The SF86 asks for an applicant’s gender, height, weight, color hair, and color of eyes. The older DD Form 398, which was used prior to the mid-1990s, also asked for race. After the change from the DD398 to the SF86, the absence of race sometimes caused problems during a neighborhood investigation.
NEIGHBOR: I don’t recognize the name Morgan Taylor Wilson. Was he the black guy who lived across the street about a year ago? INVESTIGATOR: I don’t know Morgan Wilson’s race.
The new PVQ, which should be fully implement before next spring, does not ask for gender, race, height, weight, color of hair, or color of eyes.
NEIGHBOR: I don’t recognize the name Morgan Taylor Wilson. Was he the black man who lived across the street about a year ago? INVESTIGATOR: I don’t know Morgan Wilson’s race. NEIGHBOR: There was a couple living there last year. The woman was polite and courteous, but the man was a jerk. Was Morgan a man or a woman? INVESTIGATOR: I don’t know Morgan Wilson’s gender. NEIGHBOR: The man was about 6’4”, 210 and considerably bigger than the woman. INVESTIGATOR: I don’t know Morgan Wilson’s height or weight. NEIGHBOR: What do you know about Morgan Wilson? INVESTIGATOR: Morgan Wilson was 30 years old. Other than that I can’t disclose anything about the person.
How do you think this will this affect neighborhood investigations? How will it affect police records checks when there’s a record with a slight variation in the name or date of birth, but you can’t compare secondary identifiers (gender, height, weight, eyes, hair)?
Good topic and question. It would seem very rare that this demographic information would be useful to investigators. Regarding police checks, if there is a variation in name or DOB then secondary identifiers will not solve that. I don’t see lack of having secondary identifiers as being a big concern. Perhaps there would be rare times that it would be useful.
Yeah I can’t see any of that information being missed or useful anymore. Nobody knows anybody in neighborhoods and/or apartment complexes anymore and it always seemed ridiculous to conduct an interview with a neighbor who wasn’t even really sure who was being investigated. It’s never seemed a good idea to reveal the Subject’s personal information to unknowing neighbors. I’ve had Subject’s who really don’t feel comfortable having their full name and age revealed to their neighbors. The smart Subject’s develop relationships with neighbors and then use those relationships to advance their investigations. I think most security officers recommend this approach.
I watched a video recently with the lady who does the blogs and someone else. This someone else said that the form wouldn’t be released 100% and used by everyone until 2027? Maybe I understand wrong?
I’ve never once used a secondary identifier in an investigation. And I would never tell a neighbor any of that info about a Subject. Besides, RESI checks will soon be a thing of the past.
canvasing neighborhoods is the most distasteful part of the job. And yes, we never tell anyone what we know about a Subject, other than their name obviously. All else is off-limits.
It’s part of the Trusted Workforce 2.0 transition. Some contracts (DHS for sure, don’t know about others) have already started implementing it. I’m sure it will only take DCSA 5-10 years to adapt.
Are they getting rid of the question about registering for Selective Service, ie “are you a male born after 1959?” (or whatever year it is). If they dropped the question about being male/born after date but they are still asking if they have registered, I can see it being awkward if you show up to an ESI and the subject looks like the character Pat from SNL. The case papers say they haven’t registered for the draft but there is no indicator that they are exempt because they are female so you are wondering if they are male/female and required to register. Yikes. A couple of times I have had to describe a subject to a neighbor. I think once it was to determine if it was Pat Jr or Pat Sr so the DoB cleared that up.
I can’t find any question on the PVQ about selective service registration. Strange, because failure to register when required is grounds for indefinite bar to federal employment. It’s also a felony, but almost never prosecuted.
Does anyone have any idea of how they are going to check the Selective Service System to see if people (men) who were required to register actually registered without knowing whether the applicant is a man or a woman?
With any luck, the Trump administration will nip this in the bud as they have with other similar nonsensical policies by the previous administration when they eliminated DEI policies and hopefully ensure people have to list their gender on a government document.
Give me another good reason why the government needs to know someone’s gender? The only good reason I can think of is if you are convicted and sent to a women’s prison or a male prison. I would love to hear some other reasons…
For a TS/SCI with FSP, a person is treated to a pretty big rectal microscope, but asking gender is a bridge too far? I’m sorry, that’s not the hill I would die on.
This is common sense approach to life in a civilized society and a common sense approach to knowing who we are calling or setting up an appointment with and who we are investigating before making the call. If it’s a female, we know the characteristics to look for in a female when we meet up with them at a designated location. If it is a male, we know the characteristics to look for in a male. Male and female are completely unique and different from each other in physical appearance.
It does make a difference when initiating contact with our Subjects to know the gender of the person being investigated.
I have described to neighbors on several occasions a brief and simple description of what my Subjects look like when conducting residence verifications.
If the neighbor doesn’t recall the name of the Subject, I provide a brief description of the Subject such as “the person is a 5’10” male and weighs approximately 185 lbs with brown hair.” I have been able to conduct many interviews with neighbors by providing a simple and brief description of the Subject. If I didn’t provide the description of the person, I would likely not get the interview with a neighbor after canvassing the neighborhood on several occasions. Once the neighbor can think back to that person’s description and recollect their memory, more often than not, I’ll be able to identify a neighbor and obtain an interview even if they don’t actually remember the name of the person but they can still verify the Subject’s residency, character, conduct, etc.. Without a gender, height, weight, etc., you won’t be able to help a neighbor recollect the Subject by providing their description.
So there are a couple of good reasons why it is helpful to know someone’s gender for the purpose of a federal background investigation.
Do you ive in a cave or are your really that out of touch? I’m thinking you haven’t done a lot of investigations with new hire college students getting T5s. “unique characteristics” Give me a break.
I have literally never done this. If they don’t know Subject by name or by “the person who lives two doors down from you in the brick house”, we move along. In fact I’d argue that you’re violating Subject’s privacy by providing a physical description and you should probably stop doing that.