NSA's Top Talent is Leaving Because of Low Pay, Slumping Morale and Unpopular Reorganization (washingtonpost.com) 225
Ellen Nakashima and Aaron Gregg, reporting for the Washington Post: The National Security Agency is losing its top talent at a worrisome rate as highly skilled personnel, some disillusioned with the spy service's leadership and an unpopular reorganization, take higher-paying, more flexible jobs in the private sector (Editor's note: the link may be paywalled; alternative source). Since 2015, the NSA has lost several hundred hackers, engineers and data scientists, according to current and former U.S. officials with knowledge of the matter. The potential impact on national security is significant, they said. Headquartered at Fort Meade in Maryland, the NSA employs a civilian workforce of about 21,000 there and is the largest producer of intelligence among the nation's 17 spy agencies. The people who have left were responsible for collecting and analyzing the intelligence that goes into the president's daily briefing. Their work also included monitoring a broad array of subjects including the Islamic State, Russian and North Korean hackers, and analyzing the intentions of foreign governments, and they were responsible for protecting the classified networks that carry such sensitive information.
Nobody wants to work for authoritarian oligarchy? (Score:1, Insightful)
Gee, I can't imagine why people are losing their enthusiasm for working for the government. Unless, of course, they can see that it's counterproductive to the goal of freedom.
Re:Nobody wants to work for authoritarian oligarch (Score:5, Funny)
Old Joke:
"But Timmy, why did you say your dad is working as a male stripper?"
"Because it's less embarrassing than admitting he's working at the NSA".
Re:Nobody wants to work for authoritarian oligarch (Score:4, Insightful)
Although the departure rates are low, compared with attrition levels in the civilian technology industry
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And that changed when?
If your answer references a date before January 20, 1981, you are wrong.
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Oh, January 20, 2009.
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“Nearly 30,000 rank-and-file federal employees who received more than $190,823 out-earned each of the 50 state governors,” the report said.
http://www.foxnews.com/politic... [foxnews.com]
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Sure, because the previous presidents weren’t plutocratic oligarchs who dreams of being the Putin of the West. Such things severely affect morale.
Re: Nobody wants to work for authoritarian oligarc (Score:5, Insightful)
The low pay and low morale take a while to set in. So it existed with Obama too. The trick is now Trump is calling them liars and unamerican on a daily basis on top of everything else.
I expect in the next year to see higher turnover at the FBI too.
Re: Nobody wants to work for authoritarian oligarc (Score:5, Insightful)
Here's the best part. The more the con artist keeps whining about the FBI doing its job, the more people leave and the more he can whine about them not doing their job.
The same with the NSA. This is one of many organizations he has called part of the "deep state", that the information they provide is worthless, they don't know what they're doing and so on.
Well golly gee, who wants to work for someone who is an incompetent idiot, a serial liar and thinks what you do is worthless?
What's that old adage about high turnover of employees? It's not them, it's you.
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Re: Nobody wants to work for authoritarian oligarc (Score:4, Interesting)
...Trump is calling them liars and unamerican on a daily basis...
Are they not liars? Have they not lied to the American public and kept secrets from the very public they ostensibly serve?
Is it not un-American to spy on everyone at all times and assist in undermining the liberty of the American people?
Our forefathers fought wars over less.
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Since 2015, the NSA has lost several hundred hackers, engineers and data scientists, according to current and former U.S. officials with knowledge of the matter
I didn't know that Trump took office in 2015... Trump: Winning even before winning!
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So why did they start resigning beginning in 2015 then?
What morale? (Score:1)
Instead of a Information network contributing to human kind we now have a weapons platform that allows to kill without a trace.
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"moral" or "morale"?
To be honest, I can't quite work how they find people clever enough to do that kind of thing properly, who are dumb enough to want to do it.
"Protecting the nation" is all well and good but anyone with a brain should be able to tell that they go far, far beyond such a remit, into things that they really shouldn't.
