The head of the NSA’s Signals Intelligence Directorate may be involved in a serious conflict of interest with a major defense contractor.
DRS Signal Solutions, a contractor offering signals intelligence (SIGINT) services to the defense industry, appears to be providing or seeking to provide services to the NSA even as it employs a vice president married to Teresa H. Shea, the head of the NSA’s Signals Intelligence Directorate. Buzzfeed’s Aram Roston, who broke the story , writes:
“Teresa H. Shea is director of the Signals Intelligence Directorate, which means she oversees electronic eavesdropping for intelligence purposes….As for Shea’s husband, James, he is currently a vice president at DRS Signal Solution…. According to its own website, DRS is seeking 15 workers for a potential SIGINT-related contract at Fort Meade, Maryland, which is the headquarters of the NSA.”
Neither the NSA nor any of the individuals involved in this story would provide a direct response to inquiries by Buzzfeed. In turning down a public records request from the publication for Shea’s financial disclosure forms, the NSA cited the 1959 National Security Agency Act, which shields the NSA from being forced to disclose its activities or “the names, titles, salaries, or number of the persons employed by such agency,” among other things.
In other words, even when it comes to some of the most basic questions of ethics and integrity in federal service, the NSA invokes its right to stay in the shadows. The agency’s refusal to answer questions about the apparent conflict or provide any other information simply contributes to the perception of a dubious business relationship. That perception, in turn, undermines Shea’s own court declarations that the program of mass data collection on American citizens revealed by NSA whistleblower Edward Snowden was subject to the strictest possible oversight. How can the American people be expected to simply trust that the NSA will protect their civil rights within such surveillance programs if it turns out NSA officials engage in dubious ethical practices generally?
(Photo: NSA/Getty Images)
Power to the People – the right people, that is – to corporate supercitizens. One ring of insiders – the beltway bandits – to rule us all.
The N.S.A. has stalked this 74 year old man for 3.5 years. Last night while I was at WORK they were in my car at work and in my apartment moving things around while I was gone. I am still recovering from a non leathal drug.The swelling is going down on my LIPS. John Bertotto
Nepotism and good old boy practices thrive in the MIC precisely because most there ignore such “dubious ethical practices [-] generally.”
Nothing will change while Congress and federal revolving door agencies lead OUR country by example – in corruption.
An excellent article, Murtaza Hussain,
You conclude by asking: How can the American people be expected to simply trust that the NSA will protect their civil rights within such surveillance programs if it turns out NSA officials engage in dubious ethical practices generally?
Clearly the answer is: We cannot.
From all we’ve learned through Edward Snowden’s revelations (as well as from The Intercept and other sources), you might have posed a broader question: How can the American people trust the NSA — in any context?
Same answer: We cannot.
And another basic question: Since US authorities, for lack of hard intelligence, are constantly surprised by world events and rarely if ever on top of a critical situation, how can we justify the hundreds of billions of dollars spent annually on the NSA and its legion of contractors:
Again the answer: We cannot.
Obama: “I full confidence in the Sheas.”
I would think that this type of conflict of interest collusion between government intelligence agencies and defense contractors is quite common. Just for information purposes one might wish to look at the following (not all inclusive) list:
“List of NASA contractors” https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_NASA_contractors
More articles pertaining to the lucrative nature and obvious corruption occurring in the revolving door of US politics and defense contractor relationships would be a topic that would suit The Intercept and readers well.
it’s all in the family. No worries.
What conflict of interest? These entities are all part of the Capitalist Machine, which controls humanity. These people need to work together to ensure that only the 1% survive. So far, they’re doing a bang-up job!
@cwradio:
Exactly.
Our ‘intelligence’ community depends upon people who sell their services to the highest bidder. Do it in house, or don’t do it.
That is really no problem. I mean, every dot of information is classified. So privacy is guaranteed.
Wow! They are really serious about cutting back in England.
http://www.theguardian.com/technology/2014/sep/19/sir-nigel-shienwald-data-access-role-david-cameron
There is a perception by many that the military, intelligence, industrial complex is a cesspool of incestual relationships with people going from public to private to public, in and out like so many rabbits, and I apologize to the rabbits for the simile. Any government entity that can insulate itself from scrutiny by the magic phrase “National Security” is by definition rogue. Congressional oversight, such as it is, is our only tool for making sure abuses aren’t occuring in any agency or department or bureau or administration. Did I det them all? It seems like anything our government does or says or prints is classified these days. Money, money, money. And they take it from us and shuffle it amongst themselves.
In other news, water is wet…
The Meritocracy at work.
