DOD Personnel Clearances
DOD Faces Multiple Challenges in Its Efforts to Improve Clearance Processes for Industry Personnel Gao ID: GAO-08-470T February 13, 2008The Department of Defense (DOD) maintains approximately 2.5 million security clearances on servicemembers, federal DOD civilian employees, industry personnel for DOD and 23 other federal agencies, and employees in the legislative branch. Delays in determining eligibility for a clearance can heighten the risk that classified information will be disclosed to unauthorized sources, increase contract costs, and pose problems in attracting and retaining qualified personnel. In this statement, GAO addresses: (1) the status of DOD's efforts to improve its projections of the numbers of clearances needed for industry personnel, and (2) other long-standing challenges that have a negative effect on the efficiency and effectiveness of DOD's personnel security clearance program for industry personnel. This statement is based on a report GAO is issuing today (GAO-08-350) and other prior work, which included reviews of clearance-related documents and interviews of senior officials at DOD and the Office of Personnel Management (OPM).
DOD has had a long-standing challenge in accurately projecting the number of clearance investigations that will be required in the future for industry personnel. The Office of Management and Budget (OMB) developed criteria for these projections in November 2005. It established a governmentwide goal for agencies to refine their projections of the number of clearance investigations that will be required in any given year to be within 5 percent of the number of actual requests for investigation. At a May 2006 congressional hearing, an OPM Assistant Director stated that DOD had exceeded its departmentwide projection by 59 percent for the first half of fiscal year 2006. The negative effects of such inaccurate projections include impediments to workload planning and funding. GAO noted the problem with the accuracy of DOD's projections in its February 2004 report and recommended that DOD improve its projections for industry personnel. In the report it is issuing today, GAO noted that DOD has initiated changes to improve its estimates of future investigation needs and is conducting research that may change these methods further. For example, in 2006, DOD took steps to increase the response rate of its annual survey used as a basis for determining its projections. In 2007, it changed its methods for analyzing data that informs its projections. However, DOD has not yet demonstrated the effectiveness of these changes. DOD must address additional long-standing challenges or issues in order to improve the efficiency and accuracy of its personnel security clearance program for industry personnel. First, continuing delays in determining clearance eligibility can result in increased costs and risk to national security. For example, when new employees' clearances are delayed, it affects their abilities to perform their duties fully since they do not have access to classified material. Second, DOD and the rest of the federal government provide limited information to one another on how they individually ensure the quality of clearance products and procedures, which affects reciprocity of clearances. Reciprocity occurs when one government agency fully accepts a security clearance granted by another government agency. GAO's September 2006 report noted that agencies may not reciprocally recognize clearances granted by other agencies because of concerns that other agencies may have granted clearances based on inadequate investigations and adjudications. Third, in DOD's August 2007 report to Congress, it provided less than 2 years of funding-requirements information, which limits congressional awareness of future year requirements for this program. Fourth, DOD does not have a comprehensive DOD-specific plan to address delays in its clearance program. While there is a governmentwide effort to reform the clearance process, it is projected not to be operational until beyond December 2008.
GAO-08-470T, DOD Personnel Clearances: DOD Faces Multiple Challenges in Its Efforts to Improve Clearance Processes for Industry Personnel
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Testimony:
Before the Subcommittee on Readiness, Committee on Armed Services,
House of Representatives:
United States Government Accountability Office:
GAO:
For Release on Delivery Expected at 2:00 p.m. EST:
Wednesday, February 13, 2008:
DOD Personnel Clearances:
DOD Faces Multiple Challenges in Its Efforts to Improve Clearance
Processes for Industry Personnel:
Statement of Jack E. Edwards, Acting Director:
Defense Capabilities and Management:
GAO-08-470T:
GAO Highlights:
Highlights of GAO-08-470T, a testimony before the Subcommittee on
Readiness, Committee on Armed Services, House of Representatives.