I think the same about GCHQ etc. and even Turing (kind of a hero to me). You can romanticise it, and say how many lives they save, but to me that's marred by the freedoms they i
Re:What morale? (Score:5, Insightful)
But when you meet someone who obviously has a brain and would have been successful even if they hadn't chosen to be a high-ranking officer, you have to wonder what their motivation is. I've never really got to the bottom of it because those people I've met like that are quite cagey and tend to hide behind some argument about "service to the country" and so on.
That's a bit cynical and possibly says much about you. Certainly you cannot totally disbelieve that there are people who truly are motivated by a moral imperative to serve their country. I understand that you may not agree with their motivations, but why can't you at least believe their stated reason?
One apropos example that has served as a sort of personal inspiration for my whole life is the case of the father of a friend of mine. The man was a successful surgeon, and an immigrant to the US. When I was in high school he resigned from private practice and joined the military as a surgeon with the stated purpose that he wanted to give back to the country that he was so proud to have joined. I'd hate to be the type of person who suspected some ulterior motive there.
A word of advice for you, since you say you've "never really gotten to the bottom of it" when trying to understand these people: Maybe you should try listening to and accepting what they say are their reasons instead of assuming they are some cagey deceivers.
Re:What morale? (Score:4, Informative)
As ex-military I will say that the "I love my country" guys were mostly in the military to do shit that is hard to do as a civilian. Mostly blowing stuff up, but the outright psychos just enjoyed treating others like shit. Some used it to rationalize their brainwashing. "Exactly why the fuck do I keep signing up?"
Your surgeon friend would be a rare breed but was probably a good guy.
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they keep signing up because it's scary out in the real world to try to get a job
Sure, some do. It's amazing how different individuals will do different things for different reasons. And just exactly who is being assigned to the word "they" now? All military? Only ossifers? Only the ones that claim patriotism?
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I would make a conscious exception for army medics, especially those higher skilled like surgeons etc.. I don't imagine (though I'm not sure) that they are there to kill people.
But even then... they've basically chosen the job of a doctor/surgeon and then they are ordered to ignore the Hippocratic oath, because they then fail to attend to the enemy wounded too. I'm sure they look after prisoners (though there was little evidence of such at Guantanamo?), I'm sure they mend up their own people, and innocent
Re:What morale? (Score:4, Interesting)
Political colouration, etc. aside (which is really just pettiness... literally classing billions of people as "one of those two types of people"), how do intelligent people work in blind obedience to service to their nation?
I think the answer is, they buy into the propaganda and the myth of what America is and stands for. They basically believe the reasons we are given for why we go to war. They think that while the US may occasionally behave badly at home or abroad, it is generally a good nation that tries to live up to its ideals.
Personally, I agree with Gen. Butler's view that war is a racket, waged to make money for the corporations involved, extend American power and influence, and to make the world safe for American business. I would never work for the military or intelligence industries, because I do not share their perspectives and values. But for those who take the world at face value, and generally don't look too deeply into what is going on and why, it can be an attractive option.
Re:What morale? (Score:5, Interesting)
"moral" or "morale"?
When you meet a guy who goes into the army because he failed school, sure, that's a good option for him... job security, a decent amount of respect and professionalism, transferable skills. It makes sense. But when you meet someone who obviously has a brain and would have been successful even if they hadn't chosen to be a high-ranking officer, you have to wonder what their motivation is. I've never really got to the bottom of it because those people I've met like that are quite cagey and tend to hide behind some argument about "service to the country" and so on.
You are the people fake news is written for. There is a world of information available to you, but you only want to hear what is slanted for you. I'll give it a shot since you haven't gotten to the bottom of it - the words will be wasted, but you've provoked my moral outrage.
I enlisted in the US Army in 1998; among different scholarships I had a full four-year scholarship to Michigan State. I opted to join the army instead. I enlisted for the maximum enlistment (six years) because of my intent to make a lifetime in service to trying to make the world a better place - to do my part to see that kids didn't grow up like I did. I joined the infantry - 11B. My ASVAB scores were phenomenal - I could have done anything.
