prescribed information in each of the applicable 13 investigative areas and  included requisite forms in the investigative report and (2) the absence of  information to help resolve issues (such as conflicting information on  indebtedness) that were raised in other parts of the investigative report.  The requirements for gathering these types of information were identified  in federal investigative standards published about a decade ago.
At least half of the 50 reports did not contain the required documentation  in 3 investigative areas: residence (33 of 50), employment (32), and  education (27). In addition, many investigative reports contained multiple  deficiencies within each of these areas. For example, multiple deficiencies  might be present in the residence area because investigators did not  document a rental record check and an interview with a neighborhood  reference. Moreover, 44 of the 50 investigative reports had 2 to 6  investigative areas out of a total of 13 areas with at least one piece of  missing documentation.
We also found a total of 36 unresolved issues in 27 of the investigative  reports. The three investigative areas with the most unresolved issues  were financial consideration (11 of 50 cases), foreign influence (11), and  personal conduct (7). Federal standards indicate that investigations may  be expanded as necessary to resolve issues.  According to OPM, (1) issue  resolution is a standard part of all initial investigations and periodic  reinvestigations for top secret clearances and (2) all issues developed  during the course of an investigation should be fully resolved in the final  investigative report provided to DOD.
One investigative report we examined serves as an example of the types of  documentation issues we found during our review. During the course of  this particular investigation, the subject reported having extramarital  affairs; however, there was no documentation to show that these affairs  had been investigated further. Also, the subject’s clearance application  indicated cohabitation with an individual with whom the subject had  previously had a romantic relationship, but there was no documentation  that record checks were performed on the cohabitant. Moreover,  information in the investigative report indicated that the subject had  defaulted on a loan with a balance of several thousand dollars; however,  no other documentation suggested that this issue was explored further.  When we reviewed this and other deficient investigative reports with OPM  Quality Management officials, they agreed that the investigators should  have included documentation to resolve the issues.
While we found that the interview narratives in some of the 50 OPM  investigative reports were limited in content, we did not identify them as  being deficient for the purposes of our analysis because such an  evaluation would have required a subjective assessment that we were not  willing to make. For example, in our assessment of the presence or  absence of documentation, we found a 35-word narrative for a subject  interview of a naturalized citizen from an Asian country. It stated only that  the subject did not have any foreign contacts in his birth country and that  he spent his time with family and participated in sports. Nevertheless,  others with more adjudicative expertise voiced concern about the issue of  documentation adequacy. Top officials representing DOD’s adjudication  facilities with whom we consulted were in agreement that OPM-provided  investigative summaries had been inadequate.
When we reviewed our findings in meetings with the Associate Director of  OPM’s investigations unit and her quality management officials they cited  the inexperience of the rapidly expanded investigative workforce and  variations in training provided to federal and contractor investigative staff  as possible causes for the incomplete investigative reports we reviewed.  Later, in official agency comments to our September 2006 report, OPM’s  Director indicated that some of the problems that we reported were the  result of transferred staff and cases when OPM accepted DOD  investigative functions and personnel. However, OPM had had 2 years to  prepare for the transfer between the announced transfer agreement in  February 2003 and its occurrence in February 2005. Furthermore, the staff  and cases were under OPM control until the investigative reports were  subsequently transferred to OPM for adjudication in January or February  of 2006. In addition, 47 of the 50 investigative reports that we reviewed  were missing documentation even though OPM had quality control  procedures for reviewing the reports before they were sent to DOD.
In our November 2005 testimony evaluating the government plan for  improving the personnel security clearance process, we stated that  developers of the plan may wish to consider adding other indicators of the  quality of investigations. During our review, we asked the Associate  Director of OPM’s Investigations Unit if OMB and OPM had made changes  to the government plan to address quality measurement and other  shortcomings we identified. OPM’s Associate Director said that the plan  had not been modified to address our concerns but that implementation of  the plan was continuing.