Why GAO Did This Study:
The Department of Defense (DOD) maintains approximately 2.5 million
security clearances on servicemembers, federal DOD civilian employees,
industry personnel for DOD and 23 other federal agencies, and employees
in the legislative branch. Delays in determining eligibility for a
clearance can heighten the risk that classified information will be
disclosed to unauthorized sources, increase contract costs, and pose
problems in attracting and retaining qualified personnel. In this
statement, GAO addresses: (1) the status of DOD‘s efforts to improve
its projections of the numbers of clearances needed for industry
personnel, and (2) other long-standing challenges that have a negative
effect on the efficiency and effectiveness of DOD‘s personnel security
clearance program for industry personnel. This statement is based on a
report GAO is issuing today (GAO-08-350) and other prior work, which
included reviews of clearance-related documents and interviews of
senior officials at DOD and the Office of Personnel Management (OPM).
What GAO Found:
DOD has had a long-standing challenge in accurately projecting the
number of clearance investigations that will be required in the future
for industry personnel. The Office of Management and Budget (OMB)
developed criteria for these projections in November 2005. It
established a governmentwide goal for agencies to refine their
projections of the number of clearance investigations that will be
required in any given year to be within 5 percent of the number of
actual requests for investigation. At a May 2006 congressional hearing,
an OPM Assistant Director stated that DOD had exceeded its
departmentwide projection by 59 percent for the first half of fiscal
year 2006. The negative effects of such inaccurate projections include
impediments to workload planning and funding. GAO noted the problem
with the accuracy of DOD‘s projections in its February 2004 report and
recommended that DOD improve its projections for industry personnel. In
the report it is issuing today, GAO noted that DOD has initiated
changes to improve its estimates of future investigation needs and is
conducting research that may change these methods further. For example,
in 2006, DOD took steps to increase the response rate of its annual
survey used as a basis for determining its projections. In 2007, it
changed its methods for analyzing data that informs its projections.
However, DOD has not yet demonstrated the effectiveness of these
changes.
DOD must address additional long-standing challenges or issues in order
to improve the efficiency and accuracy of its personnel security
clearance program for industry personnel. First, continuing delays in
determining clearance eligibility can result in increased costs and
risk to national security. For example, when new employees‘ clearances
are delayed, it affects their abilities to perform their duties fully
since they do not have access to classified material. Second, DOD and
the rest of the federal government provide limited information to one
another on how they individually ensure the quality of clearance
products and procedures, which affects reciprocity of clearances.
Reciprocity occurs when one government agency fully accepts a security
clearance granted by another government agency. GAO‘s September 2006
report noted that agencies may not reciprocally recognize clearances
granted by other agencies because of concerns that other agencies may
have granted clearances based on inadequate investigations and
adjudications. Third, in DOD‘s August 2007 report to Congress, it
provided less than 2 years of funding-requirements information, which
limits congressional awareness of future year requirements for this
program. Fourth, DOD does not have a comprehensive DOD-specific plan to
address delays in its clearance program. While there is a
governmentwide effort to reform the clearance process, it is projected
not to be operational until beyond December 2008.
What GAO Recommends:
GAO made recommendations to address DOD‘s security clearance
challenges. For example, in the report we are issuing today, GAO
recommended that DOD provide Congress with information on funding and
quality in clearance processes. DOD concurred and indicated it would
provide that information in its 2009 report to Congress.
To view the full product, click on [hyperlink, http://www.GAO-08-470T.
For more information, contact Jack Edwards at (202) 512-8246 or
edwardsj@gao.gov, or Brenda Farrell at (202) 512-3604 or
farrellb@gao.gov
[End of section]
Chairman Ortiz and Members of the Subcommittee:
I am pleased to be here today to discuss several of the long-standing
challenges that affect the efficiency and effectiveness of the
Department of Defense's (DOD) personnel security clearance program for
industry personnel. DOD's clearance program maintains approximately 2.5
million clearances on servicemembers, federal DOD civilian employees,
industry personnel for DOD and 23 other federal agencies, and employees
in the federal legislative branch. For more than two decades, we have
documented challenges to DOD's clearance program.
