Author Archive

Marko Hakamaa

Marko Hakamaa served in various military police positions with the United States Army worldwide for 22 years before retiring in 2006 as a Master Sergeant. Afterwards, he transitioned into the civilian workforce as a contractor background investigator for the Office of Personnel Management (OPM) before entering civil service as a Security Specialist in 2009.

Obtaining Security Clearance

Have you ever wondered how other countries process their applicants for a security clearance? Is it more or less stringent? It depends on what country we are talking about. Let’s take Australia for instance. They are in a strategic geographic region and have to be politically sensitive to relations with

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Security Clearance Jobs

The creation of a new branch of the military, the Space Force, has created new contract opportunities for commercial aerospace space companies to provide the Department of Defense (DoD) with critical technologies and support to help counter the continued counterintelligence threat from countries like China and Russia. Many of these companies

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Background Investigations

In accordance with Security Executive Agency Directive (SEAD) 3 all security clearance holders are required to report suspicious contact with foreign nationals, especially if they are associated with a foreign government. In a recent Department of Justice (DOJ) case an Air Force civilian employee, Xiaoming Zhang, was convicted of providing false

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Security Clearance Denial

It is well known that debt is the number one reason for security clearance eligibility denials according to appeals statistics over the years. One would think new clearance applicants would do a little research and make sure their finances were in good shape, or at least not so obviously bad as to

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