Security Clearance

[maface]

I've seen jobs were a Security Clearance is required. Is this something only someone in the Military can get? can any civilian get one?

Thanks

[RADAR1797]

Anyone can get a security clearance who is a US citizen. That being said, it is a slow process for just a Secret and a crawlingly slow process for a Top Secret. Most employers are attracted to military because many of us already have them and if you don't, they have to pay for your investigation.

-RADAR

[vass0922]

Civilians can indeed get a clearance.
Its quite common with contractors...
Anybody that does job searching in the DC area will know the horrors of requiring security clearance... its quite difficult to get ajob if you can't get a clearance.

Most times the company will sponsor you to get a clearance when you come on board unless they specify "Required existing clearance".

Usually TS (Top Secret) they get a bit more strict about having an existing clearance... then you get into that whole catch-22 thing

its a real PITA to fill out all the forms (small novel) but well worth it on the resume.
Just make sure you know everytime you farted in the past 5 years (LOTS of info required)

[maface]

Thanks Radar/Vass

So it has to be done through an employer?

[RADAR1797]

No you can do it yourself, Vass is the right guy to ask the question to though.

-RADAR

I worked in an underground telephone relay station buried in the top of a mountain for AT&T once where I needed "security clearance" to get in. There were armed gaurds, 24" thick steel doors, and all the plumbing and fixtures were installed on rubber mounts. This facility was apparently "bomb proof" and was supposed to handle much of Washington DC's communication.

The "security clearance" to enter this facility was really just a backround check performed several weeks prior to when the job was to start. It was not unlike what is required to buy a handgun.

[jman01pa]

A prospective employer from about a year ago told me that a TS Clearance costs about $35,000.

[Theophylact]

On top of everything else, the Government has cut way back on issuing security clearances, because it thinks (probably rightly so, especially in light of the number of recent spy cases) that entirely too many people have access to secret-classified material.

As a consequence, now that the only person in our division who had a security clearance has retired, we have no one who is permitted to evaluate a lot of homeland-security-related documents that we're working on. And it'll take forever to get a new person cleared.

[maface]

Originally posted by jman01pa
A prospective employer from about a year ago told me that a TS Clearance costs about $35,000.

Looks like I won't be getting it too soon

[whitebeard21]

The last ts clearance my son got the fbi interviewed my neighbors even though they had just done the same thing a year earlier for the Army.
If you ever ran a redlight admit it, if you stole a pack of gum when you were a kid say so. Do not tell a lie about anything no matter how trivial.
They know people are not angels just show a positive attitude and you will be ok.