DoD Adds “Credibility Assessment” to Polygraph Program
The Department of Defense has revised and supplemented its polygraph program to include non-polygraph techniques for detecting deception.
A new Pentagon directive (pdf) introduces the term “Credibility Assessment (CA),” which refers to “The multi-disciplinary field of existing as well as potential techniques and procedures to assess truthfulness that relies on physiological reactions and behavioral measures to test the agreement between an individual’s memories and statements.”
The new directive also transfers the polygraph program from the Defense Security Service to the secretive DoD Counterintelligence Field Activity (CIFA). The program will be overseen by the Under Secretary of Defense for Intelligence.
Eleven military and defense intelligence organizations listed in the directive are authorized to conduct polygraph and credibility assessment examinations.
The reliability of polygraph testing for employee screening is widely disputed on scientific grounds. But many government security officials nevertheless insist on its value and utility, and the practice persists.
See “Polygraph and Credibility Assessment Program,” Department of Defense Directive 5210.48, January 25, 2007.
The incoming administration must act to address bias in medical technology at the development, testing and regulation, and market-deployment and evaluation phases.
Increasingly, U.S. national security priorities depend heavily on bolstering the energy security of key allies, including developing and emerging economies. But U.S. capacity to deliver this investment is hamstrung by critical gaps in approach, capability, and tools.
Most federal agencies consider the start of the hiring process to be the development of the job posting, but the process really begins well before the job is posted and the official clock starts.
The new Administration should announce a national talent surge to identify, scale, and recruit into innovative teacher preparation models, expand teacher leadership opportunities, and boost the profession’s prestige.