DOD Personnel Clearances: Some Progress Has Been Made but Hurdles Remain to Overcome the Challenges That Led to GAO's High-Risk Designation
Released: 2005-06-28T00:00:00

Letter

Background

Since 1997, all federal agencies have been subject to a common set of personnel security investigative standards and adjudicative guidelines for determining whether servicemembers, government employees, industry personnel, and others are eligible to receive a security clearance. Clearances allow personnel to access classified information categorized into three levels: top secret, secret, and confidential. The expected damage to national defense and foreign relations that unauthorized disclosure could reasonably be expected to cause is “exceptionally grave damage” for top secret information, “serious damage” for secret information, and “damage” for confidential information. Individuals who need access to classified information for extended periods of time are required to periodically renew their clearance (a reinvestigation). The time frames for reinvestigations are 5 years for top secret clearances, 10 years for secret clearances, and 15 years for confidential clearances.

In addition to requiring different time frames for renewal, the different levels of clearances require that different types of background information be gathered and used in making the adjudicative decision about whether an individual is or is not eligible for a clearance (see table 1). Much of the information for a secret or confidential clearance is gathered through electronic files. The investigation for a top secret clearance requires the information needed for the secret or confidential clearance as well as additional data which are gathered through time-consuming tasks, such as interviews with the subject of the investigation request, references in the workplace, and neighbors. OPM officials estimated that the time required to gather information to complete initial investigations for top secret clearances is twice that needed for reinvestigations for top secret clearances and 10 times as much as that needed for initial investigations or reinvestigations for secret or confidential clearances. DOD estimated that adjudicators’ reviews of the longer investigative reports for top secret clearances also take three times as long as the reviews of investigative reports for determining eligibility for secret or confidential clearances. Moreover, if the clearance required for a position is upgraded from secret to top secret, the investigation and adjudication would need to be performed twice as often (every 5 years instead of every 10 years).

Progress and Continuing Challenges Found at Each Stage of DOD’s Personnel Security Clearance Process

We found that DOD has taken steps to address challenges found at all three stages of its personnel security clearance process, but many of the steps have not yet resulted in implementations that fully address the challenges. In the preinvestigation stage, DOD has begun decreasing the uncertainty in its projections of how many and what levels of clearances are required by identifying the clearances needed for military and civilian positions and developing software that will result in electronic submissions of clearance investigation requests to OPM. Regarding the second stage of the clearance process, OPM has been hiring investigative staff to address past personnel shortages and the resulting delays from having too few staff for the investigative workload. Adding thousands of staff could, however, result in continued timeliness problems as well as quality concerns until the staff gain experience. Regarding the adjudication stage, DOD’s Joint Personnel Adjudication System consolidated the databases for 10 DOD adjudication facilities to enhance monitoring of adjudicative decisions and time frames for renewing clearances, but a new law requires a governmentwide clearance database.

Preinvestigation Steps Being Taken to Help DOD Identify Requirements for Clearances and Address Submission of Requests for Clearance Investigations

At this time, DOD is uncertain about the number and level of clearances that it requires and has experienced problems submitting investigation requests, but the department has begun addressing these problems. DOD’s inability to accurately project such clearance requirements makes it difficult to determine budgets and staffing needs. DOD is addressing this problem by identifying the clearance needs for military and civilian positions, but no military service had completed this task as of May 2005. Similarly, in response to our May 2004 recommendation to improve the projection of clearance requirements for industry personnel, DOD indicated that it is developing a plan and computer software to have the government’s contracting officers authorize the number of industry personnel investigations required to perform the classified work on a given contract and link the clearance investigations to the contract number.

Despite having 2 years between the time when OPM and DOD announced an agreement for the transfer of DOD’s investigative functions and personnel to OPM and when the transfer actually occurred, DOD cannot make full use of OPM’s Electronic Questionnaires for Investigations Processing (eQIP), the system used to submit materials required to start a background investigation. To overcome this challenge to the prompt and efficient submission of investigation requests, DOD is developing software that will convert the department’s submissions into the eQIP format. Also, OPM told us that about 11 percent of the February 2005 clearance investigation requests submitted outside of eQIP were returned to the requesting offices when missing or discrepant information could not be obtained telephonically. Converting a DOD request for investigation into a format that is compatible with OPM’s eQIP and obtaining missing or corrected data to open an investigation delays the completion of the clearance process. OPM does not monitor how many days elapse between initial submissions and resubmissions of corrected material and, therefore, does not include that time in its calculations of the average time required to complete an investigation. Until DOD implements the software currently being developed and fully determines its clearance requirements, the department will continue to encounter problems determining budgets and staff and minimizing the delays in completing the clearance process.

