Her past is secured from prying eyes not by lies, but omissions, obfuscations, part truths, combined with enough of the reality to qualify as true. She has lived that way since college.
She had been recruited in her senior year of college to work for the government alright, but not the Department of Defense civilian schools. She was a communications analyst, with knowledge of computers, which in the mid 1970s was not all that common a field for women. And so she had been recruited to work for the Government, the Defense Intelligence Agency . She had been sent to Germany to monitor military and government communications. It was well known that less secure communications connected various military commands; her job was to find those commands (and people) that were passing sensitive information over these channels. She was not supposed discuss her occupation, and so the idea of being a teacher was born. A convenient fairy tale. "What do you do? Oh I'm a teacher" was her mantra.
She often speaks of being a middle school teacher to American children in Europe, but anyone with knowledge of government security knows a teacher does not warrant a security clearance of COSMIC TOP SECRET ATOMAL (CTSA).
She had carried out her duties well, and upon return to the US was approached with the idea of becoming an analyst for the National Security Agency. She had done so, only to have an unfortunate personal life event causing that career to end, and a return to the more mundane life known by most. Getting a divorce was frowned upon, but messy divorces were grounds to lift your clearance, and in her world, that was code for you should leave now. But always lurking in the unseen background was her connection to " the community". When she had left "the community" in the late 1970's, they had reminded her she could never discuss somethings, and she had asked how long those things would be classified. "Some 50 years, some forever. We'll be watching." They surfaced and showed themselves briefly from time to time. Not overtly, but in ways she would understand.
A company she worked for needed to send a representative to a top secret missile launch. The company submitted name after name to military authorities, and always a day later the news came back, sorry no. The story repeated itself several times, until they came to her name. Her name was submitted and within a hour the news came back. A meeting was starting, when the executive assistant slowly entered the room, and the CEO asked her " Well??? " She handed a piece of paper to him; in doing so she stared at her seated across the room, "She was approved...I just called and hung up, and in a minute or so they called back and said she could go. No problem. Just like that. " Her face got that perplexed look as she asked "Who ARE you, anyways???" She smiled and replied, "maybe its because i used to work for the government or something?"
Years later in accepting another job, they warned her a criminal background check thru the FBI would be required, which would take a few days. She smiled and said "No it won't" causing the clerk working her file to become amused. "Why not, you special?" "Something like that". Again, what took days for other applicants was approved in under an hour.
Every single time she was subject to a security review, people expecting the usual bureaucratic delay were stunned to see how quickly a response came back.
What they were seeing was how these response were created. Her file in Washington was held by "the community" which in the last 30 years had become increasingly embedded with information networks. She had received a large bulky envelope once in the mail, return addressed to the National Records Center. Inside were numerous files, documents, and a simple notice " These paper files have been imaged and the information transferred to the National Records Center archive system, and are being returned to you as they are not longer needed. "
Episode Two: CyberSpy
No comments:
Post a Comment