In category: Security Clearance
What DCSA Actually Does: The Agency That Decides Whether Your New Hire Can Start
High-risk federal vetting cases closed in the fourth quarter of fiscal 2025 averaged 220 days start to finish. Twelve of those days were intake. Forty belonged to the adjudicator. The remaining 168, better than three-quarters of the total, were the background investigation itself… more
CI vs. Full-Scope Polygraph: Which Programs Require Which, and What Each One Asks
The Defense Department retired the phrase "full scope polygraph" in writing. Its polygraph instruction defines the exam readers mean, then adds five words in the glossary: "Previously known as full-scope polygraph." The government-wide directive did the same. Energy's rulebook ne… more
Clearance Suspended Under Continuous Vetting: Your Pay, Your Access, and Your Next 90 Days
The rule that ends your workday is one sentence. Under 32 CFR 117.10(a)(2)(ii), once the Cognizant Security Agency tells your employer your eligibility is suspended, the contractor "will immediately deny access to classified information," wherever that employee sits. Badge off. N… more
Foreign Property, Foreign Bank Accounts, and Inherited Assets: What You Must Report
In March 2016, a Defense Office of Hearings and Appeals judge granted a clearance to an applicant who owned no home in the United States and two houses in Mexico, worth $160,000 and $26,000. Three years later another judge denied a clearance over a single $70,000 debt owed to a f… more
‘Bound by Affection, Influence, or Obligation’: Decoding the Close-and-Continuing Test
The phrase "bonds of affection" does not appear in the SF-86's foreign contacts question. It sits on page 40, in the marital-status block, attached to a different test. Section 19, on page 60, asks about people with whom you are "bound by affection, influence, common interests, a… more