section_title: DISCO Adjudicators Granted Top Secret Clearance Eligibility for Cases with Missing Information
paragraphs: Our review found that DISCO adjudicators granted top secret clearance  eligibility for all 47 of the 50 industry personnel whose investigative  reports did not have full documentation. In making clearance-eligibility  determinations, the federal guidelines require adjudicators to consider (1)  guidelines covering 13 specific areas, such as foreign influence and  financial considerations; (2) adverse conditions or conduct that could  raise  security concerns and factors that might mitigate (alleviate) the  condition for each guideline; and (3) general factors related to the whole  person. According to a DISCO official, DISCO and other DOD adjudicators  are to record information relevant to each of their eligibility  determinations in JPAS. They do this by selecting applicable guidelines  and mitigating factors from prelisted responses and may type up to 3,000  characters of additional information.
The adjudicators granted eligibility for the 27 industry personnel whose  investigative reports (discussed in the prior section) contained unresolved  issues without requesting additional information or documenting in the  adjudicative report that the information was missing. The following is an  example of an unresolved foreign influence issue, which was not  documented in the adjudicative report, although DISCO officials agreed  that additional information should have been obtained to resolve the issue  before the individual was granted a top secret clearance. A state-level  record check on an industry employee indicated that the subject was part  owner of a foreign-owned corporation. Although the DISCO adjudicator  applied the foreign influence guideline for the subject’s foreign travel and  mitigated that foreign influence issue, there was no documentation in the  adjudicative report to acknowledge or mitigate the foreign-owned  business. When we asked why adjudicators did not provide the required  documentation in JPAS, the DISCO officials as well as adjudication  trainers said that adjudicators review the investigative reports for  sufficient documentation to resolve issues and make judgment calls about  the amount of risk associated with each case by weighing a variety of past  and present, favorable and unfavorable information about the person to  reach an eligibility determination.
Seventeen of the 50 adjudicative reports were missing documentation on a  total of 22 guidelines for which issues were present in the investigative  reports. The missing guideline documentation was for foreign influence  (11), financial considerations (5), alcohol consumption (2), personal  conduct issues (2), drug involvement (1), and foreign influence (1). DISCO  officials stated that procedural changes associated with JPAS  implementation contributed to the missing documentation. DISCO began  using JPAS in February 2003, and it became the official system for all of  DOD in February 2005. Before February 2005, DISCO adjudicators were  not required to document the consideration of a guideline issue unless the  adverse information could disqualify an individual from being granted a  clearance eligibility. After JPAS implementation, DISCO adjudicators were  trained to document in JPAS their rationale for the clearance  determination and any adverse information from the investigative report,  regardless of whether an adjudicative guideline issue could disqualify an  individual from obtaining a clearance. The administrators also attributed  the missing guideline documentation to a few adjudicators attempting to  produce more adjudication determinations.
section_title: Delivery and Use of Incomplete Investigations Increase Risks to National Security and Reciprocity
paragraphs: Decisions to grant clearances based on incomplete investigations increase  risks to national security because individuals can gain access to classified  information without being vetted against the full federal standards and  guidelines. Furthermore, if adjudication facilities send the incomplete  investigations back to OPM for more work, the adjudication facilities must  use adjudicator time to review cases more than once and then use  additional time to document problems with the incomplete investigative  reports.
Incomplete investigations and adjudications undermine the government’s  efforts to move toward greater clearance and access reciprocity. An  interagency working group, the Security Clearance Oversight Steering  Committee, noted that agencies are reluctant to be accountable for poor  quality investigations, adjudications conducted by other agencies or  organizations, or both. To achieve fuller reciprocity, clearance-granting  agencies need to have confidence in the quality of the clearance process.  Without full documentation of investigative actions, information obtained,  and adjudicative decisions, agencies could continue to require duplicative  investigations and adjudications.