I didn't join for guns, or for a uniform, or for failing school - I joined because I wanted to help - to be a part of something with a noble cause - protecting America, bringing peace to war torn parts of the world. Patriotism is a real thing. Young men committed suicide when they were denied entry to service during World War 2. This country's administration, its choices, and treatment of its citizens might not be worthy of such loyalty, but infantrymen enforce the last 300 meters of foreign policy; they don't make it.
Two years into my enlistment, I was much...much more worldly. I was regretting having turned down college because I'd met so many retired infantry NCOs serving food in mess halls and defacs with the same story: "I've been infantry for 30 years, retired, and I don't have any useful life skills in the civilian world, so now I serve food." That's a terrifying future for a 20 year old. In theory, the military pays for 75% of the schooling costs for classes you take in service, but trying to go to college while being a soldier isn't very plausible. At least for an infantryman.
Three of the officers in my company were West Point graduates (USMA). I was young, impressionable, and that's what I wanted to look like when I grew up. Officers could do more; help more - I wanted that. I wrote a letter to my senator, my congressman, the President - I went up my chain of command and got a letter of recommendation from my battalion commander; paired with the nomination of my Senator (and I had a powerful story to tell about overcoming adversity), I got into West Point.
My army career ended up taking me into the world of Information Assurance - and here I'm going to get hazy - but I helped develop and test zero day exploits, develop cyber policy for the army - did some really interesting things. I still have my "I am the Fed" T-Shirt from one of the DefCons I went to when I got targeted in the "Spot the Fed" game. In the last decade, there's been lots of feds, so I don't know if they even play it anymore.
I have a thousand stories of helping people - because its the right thing to do.
Patriotism is real. It exists for people of all backgrounds and all educations. People make choices beyond their self interest - philanthropy is a word. If you truly discard that story and look for ulterior motive, its because you have self-imposed blinders and earplugs and refuse to hear or see anything you don't already believe - *YOU* have an ulterior motive.
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I'm not trying to judge one way or another, and I understand the need to have people doing what you did. However, I noticed your username is "Notabadguy". Are you trying to convince us of that, or yourself?
Not that it matters anymore, but women want bad guys.
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You couldn't have helped people by becoming a doctor? Or for that matter, a nurse? You had to "help people" by carrying a weapon, by being a volunteer killer-for-hire in a mercenary army?
I'm not sure you understand what the US armed forces do. Sometimes I daydream that if I were omnipotent, I would force peace on the world - destroy all guns, cause anyone with violent intent to disappear in a flash of light. But I'm not omnipotent, and nor is anyone else. In the meantime, those with the power to resist genocide, oppression, and evil have a moral obligation to do so.
You can have all the sit-ins you like, tweet from the comfort of your home how the tools of an uncaring corporatist elite ar
NATO (Score:4, Interesting)
One way they can solve this is the same way as NATO, make them tax exempt on income tax it can help level the field with private pay.
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Or we could reform the NSA so you know...it's not a freedom-hating shithole of an organization?
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It's easier for accounting. Nothing more.
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we should have an economy that is far more equal. i do not advocate for a perfectly equal economy, but the highest earner should be much closer to the lowest earner than they are today. wealth and income inequalty break the ability of the government to compete in the marketplace.
which is probably the point that's happening here, our government is being usurped completely by people who have found a way around it because they have the power and control
The free market will come to the rescue (Score:4, Informative)
Just like in Russia. When the KGB did something like that, a man named Eugene Kaspersky saw this as a good moment to start hiring more people...
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Just like in Russia. When the KGB did something like that, a man named Eugene Kaspersky saw this as a good moment to start hiring more people...
If I had to guess, many of the departing employees are already heading to small startups bathing in VC funding. Why be a Security Analyst for the NSA when you can print money as a Security Analyst for Blockchain Security Inc?
And nothing... (Score:3, Funny)
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They'll just go to work for a gov't contractor (Score:4, Insightful)
...who will then charge the gov't 10x what that person was costing us before. So is the NSA's actual functionality being reduced--or just shifted elsewhere?
(And why are only NSA people demoralized? I'd be demoralized if I worked in _any_ branch of gov't...the way things are going. Private-sector jobs providing goods and services that people actually want is the most satisfying kind of work, IMHO.)
