[Infowarrior] - NASA Security Badge Holder May Pose a Safety Hazard

[Richard Forno]

NASA Security Badge Holder May Pose a Safety Hazard 	

http://www.fas.org/blog/secrecy/2008/08/nasa_security_badge.html

http://www.fas.org/blog/secrecy/?p=1904

A secure identification badge holder that was issued to NASA  
employees could pose a threat to sensitive NASA operations or  
personnel, the agency warned.

The badge holders were issued to comply with President Bush’s  
Homeland Security Presidential Directive-12, which requires all  
government personnel to possess a secure, tamper-proof form of  
identification.

But the NASA badge holders, which are “electromagnetically opaque” to  
guard against unauthorized scanning of the identity badges, have  
created new safety problems of their own.

“The current issue with the badge holder is the possibility of the  
badge holder becoming a Foreign Object Damage (FOD) hazard to flight  
hardware, or a projectile hazard under certain circumstances,” wrote  
Randy J. Aden, the senior security official at NASA’s Jet Propulsion  
Laboratory, in an email message to all JPL personnel on August 22.

A NASA Kennedy Space Center Safety Notice on August 15 provided  
additional background.

“The badge holder may separate with little effort, allowing the  
clips, the front half of the holder and badge ID to separate creating  
a significant FOD hazard in controlled areas,” the Safety Notice  
explained (pdf).

Consequently, “personnel should ensure the badge holder is not worn,  
or is properly secured, in the vicinity of sensitive flight hardware,  
such as electronics, where FOD may be an issue,” Mr. Aden advised.

Also, “When removing your badge, do not point [the] end with metal  
clips towards your face or another person” in order to minimize the  
projectile threat, the NASA Safety Notice suggested.

NASA’s implementation of Homeland Security Presidential Directive-12  
is controversial for other reasons as well, especially at Jet  
Propulsion Laboratory. While the Directive requires agencies to  
verify their employees’ identities, JPL has instituted a far-reaching  
background investigation process that goes far beyond that.

At JPL, the HSPD-12 “identification” procedure includes a potentially  
open-ended investigation into employees’ finances, intimate  
relations, and personal conduct. It is roughly comparable to a  
security clearance background investigation, although few scientists  
are involved in classified research at JPL, which is mainly devoted  
to planetary exploration.

Last year, 28 senior scientists at JPL filed a lawsuit to challenge  
the Lab’s implementation of HSPD-12, which they described as overly  
intrusive and unconstitutional. Descriptive information on the case,  
which remains pending, is available from the plaintiffs here.

The official JPL web site states that “The successful implementation  
of HSPD-12 will increase the security of Federal facilities and  
Federal IT systems. This will provide better protection for the  
employees, the information systems and the employee’s work products.”

Neither the JPL public web site nor other NASA web sites mention the  
new badge holder safety issue.