

Slipshod vetting puts people at risk

7:05 PM, Oct. 1, 2013  |  Comments
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Aaron Alexis, the nation's most recent mass murderer, had something in common with the nation's most prolific leaker of national security secrets, Edward Snowden. Each had a national security clearance - Alexis to his killing ground at the Washington Navy Yard, and Snowden to a vast collection of top secret data.

Two cases, no matter how embarrassing, don't make a trend. But there's ample reason to see them as evidence of deep systemic problems, not aberrations:

The federal Office of Personnel Management completed an astounding 87 percent of its investigations with required documents missing, according to a sampling in 2008 by Congress' Government Accountability Office.

Just as alarming, fewer than 1 percent of files were sent back for more data in 2007 by the Defense Department, which makes the clearance decisions.

While OPM handles background checks and Defense grants clearances, the Director of National Intelligence ultimately is in charge of policy and oversight. Which means that when something goes very wrong - as it did with Snowden and Alexis - each agency has a scapegoat. It's a recipe for no accountability.

Clearances like the one held by Alexis are valid for a decade - a long time to trust that nothing will change in a person's life.

In all, it must sound like heaven to a spy. Clearance is readily obtained, vetting can be cursory, information is loosely secured and accountability is diffuse.

Since the Navy Yard shootings, officials in many of the agencies involved have scurried to investigate and promise reforms. But they have a credibility problem. This mess had to be obvious to insiders, who ignored it. The scale also suggests it can't be easily fixed.

Meanwhile, there's no telling who might have access to secret information. Most malefactors aren't going to shoot up a Navy yard like Alexis or give it to the public like Snowden. They'll just spirit the secrets away.

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