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There is so much truth to this, 10x is high, more like 3-4x when the full burdened costs are taken into account. I used to manage the interop matrix and upgrade SOP for a generic comms truck. There were like 200 of these trucks floating around and it took a couple days to upgrade and PM the equipment. It was literally me another guy and 2-5 interns, depending on the time of the year. Some weeks we worked more other weeks we worked less to make up for the extra, but we never missed a deadline and getting don
Re:They'll just go to work for a gov't contractor (Score:4, Informative)
It's the usual strategy when a right-wing government comes into power. The mantra is "the private sector can do things more efficiently and cheaply that the public sector". So all those departments are required to reduced people count. They then rehire their staff as private sector consultants and contractors to do the same work as before, then claim more jobs have been created while reducing the size of the public sector.
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(And why are only NSA people demoralized? I'd be demoralized if I worked in _any_ branch of gov't...the way things are going.
I assume working conditions have gotten worse due to steps taken to prevent future Snowdens.
Snowden irony (Score:1)
Snowden leaks showed they'd built a giant surveillance machine that could be turned at a whim against US citizens.
Putin showed how trivial it is to leverage party-above-country loyalty and gain access to that surveillance engine with his needy orange puppet.
THEY are part of that surveillance engine, it's THEIR work that funnels intelligence to US enemies. So of course they don't want to undermine their own country anymore.
Perhaps Trump will fill the void by co-operating on Intelligence matters with the Puti
No loss (Score:1)
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The Arab spring was predicted, but the predictions were discounted because they were unbelievable. We trusted hindsight instead of the data.
I don't recall the exact methodology, but it's something about the population distribution and unemployment. My recollection is that it's something about more people unemployed people between 15 and 25 than employed 30+ that it rolls up with a very strong correlation. Let me see if I can dig up the reference.
This is nothing new (Score:4, Interesting)
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these guys can clear $500k/yr working for Wallstreet. It's no wonder they don't want to settle for $140k/yr working for Uncle Sam. Having their Boss call them out for being part of the "Deep State" conspiracy is just a dingleberry on that shit cake.
As a non native speaker I didn't know the meaning of the word "dingleberry" and looked it up ... Thank you for my new personal nightmare.
Re:This is nothing new (Score:5, Informative)
You forgot to factor in Locality adjustment. DC area base at step 10 is $126k. Additionally, federal employee benefits are very generous, including pension benefits that are generally unavailable in the comparable private sector jobs.
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Yep. The bennies are where it's at in civil service jobs. People on the outside really have no idea how good those benefits really are. I play golf with a few retired civil servants. They retired at 50, get most of their pay and full medical. And then they get part time work to pile onto the money they get from their pensions. Sweet gig actually.
SHA... right, right! (Score:2)
I interviewed a candidate from NSA last year. . . (Score:4, Interesting)
. . . .among her complaints were being pigeonholed (i.e. if you were good at a particular thing, they want you to concentrate on that thing, instead of broadening one's skill base), promotions were glacial (she had her Masters and STILL was a GS-9-equivalent), and the pay is abysmal, compared to their peers in the private sector.
On the other hand, 6 years experience out of undergrad, plus a Masters, and she wanted 300+K. You're not going to get that ANYWHERE in Club Feb. . . .
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We suffer from reverse pigeonholing -- everyone is expected to be a generalist on every subject *and* a specialist on particular subjects when tasked with it.
I'm not sure which is worse, really. I work with some people with EMC storage experience and their knowledge of closely related technologies is near zero (the guy who installs iSCSI storage couldn't configure the needed VLAN access or set jumbo frames in any switch if his life depended on it). They even say stupid things, the really hard-core EMC guy
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The problem, though, is that these highly silo'd guys make all kinds of recommendations about things they know nothing about *and* they are the first to point fingers when their zillion dollar system doesn't work right. Their troubleshooting doesn't extend beyond the product's logging facility.
Their Overarching Motivation Vanished (Score:3)
Trump has called out the intelligence community as being part of some "deep state" conspiracy. True or not, that clearly indicates he will view their work as suspect.
