LANL has quietly started issuing new badges to employees this week. The Badge Office has an item on their website dated 3/3/08 at this link:
https://int.lanl.gov/security/newbadge/
"In response to Homeland Security Presidential Directive-12 (HSPD-12), most L- and Q-cleared workers at LANL will soon have new badges." I am attaching a picture of the new badges. There is no color-coding of clearance level.
For those without yellow net access, the Badge Office provides a link to the USAccess Program homepage.
http://www.fedidcard.gov/
Also, cynically minded readers may want to check out the pricing information:
http://www.fedidcard.gov/priceinfo.aspx
Last time we rebadged from O'Leary green back to color-coded badges, there were posters in every building, multiple announcements and reminders, and so on. This time... nothing. I doubt it's a conspiracy, just more LANS incompetence.
31 comments:
It gets better....
DOE is the only agency to put their clearance on the badge, and they are rethinking whether it should remain.
$3/month per badge maintenance fee.
DOE/NNSA has not budgeted for sites to accommodate the credential.
Ok, before folks from various Gov Depts (usda, et, al) start showing up at LANL, Y-12, PX,etc.) what do you talented folks at LANL think about RFID?
LANL had absolutely no choice in this. DHS is driving the bus. It could be a really big problem for DOE and NNSA based on the Q-vs-L problem and visual determination - just like under O'Leary. Any LANL re-badging exercise is very expensive and nobody has provided or identified funds for this exercise. DOE/NNSA has supported LANL and other sites and is not to blame here.
It is not "LANL incompetence", it is just knowing about an upcoming requirement for about three years, and not being able to get any information from DHS about format, badge-generation equipment requirements, or even colors, from DHS. Don't blame LANL or DOE/NNSA for this one. This is yet another DHS FUBAR.
Another point is that the "smart badge" idea will not work where most computing is sensitive or classified, and passwords or the equivalent are not allowed to be stored electronically. What a cluster!
"DOE/NNSA has not budgeted for sites to accommodate the credential." (5:13 PM)
I sense another program tax about to magically appear at LANL to pay for all this stuff.
Employees at NASA's JPL won a court injunction, and will not have to comply with this directive... here's their websitel
http://hspd12jpl.org
It looks like Hazel O'Leary's legacy lives on. I can't wait until the next Administration takes over and we can rename DOD as the Department of Peace.
I have to say that I'm surprised that LANL waited so long to start on this re-badging effort. It's been know for several years that this new federal badging standard was coming.
Are all the other federal agencies behind the curve with this effort? It was my impression that DOD had already implemented this new badging system.
It will be interesting to see where LANL finds the funds to implement it. I don't expect NNSA to help out with any of the costs.
Perhaps LANS is only telling the employees they want to keep about this new badge. The others will find out about it on the day their old badges fail to allow them in to their offices. Sneaky, huh?
9:22 pm: "I mean what do you expect when the idiots have only one machine to do the re-badging and only one person qualified to do the task for a Lab the size of LANL"
What do you expect when a new government requirement (not from DOE/NNSA) arrives?? LANL should have maintained a badge-making capacity far in excess of DOE requirements "just in case" another agency came down with a new requirememt? What would you have said about that waste of taxpayers' money?? Get real. Why is it LANL's fault that a new unforseen requirement without discernable details was not funded? BTW, LANL proposed funding for this in each of the past several years, knowing the mandate was coming, but was refused by NNSA. This is a fight between DOE/NNSA and DHS, which only includes LANL as a victim.
The US government has recently re-branded the famous term "Need to Know" to "Responsiblity to Share":
www.afcea.org/events/techforum/
es/harris.pdf
Pair this with a new federal badging system that doesn't indicate clearance levels and you have a system that will generate lots of excitement! At LANL, you may not even be able to tell whether the guy sitting next to you is a foreign national.
Anatasio has been too busy of late to be bothered with this pesky new badge requirement. He's probably been spending his time trying to figure out how to sell his home in Santa Fe so he can get out of this ever growing sh*t-hole and move back to California by this summer.
"At LANL, you may not even be able to tell whether the guy sitting next to you is a foreign national."
Oh my God! The horror!
Remember the Great Badge Reform of a few years ago? "A badge of a different color?" Restoring the colors so you knew the clearance levels and did not inadvertantly reveal information?
This was to reform O'Leary's reform, where we went to one badge color, from the multiple badge colors. So we are now reforming the reform of the reform? When does it end?
It's not surprising that the DHS came up with this. If there's a worse organization in DC, nobody knows what it is.
So, give it 2-3 years, there will be a huge issue, secrets leaked, and the next Great Badge Reform will be announced.
It would be funny were it not so sad.
I think the new badges look too similar and create a security problem.
I don't know what that smart chip and USAccess is all about. The USAccess Centers make no sense to me. Tell me again what I can do at an Access Center (other than register a badge) that I can't do at my desk?
Are we going to have to use this thing to log onto the Yellow Network? Isn't needing a badge to get into the building and a password to log onto the computer enough to control access to unclassified information? Or are these other measures to be replaced by a chip that can get lost or stolen?
