The CIA and NSA Want You to Be Their Friend on Facebook
The spy agencies are using the popular social-networking site as part of their recruiting efforts
The online social-networking service Facebook works for finding old classmates or arranging happy hours, so why not use it to help recruit the next generation of spies? That's what's happening now in cyberspace, as the country's intelligence community turns to such sites to attract a wider range of résumés.
The CIA now has its own Facebook page, as does the hush-hush National Security Agency, which vacuums up the world's communications for analysis. Both invite Facebook members to register and read information about employment opportunities. It's part of a larger, multiyear hiring push to boost the size of the U.S. intelligence community.
But should the country's secret spy agency be encouraging potential hires to publicize their interest in the intelligence field? Apparently, it's not a concern. In the first place, since the groups are not directly moderated, it is impossible to control who registers as a member. Some may enroll on the site out of curiosity. And, of course, none of those who show interest are yet officers in the clandestine service.
Even so, once they are on the CIA payroll, employees face no prohibition against keeping social-networking accounts or pages. "While agency officers are not, as a rule, prohibited from maintaining a page on Facebook, they are made aware of precautions to take if they choose to do so," says CIA spokesman George Little.
But the Facebook posting shouldn't necessarily cause a run on tinfoil hats. The pages aren't designed to surreptitiously gather information about those who visit the site, as fearful skeptics allege. In reality, says the CIA, they are flashy recruiting posters, "used strictly for informational purposes."
"From time to time over the past few years, we have used Facebook to share information on employment opportunities with the agency," says Little. He says it is part of a much broader campaign "leveraging traditional and new advertising media."
The NSA, for its part, sees the bleak tech-sector landscape as an opportunity to attract good workers and provide jobs. The Facebook site, according to Don Weber, deputy chief in the NSA's recruitment office, is just another venue where applicants can learn more about the agency, "as well as discuss those opportunities with fellow job seekers and NSA recruiters."
The NSA site is four months old and already has nearly 1,000 members, along with a listing of current job openings, from cryptological and language analysts to information system security designers.
Nearly 800 Facebook members have joined the CIA group, which is free and does not require approval from a moderator. "Finding the right people to do the job is of the utmost importance," reads the CIA page. "You could be one of those people."
It's all a far cry from the historical spy-recruiting process, which traditionally focused on Ivy League campuses or the ranks of the U.S. military.
Indeed, staffing the country's clandestine service has been a major focus in the past few years. President Bush ordered the CIA to increase its collection, analysis, and technological workforce by 50 percent—an ambitious goal that the CIA says has nearly been reached.
The specifics of how much the agency spends on staffing and how many people it employs are classified. But in his farewell address to the agency at its Virginia headquarters last month, outgoing director Michael Hayden told his employees that increasing human resources had been one of his greatest achievements as chief of the spy service. In the past few years, he said, the CIA has hired "thousands of talented new officers, chosen from hundreds of thousands of skilled Americans seeking to be part of our mission." He told reporters recently that the agency has received between 130,000 and 150,000 job applications since the hiring push began.
Moreover, the face of the CIA and the broader intelligence community is changing. Minorities accounted for almost a third of new CIA hires last year, a record.
- Read more news about the CIA.
Reader Comments
HOW CAN I BECOME A CIA FAMILY.
I AM REPLYING TO YOUR MESSAGE ON THE THE US NEWS SENT SINCE MAY THIS YEAR. I WOULD HAVE RESPONDED BUT I AM JUST READING IT TODAY. PLEASE HOW CAN I BECOME ONE OF THE CIA FAMILY. I THINK I AM A MATERIAL THAT CIA NEEDS TO EXPLOIT. I AN A NIGERIAN AND I LIVES IN NIGERIA. PLEASE ASSIST ME IN GETTING TO KNOW HOW TJIS CAN BE DONE.
THANKS FOR YOUR KIND RESPONSE WHILE I EAGERLY WAIT FOR YOUR KIN D RESPONSE,
hi
Am jeff and am 19years of aga. am in ghana i have no parent and i need you as friend.thank you
“THE DARK SIDE OF FACEBOOK, AKA, “DISGRACEBOOK,” OR FACEBOOKS COMPLETE LACK OF CUSTOMER SERVICE”
The unaired dark side of Facebook, or should I call it “Disgracebook” because of the extremely poor disgraceful way Facebook treats its members. The reason I say the unaired dark side of Facebook is I have yet to see anything announced on the prime time major news outlets about the disgraceful practices Facebook uses on its members. The Internet is bursting at its seems with unhappy disabled Facebook members who have posted thousands of complaints everywhere it is possible to post complaints about Facebooks complete lack of customer service and mean spirited disregard for concerns, questions and feedback from members and former members.