If anyone worked in that agency with a sincere desire to protect the American people and inform their national leaders of threats against the country, then that person's motivation is going to evaporate. When your leader has basically announced that he won't extend any consideration or trust to your organization, is there any value to your work? At the end of the day, what will all of your efforts accomplish?
This is not encouraging at all, but I can understand why they might feel this way.
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If anyone worked in that agency with a sincere desire to protect the American people and inform their national leaders of threats against the country, then that person's motivation is going to evaporate.
I really question how many people are described by this. I still don't see how one can call themselves a patriot when they violate the 4th amendment around the clock.
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People are told it was always against the Soviet Union, Russia, other nations mils, bad people in other nations.
That legal generational group think within an agency flows to forums, chat sites, popular culture, movies.
When the 4 hops of illegal domestic spying is questioned the usual decades of talking points get rolled out.
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If anyone worked in that agency with a sincere desire to protect the American people and inform their national leaders of threats against the country, then that person's motivation is going to evaporate. When your leader has basically announced that he won't extend any consideration or trust to your organization, is there any value to your work? At the end of the day, what will all of your efforts accomplish?
And that's the problem: The pay is *not bad* though less than private for some folks. So what's the motivation to stay? Serving your country and all that. When the President starts bad-mouthing what you do, why you do it, and calling into question your patriotic motivations, YES, it's no longer worth it.
This is why I've just left Federal servoce.
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So how do you reconcile Trump's attitude as the cause when rate of the people leaving the NSA as described started in 2015, peaked in 2016 and then went down once Trump was elected?
I guess you could blame Obama instead, but back in the non-politically-motivated reality you seem to have missed, less than 1% turnover in a few years is still lower than most government agencies and certainly most companies. It's probably just people noticing they can make more money in the private sector because security analys
President's Daily Intelligence Briefing (Score:1)
> the intelligence that goes into the president's daily briefing.
Do we actually need those people? My understanding is that the current administration demanded a change to the daily intelligence briefing such that it is now a single page, with pictures. Yes, really. I'm serious.
Just how many NSA, CIA and other TLA people do we need to produce this? Could they employ much younger people using finger-painting and still
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Michelle Bachman, or will it be Condoleezza Rice?
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Lady Gaga
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Are you sure Sarah Palin wears briefs. Boxers?
Still, Hillary has larger testicles than any of them.
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The CIA can do the international spy work. The FBI can fully protect the USA.
The why of the NSA is a historical issue that goes back to the end of WW2 and not wanting to trust the Navy, Army code breakers, domestic reports by the FBI.
A new agency with new methods, trusted new staff and global collection.
The Army w
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So all we'll have left is boxers.
Demoralized (Score:3)
I can completely understand NSA workers being demoralized. Their mission has changed from protecting U.S. citizens from externals threats to becoming the threat to U.S. citizens. If my job were to continuously violate the U.S. Constitution, and thereby be hated by most of America, I would be demoralized, too.
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The real issue now, is having a president that is claiming that the entire intelligence world is lying, when they are reporting that the president , VP, and others in the admin were committing treason and half of CONgress is claiming that they are lying.
Their jobs were obsolete anyway (Score:2, Funny)
The people who have left were responsible for collecting and analyzing the intelligence that goes into the president's daily briefing
Their jobs have been replaced by a script that generates random quotes from FoxNews with the President's name on it and happy emoji faces.
Contracting, or just frustration? (Score:5, Insightful)
Believe it or not, there are still people who are loyal to the country and "believe in the mission." Lots of people in these agencies come from the military, so you're bound to have a committed core of individuals. But it's an organization like anywhere else...the place I work has serious faults but they're definitely not something to throw a temper tantrum about. Some people think differently about this, get fed up and leave. It's all up to personal choice, and I would think anyone smart enough to get a technical position at the NSA would be able to go work anywhere else...these aren't your typical Keyboarding Specialist III civil service workers who make a home for themselves deep in an agency's bureaucracy. I don't throw a fit and leave my position because I have the opportunity to do interesting work even if I have to work around dumb decisions above my level.
