I know a guy in CA who works for a NASA contractor. It’s probably not so secret now, but I was able to determine that he was involved with the artificial intelligence on one of the early Mars rovers. Mainly because after it was up there and roving, he’d let on to how his work was on it. But otherwise, discussing his work is a very short conversation.
My work should be classified, but that concept doesn’t really come into play in publicly-held corporations. I work in bank security, and normally, I do not say precisely what I do or for whom, as people will otherwise be asking for “samples” of money, or bank wires, or how to break into an ATM. Generally I’ll just say that I do computer security.
I didn’t say that there is no classified work at NASA. The point is though that it’s a very limited amount. Once again, look at what Justin_Bailey wrote:
> I have two friends, one works for the CIA and one works for NASA. Per the
> contracts they signed, neither is allowed to say what they actually do. All they
> can legally tell people is “I work at NASA/the CIA.” I sincerely doubt either is
> doing spy stuff, it’s just a quirk of those organizations.
The security at the CIA and at the NSA is very high. That is, everyone who might conceivably see classified material, including secretaries and janitors, has to have a top secret clearance. Even cafeteria workers have to have a lower level clearance to get into the building. On the other hand, the amount of classified work at NASA is much more limited. Even the majority of the most highly scientific jobs there don’t involve classified work. Only a fairly limited amount of NASA employees need any clearances. For that reason, I wondered if perhaps Justin_Bailey had added an extra letter by mistake. Look, let’s wait until Justin_Bailey answers my question. Did he mean NASA or did he mean NSA?
My husband’s cousin and his wife have both held many different positions in and involved with the government. They joke that they haven’t been able to ask “What did you do today?” for a good 10 years.
I also just recently met someone who will say he’s a military intelligence officer, but obviously doesn’t discuss details. He’s mostly a paper-pusher.
I think that’s a good possibility. I know many people who work in law and health care who dodge the what do you do question because they don’t won’t people coming to them for free advice.
When I was quite a bit younger, and quite a bit stupider, I gave Amway a shot. My sponsor’s group made a big deal out of not letting on that it was Amway until prospective recruits had attended the gee-whiz presentation. I went along with this, and since anyone you knew or met could be a prospective recruit, and any description of it would be giveaway, I wouldn’t tell people what my business was. To ice the cupcake, I was pretty darn clumsy at not telling people what my business was.
No one guessed I was a spy. The ones who weren’t smart enough to ignore me figured I was a drug dealer.
I work with some sensitive information, some government stuff and some things coupled to NDAs with private customers. (I’d prefer not to mention exactly what I do, but that for my own personal privacy…though figuring out who I am IRL is really quite trivial). I have on the other hand no problem at all explaining what I do, in fact most of my work is open source.
If prodded I’ll talk somebody’s ear off about whatever I work with which is public information…the stuff that isn’t is never asked about, because I never bother giving a hint that such information exists.
I have friends who either work for government agencies or work for defense contractors. They cannot, under any circumstances, discuss exactly what their jobs entail. My guess is that whatever their work involves contains sensitive information, and I respect that.
I once had an acquittance who tried to get a bunch of us to attend a meeting. I think she referred to it as a business opportunity, but I don’t recall for sure.
We all immediately started in on her: “it’s Amway, right”.
Her - “I can’t say”.
Us - “Sure, it’s Amway, or you’d just deny it.”
Her - “Sigh… it’s Amway.”
No one went, of course. I doubt her MLM career lasted long.
Just how does one get people to come to a meeting when you won’t tell them what it’s about?
An old schoolfriend invited us to a ‘party’. When we arrived, beers in hand, instead of a party we were sat down and politely watched a super-hyped-up presentation from Vegas on video, which meant nothing to us, and then the rest of the evening was him trying to recruit us to sell Herbalife.
None of us saw or spoke to him again for twenty years.
I’ve known a fair number of people who couldn’t give specifics of their jobs, largely because they were privy to technical or some other information that could have significant consequences if that information became public prematurely. For example, I used to work with a lawyer who specialized in high-value commercial real estate transactions. If he discussed his work on even somewhat specific terms, people could figure out what was going on. Citizens groups might use this information to mount a protest to block the deal outright, or one of the parties to the deal or some other commercial enterprise could use this information to their unfair advantage. By keeping his yap shut, the lawyer was doing what he needed to do to make sure that didn’t happen.
Military spouses also have to be mindful of security. I’ve known some military spouses who had to be as closed-lipped as their husbands. If Airman is deployed, for example, I won’t say where he is or when he’s expected home. I will tell you that he is deployed and that he’s expected home in a few months, but that’s about it. Part of this is a holdover from my own days in the Navy, and part of this is because I really don’t want to be hassled.
“Business opportunity” is the standard description.
Some folks will give you the benefit of the doubt because they know you, and don’t suspect you would take them to an Amway meeting. Of course, those who have been fooled before are more wary. Then there are the slick talkers, sell-ice-to-the-Eskimos type, who are adept at persuading people to come.
Some of my projects are confidential, as in military or other gov’t agency confidential. They’re not super secret squirrel TOP SECRET or anything, but sometimes I truly am not allowed to talk about what I do.
Some years ago I contacted an actual professional recruiter, who had previously landed me a legit engineering job, because I was looking for new employment opportunities. He asked me to meet him in person to discuss an opportunity he just happened to have.
Me: “Is it engineering?”
Him: “Not exactly, but we’re recruiting a lot of engineers to do this.”
Yes, it sounded fishy, but the guy was a professional recruiter. I agreed to meet with him and was extremely pissed off when it turned out to be an Amway presentation.
As to the OP, even if I’ve signed NDCs I can at least say I’m an engineer at Company X. I just can’t say what projects I’m working on. I would think anyone could at least identify their general field of employment, be it engineer, secretary, doctor, or just government contract.
