What Clearances Do CIA Officers Have? (2024)

If you want to work for the Central Intelligence Agency, you will need to pass an extensive background check in order to be a serious candidate for a job with the agency. A CIA security clearance often involves interviews with people you have lived or worked with in recent years.

CIA Security Clearance

Working in the CIA often means you'll be working with information that is deemed essential to national security. If you make it through the hiring process and the agency has decided to make a provisional offer, you will have to undergo a background check, according to the CIA Career Application Center. To get a CIA security clearance, you'll undergo either a confidential, secret or top-secret clearance check, according to Go Government, although nearly all CIA jobs require a top-secret clearance, according to Clearance Jobs.

You must be patient and thorough when undergoing a CIA security clearance. It often takes more than a year from job offer to your start date, according to Clearance Jobs. That's not necessarily by accident. Two qualities the CIA seeks are candor and patience, Clearance Jobs states, and both of these will be revealed during the lengthy background check.

The CIA asks job candidates and employees to be open about their lives, not only during the hiring process but throughout their careers. Because they have access to some of the nation's most sensitive information, they need to have good character, be law-abiding and have no foreign associations that can be considered compromising.

Security Clearance Requirements

The three levels of security clearance requirements in the U.S. government correspond to the sensitivity of the information you as an employee will have access to, according to Go Government. Confidential, secret and top-secret all investigate your background, but the confidential process is much less thorough than the top-secret process.

Confidential security clearances must be renewed every 15 years. If you have a confidential clearance, you may have access to information that can cause damage to national security if disclosed without authorization, according to Go Government. This level of clearance usually depends on automated checks of your history.

Secret and top-secret clearance checks require personal interviews with people you have lived with and worked with in the last seven years or more, Go Government states. Secret clearance is needed for jobs that provide access to information that may cause serious damage to national security if disclosed without permission. These need to be renewed every 10 years. Top secret clearance is needed for jobs that have access to information that could cause grave damage to national security if revealed without authorization. These need to be renewed every five years.

Getting the Security Clearance

Be prepared to give up a lot of information about your background if you hope to get a job at the CIA. For a CIA job, you will be required to fill out an SF-86 (SF means standard form). Providing all this information is voluntary; however, if you leave anything out, the investigation will be incomplete, which will affect your eligibility for the job.

At 133 pages long, SF-86 is extensive. You will not only have to list previous jobs, for example, but you'll also have to provide an extensive list of contact information. You'll have to provide addresses and previous addresses, along with names and contact information of landlords or neighbors who knew you at this address.

You'll have to provide a list of schools you attended within a certain time period and the names and contact information of instructors or fellow students. And that's just the beginning. You'll have to provide details of any military service, your marital status, relatives, foreign contacts, any foreign trips you've taken, any drug use, financial information and much more.

Potential Red Flags

You may be worried that past illegal drug use or financial troubles will disqualify you from most CIA jobs. This can slow the process, according to Yale Law School, but it doesn't mean you won't get the job. Most likely, it will only mean you'll have to answer a few more questions. You should be able to show your drug use or your financial troubles were infrequent occurrences, which will help you get past these red flags.

Decisions are usually based on the severity and frequency of occurrence of negative behaviors, and whether any steps were taken to make changes, Yale Law states. You're much better off if any of this illegal or unfortunate financial behavior took place many years ago. As far as drugs, a report from NPR states that as long as you haven't done drugs within the past year, you shouldn't have any problem.

Being honest throughout your application is the best way to deal with any past misdeeds. Dishonesty on a federal form will not only likely disqualify you from the job, it carries a potential federal offense subject to fines or imprisonment. Even if your background reveals activities that disqualify you from a current job, you may still be eligible for other federal jobs as long as you're upfront about your past.

Other CIA Requirements

The clearance process "involves a thorough examination of your life history and fitness to safeguard the nation's secrets," states the CIA. "Think of it as building a bridge of trust between you and the agency. Candor is an essential ingredient in the establishment of that trust."

Also, you don't want to engage in any drug use or intellectual property theft during the application process, the CIA states. Accepting unauthorized copies or illegally downloading music, movies, software, courses or TV episodes is considered disqualifying behavior.

The CIA uses a lie detector test to ensure that all the information you are providing them is truthful. The CIA wants to also ensure that you are free from any conflicting allegiances to foreign governments or terrorist organizations or free from the potential to be coerced. You will also undergo lie detector tests periodically once employed.

CIA Recruiting Tools

The CIA is recruiting, according to the NPR report. Up to 20 percent of new hires are mid-career, with specialized skills. Some are ex-military, some are cyber experts and some speak foreign languages like Korean, Farsi and Chinese.

The agency is trying to attract more women and minorities. The CIA also recruits at universities and colleges, sending recruiters to campuses to meet with interested students and encourage them to apply to the agency. While most CIA jobs are for those who have college degrees, there are some jobs available to high school graduates. There is also an intern program for college students.

The CIA has even aired its first TV recruiting ad in June 2020, according to the New York Times. There is an Instagram account for people interested in CIA careers. Skills such as critical thinking, teamwork and interpersonal abilities are often more important than a specific study area or expertise, according to Clearance Jobs.