Just like businesses, government agencies outsource everything they can as well. I would think that some of the defection is to contractors, where they would trade job security for a higher salary. I imagine there's basically a few "Spies R Us" firms right in the DC metro area that does the same analysis work the official TLAs do.
Another place they could end up at is management consulting firms. I work for an IT services company and we respond to RFPs all the time -- there's a lot of pressure to keep up the credentials on the individuals presented as the "A Team" (who gets swapped out when the contract is signed.) There's a lot of cache in saying "Dude, this guy's ex-NSA" when referring to a security consultant. Even if they barely do any work, just having them is like the big tech companies employing Technical Fellows.
Still other employers are basically anywhere else math geniuses get jobs. Insurance companies still pay actuaries handsomely. Investment banks doing HFT would love to have a few NSA people on staff and would probably overlook some of their quirks. The private sector does pay much better than government work over the short term. And, post-Cold War and post-Snowden, there's less public acceptance of the spy agencies. I'm sure there's tons of issues they silently prevent or give advance notice of, and I'll bet that's what's keeping some people on staff...it's naive to think that other countries aren't spying on their citizens or foreign governments as well.
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It's all up to personal choice, and I would think anyone smart enough to get a technical position at the NSA would be able to go work anywhere else...these aren't your typical Keyboarding Specialist III civil service workers who make a home for themselves deep in an agency's bureaucracy.
Yes, yes. I heard in Opportunist's above post, some of them have quite advanced exotic dancing skills. Quite valuable in the private sector at certain establishments.
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> Believe it or not, there are still people who are loyal to the country and "believe in the mission."
If the mission has something to do with following the Constitution and "We the people," probably most of us are. The Constitution is a great document. The most prominent violators of the Constitution are in the White House, enriching themselves at the expense of the mission.
Government employment (Score:1)
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The GCHQ did a lot of work on that issue in the 1950-70's. What insight did the Soviet Union have about once loyal staff that had offers to spy accepted?
Staff got blackmailed? Political? Cash? Long working hours globally? Poor working conditions at US and US sites around the world for very low pay?
After much funding, review and study the resul
Oh (Score:2)
For a second there, I was extremely worried. I read NASA instead of NSA.
Carry on.
This is very low turnover (Score:3)
An employer with 21,000 employees losing "several hundred" over two to three years would be thrilled.
A better headline might be "NSA has 99.9% annual employee retention rate"
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The people who leave are always the best, never the worst. That is the curse of government employment.
It's true no matter who the employer is. The best always look for better opportunities
Before everyone takes the typical leap to Trump (Score:2)
"Since 2015, the NSA has lost several hundred hackers, engineers and data scientists, according to current and former U.S. officials with knowledge of the matter."
I don't think Trump was president in 2015, but I could be wrong.
They need to pay more (Score:2)
I applied to Cybercom last year. I have over 20 years of technical and technical leadership experience - they offered me a salary of $86K. Have fun living anywhere near Ft Meade on that - never mind that making almost twice that I have mortgage and bills to match.
So, no loss.... (Score:2)
Not much of a loss for now, the president doesn't read anyways. Let's hope they all these people got hired by Fox News, though I highly doubt it.
this is actually scary and bad (Score:2)
As such, they spend all their time listening in on what foreign gov and terrorists were up to so as to avoid any foolishness on our part.
Now, with this crumbling, the west is likely to have less intel which will mean that is is easier for a foreign power to set off a war.
Keep in mind that we saw what happens when NSA is forced to lie, even by our own side. We invaded Iraq based on ou
problem vs solution (Score:2)
PROBLEM: Many NSA officers are decent red-blooded Americans who signed up to serve their country and protect it from foreign enemies. Fighting the Soviets, the Chinese, Dr Evil, etc.
Now they are demoralized. Because their job has nothing to do with defending against foreign threats, and everything to do with turning America into a police surveillance state. They basically work for the Stasi, and don't like it.
PROPOSED SOLUTION: Crank up spending on the Stasi surveillance state!