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 to continue
that designation in the updated list of high-risk areas that we
published in 2007.[Footnote 1] We identified this as a high-risk area
because problems in the clearance program can negatively affect
national security. For example, delays in renewing security clearances
for personnel who are already doing classified work can lead to a
heightened risk of unauthorized disclosure of classified information.
In contrast, delays in providing initial security clearances for
previously noncleared personnel can result in other negative
consequences, such as additional costs and delays in completing
national security-related contracts, lost-opportunity costs, and
problems retaining the best qualified personnel. At the same time, our
work has acknowledged recent improvements to the department's clearance
processes that were DOD-specific or part of governmentwide efforts.
My statement today will focus on two issues: (1) the status of DOD's
efforts to improve its projections of the number of clearances needed
for industry personnel, and (2) an overview of other long-standing
challenges that have a negative effect on the efficiency and
effectiveness of DOD's personnel security clearance program for
industry personnel. My statement draws on a report which we are issuing
today[Footnote 2] and on our prior work on clearance processes which
included reviews of clearance related documents and interviews of
senior officials at DOD and the Office of Personnel Management (OPM)
which has the primary responsibility for providing investigation
services to DOD. Our work was performed in accordance with generally
accepted government auditing standards. Those standards require that we
plan and perform the audit to obtain sufficient, appropriate evidence
to provide a reasonable basis for our findings and conclusions, based
on our audit objectives. We believe that the evidence we obtained
provides a reasonable basis for our findings and conclusions based on
our audit objectives. A list of our related GAO products can be found
at the end of this statement.
Summary:
DOD has had a long-standing challenge in accurately projecting the
number of clearance investigations that will be required in the future
for industry personnel. In November 2005, the Office of Management and
Budget (OMB) reported a governmentwide goal for agencies to refine
their projections of the number of clearance investigations that will
be required in any given year to be within 5 percent of the numbers of
actual requests for investigation. In contrast, at a May 2006
congressional hearing, an OPM Assistant Director stated that DOD's
actual number of clearance investigation requests exceeded its
departmentwide projection by 59 percent for the first half of fiscal
year 2006. The negative effects of such inaccurate projections include
impediments to workload planning and funding. These negative effects
led us to recommend in our February 2004 report that DOD improve its
projections for industry personnel. In the report we are issuing today
on security clearances, we note that DOD initiated changes to improve
its estimates of future investigation needs and is conducting research
that may change these methods further. DOD's Defense Security Service
(DSS) took steps to improve the response rate of its annual survey used
to determine the number of clearances that industry anticipates needing
in order to perform classified work. First, in 2006 to improve response
rates, DSS made its annual survey accessible through the Internet, and
DSS field staff began actively encouraging industry representatives to
complete this voluntary survey. Second, in 2007, DSS changed the
methods it uses to analyze the survey data. For example, DSS began
performing weekly analyses of future investigation needs rather than
relying on the previous method of performing a one-time annual analysis
of its survey results. DSS also changed its analysis procedures by
including variables (e.g., company size) not previously accounted for
in its analyses. In addition to these recent changes to the methods DSS
uses to develop its projections, DOD is conducting research that may
change these methods further. However, DOD has not yet demonstrated the
effectiveness of these changes.