Delays Exist in Completing Investigations, but Recent Steps May Decrease the Delays

DOD and the rest of the government serviced by OPM are not receiving completed investigations promptly, but recent initiatives may decrease these delays. For February 2005, OPM told us that it had more than 185,000 investigations governmentwide that had taken longer than its goals for closing cases: 120 days for initial investigations and 180 days for reinvestigations. The current goals for completing a case allow more time than did the DOD goals reported in our earlier work and, therefore, comparison of the investigation backlog size that OPM reported in February 2005 to the backlog size cited in our prior reviews would not provide any meaningful information. The Intelligence Reform and Terrorism Prevention Act of 2004 requires that not later than December 17, 2006, and ending December 17, 2009, each authorized adjudicative agency shall make a determination on at least 80 percent of all applicants for personnel security clearances within an average of 120 days—90 days to complete the investigation and 30 days to complete the adjudication—of receiving the security clearance application. Also, not later than February 15, 2006, and annually thereafter through 2011, a report on the progress made during the preceding year toward meeting these goals is to be supplied to appropriate congressional committees. Table 2 shows that, across the government, standard service for both initial investigations and reinvestigations for top secret clearances resulted in more than 1 year elapsing, on average, between submitting the investigation requests and closing the investigations. OPM does, however, permit agencies to request priority (expedited) processing on a limited number of investigations, and those investigations took less time to close. Table 2 also shows a difference in the time required to close initial investigations and reinvestigations for top secret clearances.

In February and May 2004, we reported that different risks are associated with delays in completing initial investigations and reinvestigations. Delays in completing initial personnel security clearances can have negative impacts on the costs of performing classified work within or for the U.S. government. For example, delays in clearing industry personnel can affect the cost, timeliness, and quality of contractor performance on defense contracts. Conversely, delays in completing reinvestigations may lead to a heightened risk of national security breaches because the longer individuals hold clearances, the more likely they are to be working with critical information systems.

Our prior review noted that delays in completing personnel security clearance investigations for DOD and other agencies have resulted, in part, from a shortage of investigative staff. In February 2004, we noted that the Deputy Associate Director of OPM’s Center for Investigations Services estimated that OPM and DOD would need a total of roughly 8,000 full-time- equivalent investigative personnel to eliminate backlogs and deliver investigations in a timely fashion to their customers. To reach its goal of 8,000, OPM must add and retain approximately 3,800 full-time equivalent investigative staff, and retain all of the estimated 4,200 full-time-equivalent staff that OPM and DOD had combined in December 2003. In our February 2004 report, we noted that OPM’s primary contractor was adding about 100 and losing about 70 investigators per month. If the high rate of turnover has continued, the ability to grow investigative capacity could be difficult. In addition, OPM could be left with a large number of investigative staff with limited experience.

OPM’s Deputy Associate Director noted that the inexperience among investigative staff results in investigations not being completed as quickly as they might have been if the investigators were more experienced. The OPM official also noted that the quality of the investigations is not where she would like to see it. As we noted in our September 2004 testimony before this subcommittee, OPM had continued to use its investigations contractor to conduct personnel security clearance investigations on its own employees even though we raised an internal control concern about this practice during our 1996 review. OPM officials indicated that they plan to use the government employees that were transferred from DOD to address this concern.

In addition to adding staff, two other initiatives should decrease delays in completing clearance investigations. A new DOD initiative—the phased periodic reinvestigation (phased PR)—that we discussed in our May 2004 report can make more staff available and thereby decrease the workload associated with some reinvestigations for top secret clearances. The phased approach to periodic reinvestigations involves conducting a reinvestigation in two phases; a more extensive reinvestigation would be conducted only if potential security issues were identified in the initial phase. Specifically, investigative staff would verify residency records and conduct interviews of listed references, references developed during the investigation, and individuals residing in the neighborhood only if potential security issues were identified in other parts of the standard reinvestigation process. The Defense Personnel Security Research Center showed that at least 20 percent of the normal investigative effort could be saved with almost no loss in identifying critical issues needed for adjudication. In December 2004, the President approved the use of the phased PR for personnel needing to renew their top secret clearances.