Re:Nor surprising really, with a $230K max salary (Score:4, Interesting)
A quick check reveals that there are approximately 12,989 federal employees making salary more than the VP, in fact.
Virtually all work for the VA and are medical officers, doctors, or dentists. Many are employed by NIH as medical officers. A few by the military as, you may have guessed, medical officers, and a stray here and there by the FDIC, SEC, etc.Six federal employees make $400,000 or more. I do not include awards, which boost pay, but we're talking salary here.
Mind you, 13,000 employees in the US government is a relatively minuscule sample. You're not out earning the VP even for typical agency executive positions. But for doctors you have to compete, since asking a skilled MD to take an 80% pay cut isn't realistic, and a variety of skilled workers such as attorneys or financial experts likewise.
I'm not yet as concerned about the NSA being unable to retain experienced talent as I ought to be, because the mission of the NSA has been so perverted that a certain level of incompetence is appealing. But selective incompetence is what I would like, and that doesn't work either.
Time to restrain the surveillance state. A valuable but appropriate mission might attract good candidates. Restraining the self-righteous or over zealous might be part of the impetus for this exodus...
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I think you're optimistic.
I think the increasingly lucrative market (much from repressive governments) for exploits and surveillance/datamining has more to do with the exodus. Globalism lets them sell their soul to international buyers, instead of the US government.
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Like most things, the money we spend on them is directly proportional to the importance we place on them. Notwithstanding your complaints about the mission change, if you think that what the NSA does is not important because, for example, what you know is true and the NSA contradicts it, then it makes sense that you are not concerned with losing experienced people. They do not contribute anything in that case.
This is why in most states the highest paid state employee is a college sports coach. We attach en
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"what you know is true and the NSA contradicts it"
Actually, this has nothing to do with why most of the people I hear denigrate the NSA do so. their complaints include:
- Excessive collection; they get everything, even things there is not a clear legal permission for.
- Unwarranted distribution; Some of what they get is given out where it ought not be. Some of this is legal, so the real complaint here starts with laws permittign excess collection and distribution, of course.
Not about the quality or veracity o
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I didn't mean you as in rickb928. I meant the you as in someone who knows what is true based on what he sees on Fox and Friends and then the NSA says "well, actually...". That means the NSA actually does negative work because they aren't confirming the pre-existing biases of that person.
Re:3 important points folks made here... apk (Score:5, Informative)
There is SOME truth here: Government pay DOES seriously lag behind private sector pay. But the contracting world isn't MUCH better. High-end federal contractors make perhaps a quarter to a third higher than "govvies", but the 10 times cost of a fed is an exaggeration. On the average, a contractor, at fully-burdened rate, costs somewhat more than a Fed does, for the same skills and experience (and that varies by the skill in question, and location), but not overwhelmingly more.
The advantage to contractors, is that they can be dropped almost immediately at no cost to the Government. An actual Fed can drag out a dismissal for years, collecting pay and seniority while doing so. And in the meantime, if they transfer to another agency. . . the attempt to drop them goes away. . .
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OTOH, getting money to accomplish things varies from year to year.
Re: Good news for the rest of us (Score:3, Insightful)
This is hilariously stupid.
It's not saving any money, or draining any "swamps".
The same positions exist, paying the same rate, and are now being occupied by less-skilled stand-ins to defend the nation against hostile foreign intelligence agencies.
Re: Good news for the rest of us (Score:5, Insightful)
If we could actually be sure the targets were kept foreign, sure. Instead we have ample evidence that the NSA has cast a much wider net, and undermined much of our infrastructure to assure they can gain access. The result is a porous compute infrastructure that keeps being broken. Now we will never know how many exploits were intentionally placed, but any non-zero number is too many. With no trust I see a brain drain there as a net positive until the organization has a real come-to-jesus moment and stops sweeping up the citizenry in their dragnet operations.
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Would that be thee conscience of spying on Americans for political reasons, or working for DJT administration?
I know plenty of people who find spying on Americans okay, but only because it was Obama doing it on Trump. I'm sure if the hypocritical roles were reversed, they would be OUTRAGED!!!!