DOD must address additional long-standing challenges or issues in order
to improve the efficiency and effectiveness of its personnel security
clearance program for industry personnel. First, delays in determining
the eligibility for a clearance continue. For example, DOD's August
2007 congressionally mandated report on clearances for industry
personnel noted that it took 276 days to complete the end-to-end
processing of initial top secret clearances in the first 6 months of
fiscal year 2007. These delays result in increased costs and risk to
national security, such as when new industry employees are not able to
begin work promptly and employees with outdated clearances have access
to classified documents.[Footnote 3] Second, DOD and the rest of the
federal government provide limited information to one another on how
they individually ensure the quality of clearance products and
procedures which affects reciprocity of clearances. Reciprocity occurs
when one government agency fully accepts a security clearance granted
by another government agency. In our September 2006 report, we noted
that agencies may not reciprocally recognize clearances granted by
other agencies because the other agencies may have granted clearances
based on inadequate investigations and adjudications.[Footnote 4]
Third, in DOD's August 2007 report to Congress it provided less than 2
years of funding-requirements information which limits congressional
awareness of future year requirements for this program. Fourth, DOD
currently has no comprehensive DOD-specific plan to address delays in
its clearance program. There is a new governmentwide effort led by an
interagency security clearance process reform team to reduce delays in
the security clearance process.[Footnote 5] However, the future system
will not be operational until some time after December 2008. We have
recommended that DOD take several actions to address each of these
challenges in our prior work. Most recently, in the report we are
issuing today, we are recommending that DOD augment its annual report
on industry personnel security clearances with additional information
on funding and quality in clearance processes. DOD concurred with those
recommendations and indicated it would provide that information in its
2009 report.
Background:
As with servicemembers and federal workers, industry personnel must
obtain security clearances to gain access to classified information.
Clearances are 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 cause to national security.
The degree of expected damage 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.[Footnote 6]
DOD's Office of the Under Secretary of Defense for Intelligence
[OUSD(I)] has responsibility for determining eligibility for clearances
for servicemembers, DOD civilian employees, and industry personnel
performing work for DOD and 23 other federal agencies, and employees in
the federal legislative branch.[Footnote 7] That responsibility
includes obtaining background investigations, primarily through OPM.
Within OUSD(I), DSS uses OPM-provided investigative reports to
determine clearance eligibility of industry personnel. DOD has
responsibility for adjudicating the clearances of servicemembers, DOD
civilians, and industry personnel. Two DOD offices are responsible for
adjudicating cases involving industry personnel: the Defense Industrial
Security Clearance Office within DSS and the Defense Office of Hearings
and Appeals within the Defense Legal Agency. Accordingly, the Defense
Industrial Security Clearance Office adjudicates 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 adjudicates cases containing major security issues
(e.g., an individual's unexplained affluence or criminal history) that
could result in the denial of clearance eligibility and possibly lead
to an appeal.
Recent significant events affecting DOD's clearance program include the
passage of the Intelligence Reform and Terrorism Prevention Act of
2004[Footnote 8] and the issuance of the June 2005 Executive Order
13381, "Strengthening Processes Relating to Determining Eligibility for
Access to Classified National Security Information." The act included
milestones for reducing the time to complete clearances, general
specifications for a database on security clearances, and requirements
for reciprocity of clearances. Among other things, the executive order
stated that OMB was to ensure the effective implementation of policy
related to appropriately uniform, centralized, efficient, effective,
timely, and reciprocal agency functions relating to determining
eligibility for access to classified national security information.
Another recent event affecting DOD's clearance program was the passage
of the John Warner National Defense Authorization Act for Fiscal Year
2007[Footnote 9] which required DOD to include in its annual budget
submission to Congress a report on DOD's industry personnel clearance
investigations program. In response to that mandate, DOD's August 2007
Annual Report to Congress on Personnel Security Investigations for
Industry described DOD-specific and governmentwide efforts to improve
security clearance processes.[Footnote 10] For example, one DOD-
specific action described in the report is the addition of a capability
to electronically submit a clearance applicant's form authorizing the
release of medical information. In addition, one governmentwide effort
described in the report is that all requests for clearances are now
being submitting using OPM's Electronic Questionnaires for
Investigations Processing.