Another source of investigative, as well as adjudicative, workload reduction may result from the recent reciprocity requirements contained in the Intelligence Reform and Terrorism Prevention Act of 2004. Our May 2004 report noted that the lack of reciprocity (the acceptance of clearance and access granted by another department, agency, or military service) was cited as an obstacle that can cause contractor delays in filling positions and starting work on government contracts. Under the new law, all security clearance background investigations and determinations completed by an authorized investigative agency or authorized adjudicative agency shall be accepted by all agencies.

Joint Personnel Adjudication System Consolidates DOD Adjudicative Data, but a New Law Requires Wider Consolidation

DOD’s Joint Personnel Adjudication System (JPAS) consolidated 10 DOD adjudication databases to provide OUSD(I) with better monitoring of adjudication-related problems, but a new law requires wider consolidation. Past delays in implementing DOD’s JPAS greatly inhibited OUSD(I)’s ability to monitor overdue reinvestigations and generate accurate estimates for that portion of the backlog. In addition to correcting these problems, implementation of much of JPAS has eliminated the need for DOD’s 10 adjudication facilities to maintain their own databases of adjudicative information. This consolidation may also assist with a requirement in the Intelligence Reform and Terrorism Prevention Act of 2004. Among other things, the law requires that not later than December 17, 2005, the Director of OPM shall, in cooperation with the heads of the certain other government entities, establish and commence operating and maintaining a single, integrated, secure database into which appropriate data relevant to the granting, denial, and revocation of a security clearance or access pertaining to military, civilian, or government contractor personnel shall be entered from all authorized investigative and adjudicative agencies. OPM officials stated that JPAS and OPM’s Clearance Verification System account for over 90 percent of the government’s active security clearances and that the remaining clearances are primarily housed in classified record systems (e.g., the Central Intelligence Agency’s Scattered Castles) devoted to the intelligence community.

Additionally, DOD may move closer toward the 9/11 Commission’s recommendation of having a single government agency responsible for providing and maintaining clearances by co-locating its 10 adjudication facilities on a single military installation. The recent base realignment and closure list includes a recommendation to co-locate all of DOD’s adjudication facilities. While co-location—if it occurs—would not be the same as consolidation, it might provide opportunities for greater communication within DOD. However, the proposed co-location at Fort Meade, Maryland, could also result in the loss of trained staff who might choose not to relocate, such as some of the roughly 400 employees in the Defense Industrial Security Clearance Office and the Defense Office of Hearings and Appeals Personal Security Division in Columbus, Ohio.

In our February 2004 report, we noted that DOD had (1) as of September 30, 2003, a backlog of roughly 90,000 completed investigations that had not been adjudicated within prescribed time limits, (2) no DOD-wide standard for determining how quickly adjudications should be completed, and (3) inadequate adjudicator staffing. Also at the time of our report, the DOD Office of Inspector General was examining whether the Navy adjudicative contracts led to contractors’ staff performing an inherently governmental function—adjudication. Because of that examination, it was unclear whether the Army and Air Force adjudication facilities would be able to use similar contracting to eliminate their backlogs.

Although DOD concurred with our April 2001 recommendations for improving its adjudicative process, it has not fully implemented any of the recommendations as of May 2005. OUSD(I) reported the following progress for those four recommendations. (Our recommendations appear in italics, followed by a summary of DOD’s response and/or actions.)

Establish detailed documentation requirements to support adjudication decisions. Use of JPAS will require greater documentation on adverse information and possible factors to mitigate that information, but this feature of JPAS has not been fully implemented.

Require that all DOD adjudicators use common explanatory guidance.

DOD has developed this guidance and is awaiting review by the Personnel Security Working Group of Policy Coordinating Committee for Records Access and Information Security Policy, an interagency group.

Establish common adjudicator training requirements and develop appropriate continuing education opportunities for all DOD adjudicators. A work plan has been developed to establish an adjudicator certification process, to be implemented in late 2005 or early 2006. The plan will include continuing education requirements.

Establish a common quality assurance program to be implemented by officials in all DOD adjudication facilities and monitor compliance through annual reporting. OUSD(I) indicates DOD is developing criteria and a form to assess the quality of the investigations that DOD is receiving. Also, in the future, cases are to be randomly selected from JPAS and reviewed by a team of adjudicators from the various adjudication facilities.

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. In summary, Mr. Chairman, we will continue to monitor this area as we do for all of the high-risk programs on our list. Much remains to be done to bring lasting solutions to this high-risk area. As we stated in our report, High-Risk Series: An Update, perseverance by the administration in implementing GAO’s recommended solutions and continued oversight and action by the Congress are both essential.