The benefits are not clear to me. Maybe I didn't read the announcement carefully enough. Can anyone explain it?
"It is not "LANL incompetence", it is just knowing about an upcoming requirement for about three years, and not being able to get any information from DHS about format, badge-generation equipment requirements, or even colors, from DHS."
Really? Pinky's got the information posted here. How hard can it be for the Newsbulletin to post it too?
Seems to me that having any kind of "smart chip" on your badge would go against what security around the Lab has been trying hard to beat for the past few years...outside circuits that could tap into data sources.
I mean a cell phone, even turned off, is a big problem. Or is somebody from security going to BS us a justification that this will be okay.
"At LANL, you may not even be able to tell whether the guy sitting next to you is a foreign national."
Don't worry. For sure the stylish, Ferrari-red badges for FNs will continue to be issued by LANL and not by DOE or DHS.
Here is an interesting article from Government Technology magazine on the HSPD-12 issue.
Looks like a clusterf*ck, alrighty.
Here's another HSPD-12 horror story.
When the smartchips were put into US passports it was pointed out that a scanner could be configured to identify US citizens carrying them. A real help to terrorists! After much complaining to Congress the passports were modified to incorporate RF shielding so it could not be easily scanned unless it was opened. Suppose DOE is bright enough to figure this out?
What's next implanted RFID chips like they do to cattle and dogs?
"At LANL, you may not even be able to tell whether the guy sitting next to you is a foreign national."
Oh come now. If they sound smart and are talking about science than they are a foreign national.
"
It's not surprising that the DHS came up with this. If there's a worse organization in DC, nobody knows what it is. "
The greatest harm done to the United States by Osama Bin Ladin will ultimatley be creation of the DHS.
Those FN's are some smart cookies, but they need to shower and shave and they talk funny........I say since they are different like this new badge then we should just get rid of them.
9:34 pm: "Oh come now. If they sound smart and are talking about science than they are a foreign national."
I'd be tempted to say you are a foreign national and tooting your own horn. But your spelling and grammar errors tag you as a US citizen who has reaped the benefits of our stellar public school system. "Then," not "than." Since you used "they" you must use "foreign nationals" not "a foreign national." Simple stuff, really. Like fifth grade, unless you grew up in the US in which case you never learned it if you are younger than 40 or so; your teachers thought it beneath them to actually teach.
Before we descend into namecalling again, can I make a few observations about the new badges?
First - Friday's LINKS finally mentioned the new badges. So thanks, Pinky. Another example of management-by-blog!
Second - I think I see why only L and Q cleared employees are slated to get the new badges. The JPL protest and the link to the story about the guy's wife (grad student working in a NASA facility) having her privacy invaded to get her new badge are the key. L and Q cleared employees have already given away all of their personal background infomation and been fingerprinted. So LANS doesn't expect any protests from us. Uncleareds might still put up a fight and possibly go to court.
Still, I can't fathom why the lab is keeping this so quiet. LINKS says "NNSA/LASO, the Associate Directorate for Security and Safeguards, and SOC-LA have been testing the process for issuance of the new badge." Testing the process? S Division employees are running around LANL with a new badge that nobody is familair with. Coworkers would be well within their rights to question whether these badgeholders are allowed to be in our secure areas!
"Second - I think I see why only L and Q cleared employees are slated to get the new badges. The JPL protest and the link to the story about the guy's wife (grad student working in a NASA facility) having her privacy invaded to get her new badge are the key. L and Q cleared employees have already given away all of their personal background infomation and been fingerprinted. So LANS doesn't expect any protests from us. Uncleareds might still put up a fight and possibly go to court."
NSTec employees at the Nevada Test Site ALL had to provide the same information (going back five years) as those putting in for an L clearance, and had to be fingerprinted. Even those employees who required no clearance. This happened at contract transition in 2006.
As I understand it, all federal contractors will now be required to have a background check. This applies whether they are cleared or uncleared employees. It involves looking at financial background (bankruptcies, credit problems) and any criminal charges. This new rule would also apply to foreign national who work at LANL.
11:56 am: "As I understand it, all federal contractors will now be required to have a background check. This applies whether they are cleared or uncleared employees. It involves looking at financial background (bankruptcies, credit problems) and any criminal charges. This new rule would also apply to foreign national who work at LANL."
Absolutely correct. And, it is a mandate of NSPD-12, not the DOE/NNSA. The fact that it applies to all subcontractors (e.g., the guys banging nails in CMRR, or filling the Coke machines) has not been figured out by anyone.
Could somebody please explain to me how simple background checks for federal contractors/employees is a bad thing? And don't even come back with "it's as bad as if I had a Q/TS clearance". It's not even close.
DOE is NOT the only agency that puts clearance level on security badges. The NSA and most of the military intelligence agencies have color-coding for Top-secret and Foreign-nationals. They have to adopt this new badge with RFID too. I guess they are used to taking orders without question.
And yes, the reason the clearance is not on the badge is because it discriminate. http://nihrecord.od.nih.gov/newsletters/2007/11_02_2007/story1.htm
NIH must have had some serious pull on the badge design team.
The more things change . . .
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