DOD's Procedures for Projecting Future Industry Investigation Needs Are
Evolving, but the Effectiveness of These Efforts Is Unclear:
DOD has had a long-standing challenge in accurately projecting future
industry investigation needs and is developing and implementing new
methods to improve its procedures. However, DOD has not yet
demonstrated the effectiveness of these changes. Since 2001, DOD has
conducted an annual survey of contractors performing classified work
for the government in order to estimate future clearance-investigation
needs for industry personnel, but those estimates have not accurately
reflected actual clearance needs. In November 2005, OMB reported a
governmentwide goal whereby agencies have been asked to work toward
refining their projections of required investigations to be within 5
percent of the numbers of actual requests for investigation.[Footnote
11] However, according to an OPM Associate Director's May 2006
congressional testimony, DOD exceeded its departmentwide projection by
59 percent in the first half of fiscal year 2006.
Our work has shown that DOD's long-standing inability to accurately
project its security clearance workload has had negative effects on its
clearance-related budgets and staffing requirements. For example, as we
reported in 2004, the services and defense agencies had to limit the
number of overdue reinvestigations that they submitted for
investigation in fiscal year 2000 because they did not budget
sufficient funds to cover the costs of the workload.[Footnote 12]
Furthermore, in April 2006, DOD temporarily stopped processing
applications for clearance investigations for industry personnel,
attributing the stoppage to a large volume of industry clearance
requests and funding problems.[Footnote 13]
In May 2004, we addressed DOD's problems with inaccurately projecting
the future number of clearances needed for industry personnel and the
negative effect of inaccurate projections on workload
planning.[Footnote 14] In that report, we recommended that OUSD(I)
improve its projections of clearance requirements for industry
personnel--for both the numbers and types of clearances--by working
with DOD components, industry contractors, and the acquisition
community to identify obstacles and implement steps to overcome them.
At that time, DOD officials attributed inaccurate projections to (1)
the use of some industry personnel on more than one contract and often
for different agencies, (2) the movement of employees from one company
to another, and (3) unanticipated world events such as the September
11, 2001, terrorist attacks. Because DOD continues to experience an
inability to accurately project its security clearance workload, we
believe that our 2004 recommendation for improving projections still
has merit.
In the report on security clearances we are issuing today, we note that
DSS has made recent changes to the methods it uses to develop these
estimates, and it is conducting research that may change these methods
further. For example, DOD has modified the procedures for annually
surveying contractors performing classified work for the government in
order to more accurately estimate the number of future clearance
investigations needed for industry personnel. To improve the response
rate to this survey, in 2006, DSS made its survey accessible through
the Internet, and DSS field staff began actively encouraging industry
representatives to complete this voluntary survey. According to a DSS
official, these changes increased the survey response rate from
historically low rates of between 10 and 15 percent of the surveyed
facilities providing information in previous years to 70 percent of
facilities in 2007, which represented 86 percent of industry personnel
with a clearance. In addition to improving the response rate for its
annual survey, DSS also changed its methods for computing the
projections. For example, DSS began performing weekly analyses to
refine its future investigation needs rather than relying on the
previous method of performing a onetime annual analysis of its survey
results. DSS also changed its analysis procedures by including
variables (e.g., company size) not previously accounted for in its
analyses. In addition, DOD's Personnel Security Research Center is
assessing a statistical model for estimating future investigation needs
in order to determine if a model can supplement or replace the current
survey method. However, it is too early to determine the effect of
these new methods on the accuracy of DOD's projections.
DOD Faces Additional Long-standing Challenges to Improving the
Efficiency and Effectiveness of Its Personnel Security Clearance
Program for Industry Personnel:
DOD must address additional long-standing challenges or issues in order
to improve the efficiency and effectiveness of its personnel security
clearance program for industry personnel. First, delays in the
clearance process continue to increase costs and risk to national
security, such as when new industry employees are not able to begin
work promptly and employees with outdated clearances have access to
classified documents. Second, DOD and the rest of the federal
government provide limited information to one another on how they
individually ensure the quality of clearance products and procedures.
Third, in DOD's August 2007 report to Congress, it provided less than 2
years of funding-requirements information which limits congressional
awareness of future year requirements for this program. Fourth, DOD
currently has no comprehensive DOD-specific plan to address delays in
its clearance program.
