Aspiring federal agents who can hack a computer with ease but can’t shoot their way out of a paper bag could soon find the FBI to be more welcoming.
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In a series of recent speeches, FBI Director James Comey has hinted the bureau may adjust its hiring requirements to attract top-notch cyber recruits, the better to compete with private sector companies who can lure the sharpest technical minds with huge salary offers.
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He’s floated the idea of scrapping a requirement that agents who leave the FBI but want to return after two years must re-enroll in the bureau’s storied but arduous Quantico, Virginia, training academy. He’s also lamented, half-jokingly, that otherwise qualified applicants may be discouraged from applying because of a fondness for marijuana.
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And he’s suggested the FBI may need to build its own university to groom cyber talent and questioned whether every member of a cyber squad actually needs to be a gun-carrying agent.
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Our minds are open to all of these things because we are seeking a talent — talent in a pool that is increasingly small. So, you’re going to see us experiment with a number of different approaches to this, Comey said last week at a gathering of the Intelligence National Security Alliance.
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The rethinking on recruitment comes as the FBI confronts increasingly complex cyber challenges, including crippling state-sponsored attacks, and as it’s racing to develop more sophisticated techniques for combating internet-based threats.
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The FBI, for instance, has struggled in recent years to break into encrypted cellphones of criminal suspects and sued Apple last year after agents could not access a locked iPhone used by a mass shooter in a San Bernardino, California.
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Though an unidentified third-party vendor ultimately came forward with a tool to open the phone, law enforcement officials remain concerned about electronic terrorism recruitment that occurs through encrypted channels…