GAO Contact and Staff Acknowledgments

GAO Contact

Acknowledgments

Individuals making key contributions to this statement include Alissa H. Czyz, Jack E. Edwards, Julia C. Matta, and Mark A. Pross.

Related GAO Products

Defense Management: Key Elements Needed to Successfully Transform DOD Business Operations. GAO-05-629T. Washington, D.C.: April 28, 2005.

Maritime Security: New Structures Have Improved Information Sharing, but Security Clearance Processing Requires Further Attention. GAO-05-394. Washington, D.C.: April 15, 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.

Intelligence Reform: Human Capital Considerations Critical to 9/11 Commission’s Proposed Reforms. GAO-04-1084T. Washington, D.C.: September 14, 2004.

DOD Personnel Clearances: Additional Steps Can Be Taken to Reduce Backlogs and Delays in Determining Security Clearance Eligibility for Industry Personnel. GAO-04-632. Washington, D.C.: May 26, 2004.

DOD Personnel Clearances: Preliminary Observations Related to Backlogs and Delays in Determining Security Clearance Eligibility for Industry Personnel. GAO-04-202T. Washington, D.C.: May 6, 2004.

Security Clearances: FBI Has Enhanced Its Process for State and Local Law Enforcement Officials. GAO-04-596. Washington, D.C.: April 30, 2004.

Industrial Security: DOD Cannot Provide Adequate Assurances That Its Oversight Ensures the Protection of Classified Information. GAO-04-332. Washington, D.C.: March 3, 2004.

DOD Personnel Clearances: DOD Needs to Overcome Impediments to Eliminating Backlog and Determining Its Size. GAO-04-344. Washington, D.C.: February 9, 2004.

Aviation Security: Federal Air Marshal Service Is Addressing Challenges of Its Expanded Mission and Workforce but Additional Actions Needed. GAO-04-242. Washington, D.C.: November 19, 2003.

DOD Personnel: More Consistency Needed in Determining Eligibility for Top Secret Security Clearances. GAO-01-465. Washington, D.C.: April 18, 2001.

DOD Personnel: More Accurate Estimate of Overdue Security Clearance Reinvestigation Is Needed. GAO/T-NSIAD-00-246. Washington, D.C.: September 20, 2000.

DOD Personnel: More Actions Needed to Address Backlog of Security Clearance Reinvestigations. GAO/NSIAD-00-215. Washington, D.C.: August 24, 2000.

DOD Personnel: Weaknesses in Security Investigation Program Are Being Addressed. GAO/T-NSIAD-00-148. Washington, D.C.: April 6, 2000.

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Background Investigations: Program Deficiencies May Lead DEA to Relinquish Its Authority to OPM. GAO/GGD-99-173. Washington, D.C.: September 7, 1999.

Military Recruiting: New Initiatives Could Improve Criminal History Screening. GAO/NSIAD-99-53. Washington, D.C.: February 23, 1999.

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Privatization of OPM’s Investigations Service. GAO/GGD-96-97R. Washington, D.C.: August 22, 1996.

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Security Clearances: Consideration of Sexual Orientation in the Clearance Process. GAO/NSIAD-95-21. Washington, D.C.: March 24, 1995.

Personnel Security Investigations. GAO/NSIAD-94-135R. Washington, D.C.: March 4, 1994.

Nuclear Security: DOE’s Progress on Reducing Its Security Clearance Work Load. GAO/RCED-93-183. Washington, D.C.: August 12, 1993.

Personnel Security: Efforts by DOD and DOE to Eliminate Duplicative Background Investigations. GAO/RCED-93-23. Washington, D.C.: May 10, 1993.

Security Clearances: Due Process for Denials and Revocations by Defense, Energy, and State. GAO/NSIAD-92-99. Washington, D.C.: May 6, 1992.

DOD Special Access Programs: Administrative Due Process Not Provided When Access Is Denied or Revoked. GAO/NSIAD-93-162. Washington, D.C.: May 5, 1993.

Administrative Due Process: Denials and Revocations of Security Clearances and Access to Special Programs. GAO/T-NSIAD-93-14. Washington, D.C.: May 5, 1993.

Due Process: Procedures for Unfavorable Suitability and Security Clearance Actions. GAO/NSIAD-90-97FS. Washington, D.C.: April 23, 1990.

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