Delays in Clearance Processes Continue to Be a Challenge:
DOD's August 2007 report to Congress noted that delays in processing
personnel security clearances have been reduced, yet the time required
to process clearances continues to exceed time requirements established
by the Intelligence Reform and Terrorism Prevention Act of
2004.[Footnote 15] This law currently requires adjudicative agencies to
make a determination on at least 80 percent of all applications for a
security clearance within an average of 120 days after the date of
receipt of the application, with 90 days allotted for the investigation
and 30 days allotted for the adjudication. DOD's August 2007
congressionally-mandated report on clearances for industry personnel
described continuing delays in the processing of clearances. For
example, during the first 6 months of fiscal year 2007, the end-to-end
processing of initial top secret clearances took an average of 276
days; renewal of top secret clearances, 335 days; and all secret
clearances, 208 days.
Delays in clearance processes can result in additional costs when new
industry employees are not able to begin work promptly and increased
risks to national security because previously cleared industry
employees are likely to continue working with classified information
while the agency determines whether they should still be eligible to
hold a clearance. To improve the timeliness of the clearance process,
we recommended in September 2006 that OMB establish an interagency
working group to identify and implement solutions for investigative and
adjudicative information-technology problems that have resulted in
clearance delays.[Footnote 16] In commenting on our recommendation,
OMB's Deputy Director for Management stated that that National Security
Council's Security Clearance Working Group had begun to explore ways to
identify and implement improvements to the process.
DOD and the Rest of the Government Provide Limited Information on How
to Ensure the Quality of Clearance Products and Procedures:
DOD's August 2007 congressionally mandated report on clearances for
industry personnel documented improvements in clearance processes but
was largely silent regarding quality in clearance processes. While DOD
described several changes to the processes and characterized the
changes as progress, the department provided little information on (1)
any measures of quality used to assess clearance processes or (2)
procedures to promote quality during clearance investigation and
adjudication processes. Specifically, DOD reported that DSS, DOD's
adjudicative community, and OPM are gathering and analyzing measures of
quality for the clearance processes that could be used to provide the
national security community with a better product. However, the DOD
report did not include any of those measures.
In September 2006, we reported that while eliminating delays in
clearance processes is an important goal, the government cannot afford
to achieve that goal by providing investigative and adjudicative
reports that are incomplete in key areas. We additionally reported that
the lack of full reciprocity of clearances is an outgrowth of agencies'
concerns that other agencies may have granted clearances based on
inadequate investigations and adjudications. Without fuller reciprocity
of clearances, agencies could continue to require duplicative
investigations and adjudications, which result in additional costs to
the federal government. In the report we are issuing today, we are
recommending that DOD develop measures of quality for the clearance
process and include them in future reports to Congress.[Footnote 17]
Statistics from such measures would help to illustrate how DOD is
balancing quality and timeliness requirements in its personnel security
clearance program. DOD concurred with that recommendation, indicating
it had developed a baseline performance measure of the quality of
investigations and adjudications and was developing methods to collect
information using this quality measure.
DOD's Limited Information on Future Funding Requirements Hampers
Congressional Awareness of a Key Aspect of the Personnel Security
Clearance Program:
DOD's August 2007 congressionally mandated report on clearances for
industry personnel provided less than 2 years of data on funding
requirements. In its report, DOD identified its immediate needs by
submitting an annualized projected cost of $178.2 million for fiscal
year 2007[Footnote 18] and a projected funding need of approximately
$300 million for fiscal year 2008. However, the report did not include
information on (1) the funding requirements for fiscal year 2009 and
beyond even though the survey used to develop the funding requirements
asked contractors about their clearance needs through 2010 and (2) the
tens of millions of dollars that the DSS Director testified to Congress
in May 2007 were necessary to maintain the infrastructure supporting
the industry personnel security clearance program.