This type (where you have one family member who is a fed and one who is a contractor) happens a lot in Washington DC. What you are supposed to do is abstain yourself from the bidding process if your spouses company is involved in any way. You basically are forthcoming about the relationship and you do not get involved in contracting on any contract where there is a possible conflict of interest. This person may have absolved themself? It is hard to say yes or no since as the article states everything is hidden from the public and public oversight. We don’t know that she wasn’t forthcoming about the relationship and abstained herself from any contract awards that her husband’s company was involved in. If she was forthcoming about it and did not involve herself in that specific contract then she did not break any rules. If she did, well then that might constitute criminal behavior. But just because she works for the agency and the husband’s company is trying to contract with the agency is not in itself a conflict of interest.
And of course we have every reason to believe that NSA personnel follow both the letter and the spirit of the law. Appearances may be against them, but we know that they have done nothing wrong and will eventually be cleared of suspicion after a thorough, transparent, and independent inquiry.
If what I described seems inadequate, I should point out that this inadequacy exists in other more mundade (non-classified) federal agencies as well. This issue isn’t specific to classified agencies as the potential for abuse exists in all federal agencies. I am not saying that Congress shouldn’t change the law to be more restrictive (i.e., you cannot work for a contracting agency that does business with your spouses company) then we should change the law for all agencies (classified and unclassified). But the way the law is now, you are allowed to work for the agency and have a spouse that contracts for the agency. You just cannot (as a federal employee) participate in a contract awards process when there is a conflict of interest.
But again, if that is sufficient, it should be changed for all agencies. What I find more distrubing than this is when you have high ranking government officials who have overseen the awards process go on to take multimillion dollar jobs with the companies after they retire. This happens all the time.
James Clapper – current Director of National Intelligence (DNI), head of NSA, the man who lied to Congress about the fact that NSA is actively spying on Americans, is a former executive
Mike McConnell – a current executive of the company, had Clapper’s job (DNI) during George W. Bush’s administration (keep it in the family, eh?) — he worked for Booz Allen before Bush, then worked for Bush, then back to Booz Allen after Bush
Here is some info I found on high ranking ranking officials who worked for Booze Allen Hamilton:
James Woolsey – former CIA Director, current executive (see Jan Helfeld’s interview of Mr. Woolsey where it becomes clear that Woolsey has no interest in discussing principles, only war)
Mike McConnell – a current executive of the company, had Clapper’s job (DNI) during George W. Bush’s administration (keep it in the family, eh?) — he worked for Booz Allen before Bush, then worked for Bush, then back to Booz Allen after Bush
James Woolsey – former CIA Director, current executive (see Jan Helfeld’s interview of Mr. Woolsey where it becomes clear that Woolsey has no interest in discussing principles, only war)
And that is just one of thousands of examples. Should there be laws to stop this. Probably yes. But that is up to Congress to change the law. You shouldn’t just single out this one woman who may not have (and probably didn’t) break any law.
And I don’t necessarily want to just pick on Booze Allen Hamilton. They didn’t break any laws. I don’t think it is a bad company. I just think we have bad laws that permit lots of government contracting companies to use a revolving door that has the potential for favoritism and unfair / unethical practices.
The snippets next to the people (in my previous post) were from the text of what I copy and pasted just to list some examples of a revolving door and are not my opinions of the people.
Really, Person? After Clapper and Alexander lied to Congress and the American people, you don’t think others in the NSA are just that brazen and ruthless? One of us is naive.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zZfpy0qHp70 go to 13:40 (13 minutes and 40 seconds into video)
Sandra L. Hodgkinson – Vice President, Chief of Staff DRS Technologies
from matthewaid.com Prior to being named the head of the NSA SIGINT Directorate in the fall of 2010, Teresa H. Shea was the NSA liaison officer in London from 2009 to 2010, a position which is usually reserved for very senior NSA officials looking forward to retirement while playing endless rounds of golf in Great Britain.
There is always a concern that American taxpayers are not getting as many civil rights violations as possible for each dollar spent by the NSA – so I don’t dismiss these concerns. But the NSA, as indicated by The Intercept’s reporting, has done a pretty good job of collecting citizens’ personal data. Could they have collected more? Probably – even in the best systems, there is room for improvement. No doubt it is disconcerting to some that the NSA is in bed with the security contractors.
But the NSA is subject to oversight by Congress, which has unrivalled expertise in the areas of civil rights infringement and dubious ethical practices. So I doubt they are getting away with very much, unless Congress is getting a cut as well. And if everyone of significance is getting a cut, I don’t see that there is much to complain about.
Regulatory Capture writ large:
Does the NSA regulate contractors or do contractors regulate the NSA?
Does the NSA regulate Congress or does Congress regulate the NSA?
Glen; Just a heads up.
http://www.theguardian.com/technology/2014/sep/19/sir-nigel-shienwald-data-access-role-david-cameron