section_title: Concluding Observations
paragraphs: Incomplete timeliness data limit the visibility of stakeholders and decision  makers in their efforts to address long-standing delays in the personnel  security clearance process. For example, not accounting for all of the time  used when personnel submit an application multiple times before it is  accepted limits the government’s ability to (1) accurately monitor the time  required for each step in the application-submission phase and (2) identify  positive steps that facility security officers, DISCO adjudicators, OPM  investigative staff, and other stakeholders can take to speed the process.  The timeliness-related concerns identified in my testimony show the  fragmented approach that the government has taken to addressing  clearance problems. When I testified before this Subcommittee in  November 2005, we were optimistic that the government plan for  improving the clearance process prepared under the direction of OMB’s  Deputy Director for Management would be a living document that would  provide the strategic vision for correcting long-standing problems in the  personnel security clearance process. However, nearly 2 years after first  commenting on the plan, we have not been provided with a revised plan  that lays out how the government intends to address the shortcomings that  we identified in the plan during our November 2005 testimony. Continued  failure to address the shortcomings we have cited could significantly limit  the positive impact that the government has made in other portions of the  clearance process through improvements such as hiring more  investigators and promoting reciprocity.
While eliminating delays in the clearance process is an important goal, the  government cannot afford to achieve that goal by providing investigative  and adjudicative reports that are incomplete in the key areas required by  federal investigative standards and adjudicative guidelines. Also, the  incomplete investigative and adjudicative reports could suggest to some  security managers that there is at least some evidence to support agencies’  concerns about the risks that may come from accepting the clearances  issued by other federal agencies, and thereby negatively affect OMB’s  efforts toward achieving greater reciprocity. Further, as we pointed out in  November 2005, the almost total absence of quality metrics in the  governmentwide plan for improving the clearance process hinders  Congress’s oversight of these important issues. Finally, the missing  documentation could have longer-term negative effects, such as requiring  future investigators and adjudicators to devote time to obtaining the  documentation missing from current reviews when it is time to update the  clearances currently being issued.
Mr. Chairman and Members of the Subcommittee, this concludes my  prepared statement. I would be happy to answer any questions you may  have at this time.
section_title: Contact and Acknowledgments
paragraphs: For further information regarding this testimony please contact me at  (202)512-5559 or stewartd@gao.gov. Contact points for our Offices of  Congressional Relations and Public Affairs may be found on the last page  of this statement. Individuals who made key contributions to this  testimony are Jack E. Edwards, Assistant Director; Kurt A. Burgeson;  Nicolaas C. Cornelisse; Alissa H. Czyz; Ronald La Due Lake; Beverly C.  Schladt; and Karen D. Thornton.
section_title: Related GAO Products
paragraphs: DOD Personnel Clearances: Questions and Answers for the Record  Following the Second in a Series of Hearings on Fixing the Security  Clearance Process. GAO-06-693R. Washington, D.C.: June 14, 2006.
DOD Personnel Clearances: New Concerns Slow Processing of Clearances  for Industry Personnel. GAO-06-748T. Washington, D.C.: May 17, 2006.
DOD Personnel Clearances: Funding Challenges and Other Impediments  Slow Clearances for Industry Personnel. GAO-06-747T. Washington, D.C.:  May 17, 2006.
GAO’s High-Risk Program. GAO-06-497T. Washington, D.C.: March 15,  2006.
Questions for the Record Related to DOD’s Personnel Security Clearance  Program and the Government Plan for Improving the Clearance  Process. GAO-06-323R. Washington, D.C.: January 17, 2006.
DOD Personnel Clearances: Government Plan Addresses Some Long- standing Problems with DOD’s Program, But Concerns Remain. GAO-06- 233T. Washington, D.C.: November 9, 2005.
Defense Management: Better Review Needed of Program Protection  Issues Associated with Manufacturing Presidential Helicopters. GAO-06- 71SU. Washington, D.C.: November 4, 2005.
Questions for the Record Related to DOD’s Personnel Security Clearance  Program. GAO-05-988R. Washington, D.C.: August 19, 2005.
DOD Personnel Clearances: Some Progress Has Been Made but Hurdles  Remain to Overcome the Challenges That Led to GAO's High-Risk  Designation. GAO-05-842T. Washington, D.C.: June 28, 2005.
DOD’s High-Risk Areas: Successful Business Transformation Requires  Sound Strategic Planning and Sustained Leadership. GAO-05-520T.  Washington, D.C.: April 13, 2005.
High-Risk Series: An Update. GAO-05-207. Washington, D.C.: January  2005.
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