The inclusion of less than 2 future years of budgeting information
limits Congress's ability to carry out its oversight and appropriations
functions pertaining to industry personnel security clearances. Without
more information on DOD's longer-term funding requirements for industry
personnel security clearances, Congress lacks the visibility it needs
to fully assess appropriations requirements. Elsewhere, DOD provides
such longer-term funding projections as a tool for looking beyond
immediate budget priorities. Specifically, DOD annually submits the
future years defense program to Congress, which contains budget
projections for the current budget year and at least the 4 succeeding
years. In the report we are issuing today, we are recommending that DOD
add projected funding information for additional future years so that
Congress can use that information in making strategic appropriation and
authorization decisions about the clearance program for industry
personnel.[Footnote 19] DOD concurred with that recommendation and
stated that it would implement our recommendation in its 2009
congressional report.
DOD Has No Comprehensive Department-specific Plan to Address Delays in
its Clearance Program:
DOD currently has no comprehensive department-specific plan to address
delays and other challenges in its clearance program. In our 2004
report[Footnote 20] on personnel security clearances for industry
personnel, we recommended that DOD develop and implement an integrated,
comprehensive management plan to eliminate the backlog, reduce the
delays in conducting investigations and determining eligibility for
security clearances, and overcome the impediments that could allow such
problems to recur. However, DOD continues to address challenges in the
security clearance process in an incremental fashion. According to
OUSD(I) officials, DOD is pursuing a limited number of smaller-scale
initiatives to address backlogs and delays. For example, to address
delays in the process, DOD is working with OPM to introduce a new
method of obtaining an applicant's fingerprints electronically and
implement a method that would enable OPM to transfer investigative
records to DOD adjudicators electronically.
The DSS Director said that DSS had been drafting a comprehensive plan
to improve security clearance processes for industry personnel, but new
governmentwide efforts have supplanted the larger-scale initiatives
that DSS was planning. In particular, DOD is relying on a
governmentwide effort to reform the clearance system. Agencies involved
in this governmentwide effort include the Office of the Director of
National Intelligence, DOD, OMB, and OPM. A description of those
planned improvements are included in the team's July 25, 2007, terms of
reference, which indicate that the reform team plans to deliver "a
transformed, modernized, fair, and reciprocal security clearance
process that is universally applicable" to DOD, the intelligence
community, and other U.S. government agencies. In our November 2007
discussions with DOD officials, the OUSD(I) Director of Security stated
that the government expects to have demonstrated the feasibility for
components of the new system by December 2008, but the actual system
would not be operational for some additional unspecified period.
We believe that our 2004 recommendation for a comprehensive management
plan is still warranted because (1) many of the challenges still exist
4 years after we made our recommendation and (2) the date that the
reformed system will be in operation is unknown.
Concluding Observations:
Mr. Chairman, we are encouraged by some department-specific and
governmentwide efforts that have improved DOD's personnel security
clearance program, but the challenges identified in this testimony show
that much remains to be done. Should these long-standing challenges and
issues not be addressed, the vulnerability of unauthorized disclosure
of national security information and additional costs and delays in
completing national security-related contracts will likely continue. We
will continue to monitor DOD's program as part of our series on high-
risk issues that monitors major programs and operations that need
urgent attention and transformation.
Chairman Ortiz and Members of the subcommittee, this concludes my
prepared statement. I would be happy to answer any questions that you
may have at this time.
Contact and Acknowledgments:
For further information regarding this testimony, please contact me at
(202) 512-8246 or edwardsj@gao.gov, or Brenda S. Farrell at (202) 512-
3604 or farrellb@gao.gov. In addition, 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 Grace Coleman, James P. Klein, Ron La Due Lake, Marie
Mak, and Karen D. Thornton.
[End of section]
Related GAO Products:
DOD Personnel Clearances: Improved Annual Reporting Would Enable More
Informed Congressional Oversight. GAO-08-350. Washington, D.C.:
February 13, 2008.
Defense Business Transformation: A Full-time Chief Management Officer
with a Term Appointment Is Needed at DOD to Maintain Continuity of
Effort and Achieve Sustainable Success. GAO-08-132T. Washington, D.C.:
October 16, 2007.