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I don't think it's ok either way, but if it absolutely had to happen, I'd rather Obama be doing it rather than Trump. YMMV, of course.
I don't think there's anything wrong with this belief one way or the other. We just have to be honest about it.
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I don't think it's ok either way, but
Everything after that is exactly why it is is a problem. There is no "but". It should have been "period".
The fact that Obama actually DID it is reason enough for it to NEVER be "butt", and always be "period".
if it absolutely had to happen
What was the "absolutely had to happen" reason for spying on American Reporters? I'm still waiting for any explanation that doesn't stink.
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Come on. This is like me saying "if you had to be raped would you prefer the person be attractive or ugly" and you saying "attractive" and then me saying "AHA! Archangel Michael *WANTS* to be raped!"
People should be honest about their motivations. My belief is that faced with the choice of Donald Trump v. Barack Obama, I'd rather Obama be doing the bad thing because I think he'd be more careful about minimizing the bad in the bad thing he's doing. Give me any two people, and I'll tell you who I'd prefer.
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False dichotomy is false dichotomy. Rape victims don't care how "attractive" their rapist is. I'd rather not be raped. Period. There is no alternative that is acceptable.
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Nobody said the spying was acceptable. Stinerman said that he'd prefer Obama was running a domestic spying operation than Trump, not that either were acceptable.
Since you're distracted by the "attractive", here's a replacement question: would you prefer to be raped by a more violent attacker or a less violent attacker? I'd guess that (a) you'd rather not be raped, and (b) if you were raped, you'd prefer the less violent rapist.
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Well if I've learned anything in this thread it's that you should posit that corrupt criminal exercises should not exist and then pat yourself on the back for not actually furthering the discussion in any way.
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I remember how The NSA's mass surveillance started coming to light in 2013 with the exposure of the PRISM program, then Edward Snowden revealed a shitload more in 2014. Almost everyone, including many members of congress, lost their shit over it and the NSA actually backed off on some of the mass surveillance they'd been doing.
I also remember how the people were in favor of the mass surveillance insisted it was necessary to stop al-Qaeda from another attack like 9-11. And how those people kept claiming O
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I didn't say "Trump", I said "Americans". And there is plenty of evidence out there, from James Clapper lying to congress, to James Rosen being spied upon.
But why ruin your narrative with facts.
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Not exactly. It would be good news if they had quit because of conscience problems.
There are roles that should cause people to be shunned. I know that for me if someone said they worked for the CIA or NSA I'd avoid them while making lots of sarcastic remarks and I'd tell others as well. I've done this in the past for other jobs that I consider bad for society, like the guy I essentially called scum for operating a pay day loan place. The NSA doesn't have a leg to stand on in terms of being a force for good. Now if they used their massive powers for good then I could get behind them at
Good news for the rest of us? (Score:5, Insightful)
From TFS:
The people who have left were responsible for collecting and analyzing the intelligence that goes into the president's daily briefing.
Daily intelligence briefings for the Chief Executive used to be a vitally important component of policy formulation. Then President Chump was sworn in, and suddenly they became completely irrelevant, because they bored him. He refuses to read or even listen to them [politico.com], even when they mostly contain brightly-colored graphics, videos, and other visual elements [newsweek.com] designed to appeal to the functional-illiterate-in-chief [youtube.com]. They've also been tailored to avoid topics [washingtonpost.com], such as the latest intelligence on Russian psyops interference in the 2016 election, that push the Orange Oaf's buttons. (Let me point you to an alternative citation [businessinsider.com], because the Washington Post article may be paywalled for those who don't know how to use private browsing and cookie deletion to get around it.)
Think about how you'd feel if you had dedicated your career to producing detailed, highly-nuanced, daily reports on a whole range of intelligence topics for the most powerful national leader on the planet - only to discover that the new guy is completely uninterested in any information that can't be expressed in crayon drawings and bumper sticker catchphrases. Now throw in civil servant wages, and ask yourself whether that job would be in any way attractive to you?
Yeah - it's like that.
That's why they're leaving ...