If anyone thinks Facebook is “listening” to its members or advertisers or anyone wanting to communicate with them, they simply DO NOT know what they are talking about! Facebook ruthlessly, rigorously, relentlessly, and remorselessly walks all over its members with hob nailed boot polices of culling members from membership for unspecified unknown reasons and then accuses the permanently disabled unacceptable members as “possibly” being guilty of spamming or “possibly” being guilty of harassing other members because of asking too many members to be friends at an unspecified rate. Facebook goes on to permanently disable unacceptable members accounts that have too many friends, belongs to too many groups, pokes too many unknown times, sends too many email messages and on and on and on. The founder of Facebook, Mark Zuckerberg, says that Facebook members seem to take a “personal ownership” of their Facebook accounts. Well, golly gee Mark, Facebook is supposedly a SOCIAL Internet program that people join to meet and make new friends. Making new friends, at least to me, is personal and publishing real photographs and genuine personal information on Facebook seems personal to me. Maybe you should say in your rules and regulations that Facebook wants members to be real and genuine but do not join Facebook for personal reasons and do not expect to be treated in a true genuine caring manner because Facebook does not care in the least about what you think or how you feel. When Facebook says you are guilty of breaking polices you will be treated with complete lack of respect in an impersonal sterile manner and declared unacceptable and permanently banned from Facebook without recourse.
On Mark Zuckerberg’s Facebook Fan Page Mark states “I’m trying to make the world a more open place by helping people connect and share.” I am glad Mark says he is “trying etc.” because, in my opinion, he certainly has NOT accomplished his mission. Facebook is one of the most closed undemocratic uncaring unsocial business operations since the formation of the Gestapo. Facebook operates carte blanche without regard of a due process of rights for members Facebook deems unacceptable to be a member of its supposed Internet social network service and therefore, disables their account without warning. Facebook justifies its policy and actions under the euphemism of “protecting members” from “repeated actions that COULD BE CONSTRUED as spam,” and from anything Facebook makes up to be a threat to its security. Although Facebook publishes what it SAYS are its rules and regulations, Facebooks security is a computer program of unpublished nonspecific rules and regulations that are enforced by an automated, autocratic, uncaring broadly defined bureaucratic computer program that members violate without knowing it and then booted out of Facebook. If this is not Gestapo like policy, I guess I do not know what it is because it certainly is un-American to say the least!
Furthermore, in my opinion, Facebook is NOT a Internet “social network service.” When joining Facebook you are, in reality, joining an Internet money making “computer advertising program” that is set up to look like a Internet “social network service” for the public. In essence, the Internet “social network service” is a screen or cover for a “computerized advertising” empire designed with one thing in mind, the bottom line profits for Facebook investors. I am all for investors making a profit and if the investors will wake up they can increase their profits by paying attention to the consumer members of Facebook. As it stands now, the consumer is NOT king on Facebook. Facebook can at any time without having to explain its decision declare any member persona non grata. Is it any wonder Facebook members are treated with total disregard for being feeling thinking real people? I have yet to know of a computer program that is able to feel and or to reason. When placing a phone call to Facebook you are treated rudely and crassly informed to use their computerized automated services, which do not reply when used or quickly transferred to an automated answering service to which there is no reply. Why a business would choose to advertise on “Disgracebook” is beyond my ability to understand sound business practices? I know that I will not purchase any goods or services advertised on “Disgracebook” and I urge anyone mauled by “Disgracebooks” insensitivity to boycott anything advertised by this disgraceful, despicable, sorry company!
If “Disgracebook” is treating its foreign members as poorly as it treats its domestic members “Disgracebook” is not only giving itself a black eye it is giving the United States of America a black eye. Is there anyone out there who cares enough and can communicate with Facebook to help Facebook become a user friendly Internet social network service it claims to be?
I strongly urge anyone interested to please research what I am informing you of because I assure you the situation I have explained is the truth and nothing but the truth so help me God. Until the media and or business community and elected officials takes notice of and makes public “Disgracebooks” dark side inhuman treatment of people Mark Zuckerberg and his staff and money making computer program will continue to execute its falsely accused unacceptable members and fill up trenches behind “Disgracebooks” California headquarters with their discarded accounts.
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