DOD Personnel Clearances: Delays and Inadequate Documentation Found For
Industry Personnel. GAO-07-842T. Washington, D.C.: May 17, 2007.
High-Risk Series: An Update. GAO-07-310. Washington, D.C.: January
2007.
DOD Personnel Clearances: Additional OMB Actions Are Needed To Improve
the Security Clearance Process. GAO-06-1070. Washington, D.C.:
September 28, 2006.
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.
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.
Industrial Security: DOD Cannot Ensure Its Oversight of Contractors
under Foreign Influence Is Sufficient. GAO-05-681. Washington, D.C.:
July 15, 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.
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.
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.
[End of section]
Footnotes:
[1] GAO, High-Risk Series: An Update, GAO-07-310 (Washington, D.C.:
January 2007); and High-Risk Series: An Update, GAO-05-207 (Washington,
D.C.: January 2005). The areas on our high-risk list received their
designation because they are major programs and operations that need
urgent attention and transformation in order to ensure that our
national government functions in the most economical, efficient, and
effective manner possible.
[2] GAO, DOD Personnel Clearances: Improved Annual Reporting Would
Enable More Informed Congressional Oversight, GAO-08-350 (Washington,
D.C.: Feb. 13, 2008).
[3] GAO-08-350.
[4] GAO, DOD Personnel Clearances: Additional OMB Actions Are Needed to
Improve the Security Clearance Process, GAO-06-1070 (Washington, D.C.:
Sept. 28, 2006).
[5] GAO-08-350.
[6] 5 C.F.R. § 1312.4 (2007).
[7] DOD, National Industrial Security Program: Operating Manual, DOD
5220.22-M (Feb. 28, 2006), notes that heads of agencies are required to
enter into agreements with the Secretary of Defense for the purpose of
rendering industrial security services. The following 23 departments
and agencies have entered into such agreements: (1) National
Aeronautics and Space Administration, (2) Department of Commerce, (3)
General Services Administration, (4) Department of State, (5) Small
Business Administration, (6) National Science Foundation, (7)
Department of the Treasury, (8) Department of Transportation, (9)
Department of the Interior, (10) Department of Agriculture, (11)
Department of Labor, (12) Environmental Protection Agency, (13)
Department of Justice, (14) Federal Reserve System, (15) Government
Accountability Office, (16) U.S. Trade Representative, (17) U.S.
International Trade Commission, (18) U.S. Agency for International
Development, (19) Nuclear Regulatory Commission, (20) Department of
Education, (21) Department of Health and Human Services, (22)
Department of Homeland Security, and (23) Federal Communications
Commission.
[8] Pub. L. No. 108-458 (2004).
[9] Pub. L. No. 109-364, §347 (2006).
[10] DOD, Annual Report to Congress on Personnel Security
Investigations for Industry and the National Industrial Security
Program (August 2007). This first of a series of annual reports was
mandated by the John Warner National Defense Authorization Act for
Fiscal Year 2007, Pub. L. No. 109-364, §347 (2006).
[11] OMB, Plan for Improving the Personnel Security Clearance Process
(November 2005).
[12] GAO, DOD Personnel Clearances: DOD Needs to Overcome Impediments
to Eliminating Backlog and Determining Its Size, GAO-04-344
(Washington, D.C.: Feb. 9, 2004).
[13] GAO, DOD Personnel Clearances: Funding Challenges and Other
Impediments Slow Clearances for Industry Personnel, GAO-06-747T
(Washington, D.C.: May 17, 2006).
[14] GAO, 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).
[15] DOD, Annual Report to Congress on Personnel Security
Investigations for Industry and the National Industrial Security
Program (August 2007).
[16] GAO-06-1070.
[17] GAO-08-350.
[18] This annualized projection was based on the 41 weeks from October
1, 2006, to July 14, 2007.
[19] GAO-08-350.
[20] GAO-04-632.
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