Future FBI agent, I couldn't more than agree with you in the aspect that people should be honest about their backgrounds.  Yes I feel it kills the integrity of a certain LE agency when liars are coming aboard.   
What about those individuals who have put in their time and hard work with agencies such as the one you aspire to be in and come out being accused as spies and deceptive, when the simple fact is that there not.  I would think a thorough background investigation should gather up all the necessary material needed to determine one's suitablity for certain employments.   
The simple fact with the polygraph is that it truly doesn't work.  Why should an honest individual who has put in so many years of hard work i.e. school, experience, and have it all go down the drain, b/c if you fail one poly for federal jobs, your gone, no chances of getting hired for other ones?   
Another thing is that the polygraph is used to weed out applicants in certain processes.  For example there are some agencies who have their hiring preferences, e.g. Chief wanting his nephew to get hired, and there are applicants who have nothing against them that can dq them in processes, so they use this exam as the sole reason of denial of employment.  Pretty shady if you ask me.
I agree with you that LE agents should encompass the highest degree of integrity, but I for one would not want to have my dreams ruined just because of reasons beyond my control.   
Why do they allow these polygraphs admissible for hiring governmental agents, but are inadmissible in court, does that tell you something in itself.  I think the main fact is that the hiring processes and promotion processes themselves need to be revamped.  Better background investigations should yield all the results needed to determine suitability.  To be accused of being a foreign spy, or a crack addict is immoral itself.  If there are any group of individuals who have shady characters it's these individuals who make such determinations regarding this pseudoscience.  I agree poly's are great for interrogation and intimidation of criminals, but that's it.  Well there you have my opinion.

Duc748,

There are several logical inconsistencies within the body of your last post...unfortunately beyond the time which I can devote a response to.  But let us address your note title, "Honesty is better than deception."  The use of countermeasures by an innocent polygraph examinee has nothing to do per se with either honesty or deception.  The same answers will be given to the questions asked during the exam regardless of the use or lack thereof of countermeasures.  The use of countermeasures by such a person rather is to affect the outcome of a polygraph exam, i.e., more likely assure a correct (honest, if you will) result, that of non-deception indicated having been rendered by the polygraph examiner.  This activity (utilization of countermeasures) is not only advisable but unfortunately one I deem necessary due to the nature of the error involved in the process.  As a growing countless number of individuals who visit this site can attest to, polygraph error negatively impacts the lives of innocent examinees.  The only way this situation can be remedied is for either those who presently give polygraph (screening) exams to cease and desist from so doing or for examinees to adequately prepare themselves and to take those actions (i.e., polygraph countermeasures) necessary to protect their welfare.  Your devotion to your country's security needs is no doubt quite admirable, but your blind faith in its (including the federal agencies you specify) ridiculous tools equally astonishes...Drew Richardson

Duc748,

I neglected to compliment you on your choice of career.  Having served 25 years as an agent of the FBI, I can appreciate something of that which awaits you.  As has been said by many of my age and status (now retired from the Bureau), I am envious of you in terms of the opportunities and life/work experiences that await you.  That having been said, I will simply encourage you to hone your critical thinking and analysis skills and to do so quite apart from the bureaucratic doctrine and policy(ies) that you will soon be a part of.  Although I would not advise you to demonstrate this critical thinking too early in your Bureau experience (during your training and early career), do not let the development of those skills go wanting and don't let that which you have developed wither and die in the midst of functioning in a para-military organization.  The Bureau, your case-work, and the American people will best be served if you can maintain well  developed independent-thinking skills.... Best wishes and good luck, Drew Richardson

Duc748,

Thanks for sharing your thoughts here, and welcome to the AntiPolygraph.org message board. I noticed your earlier post to the PolygraphPlace.com message board, and I would have posted a reply there except for that that message board, which is run by polygraphers, is censored, and polygraph critics like myself are not permitted to post messages there. This message board, by contrast, is uncensored. Unlike the good people at PolygraphPlace.com, we don't fear contrary viewpoints.

I agree with the sense of the title of your post, "Honesty is better than deception." In fact, based on what you've written here, it seems our backgrounds are not dissimilar. I suspect that you, too, once subscribed to an honor code not to lie, cheat, or steal, or tolerate those who do. I don't claim perfection, but I still do my best in my daily life to live up to that commitment. Too often, those who adhere to this code in their youth forget it in their later years.

With that in mind, let's move on to polygraph "testing." You write that you "did a lot of reading about the polygraph prior to taking the FBI poly." I'm not sure just what you read, but if you did your homework, you should be aware that "control" question "test" (CQT) polygraphy (the kind relied upon by the FBI and other federal agencies for polygraph security screening) is theoretically dependent on the polygrapher lying to and deceiving the person being "tested." Polygraph "testing" relies on deception not in a minor ways, but in a fundamental ways. The polygrapher must lie to and deceive the subject from beginning to end. In short, polygraphy is a pseudoscientific fraud. If this comes as news to you, see Chapters 1 & 3 of The Lie Behind the Lie Detector.

Honesty is better than deception. But honesty is a two-way street. The FBI applicant who reports for his polygraph "test" will in each and every case be lied to by his/her FBI polygrapher, regardless of whether he/she decides to be honest with the polygrapher.

You, my friend, were lied to by your FBI polygrapher. He falsely led you to believe that he expected you to answer all questions truthfully. He didn't explain that he secretly expected your answers to the probable-lie "control" questions to be lies (or that you'd at least feel considerable doubt about the truthfulness of your answers, and that he expected that that doubt would create physiological reactions that he could compare to your reactions to the relevant questions), even after all the admissions you made. You see, the FBI (like other agencies) fully expects that every applicant who passes its pre-employment polygraph examination has been less than honest during the polygraph examination! If you have any doubt whatsoever about this, see Chapter 3 of The Lie Behind the Lie Detector and the sources referenced there.

In fact, CQT polygraphy is inherently and perversely biased against the most conscientious of applicants, because the more honestly one answers the probable-lie "control" questions, and as a consequence feels less stress when answering them, the more likely one is to fail!

This being the case, I submit that it is not unethical for truthful applicants to use polygraph countermeasures to protect themselves against the very real possibility of a false positive outcome.

AntiPolygraph.org exists not to help liars beat the system, but to help protect the innocent against the fraud that is polygraphy.

If you have done your homework, you know damned well that polygraph testing is a pseudoscientific fraud that fundamentally depends on the polygrapher lying to and deceiving each and every examinee. In the case of polygraph security screening, the vast majority of those thus lied to and decieved are honest, law-abiding citizens. You say that honesty is better than deception. Are you, my friend, willing tolerate lies merely because of the rank of those who are telling them? When I swore not to lie, cheat, steal, or tolerate those who do, there was no caveat about the number of stars on the shoulder boards of the liar, cheat, or thief.

Duc748,

You wrote:

Quote:


Did your polygrapher explain to you what a probable-lie "control" question is, and that he didn't expect your replies to these questions to be honest? If so, he was not following the protocols taught at the Department of Defense Polygraph Institute, which is responsible for the training of all federal polygraphers. The FBI agents who told you that this polygrapher is "up front with all applicants" are either ignorant or were lying to you. The polygrapher who is "up front with all applicants" is not performing his job to standard, will get no admissions, and won't last long as a polygraph examiner. Again, if you have any doubts about this, read Chapter 3 of The Lie Behind the Lie Detector and then please tell me whether:

a) you believe anything we've written there regarding polygraph procedure is untrue;

b) you find the kind of institutionized dishonesty that polygraph screening represents to be morally defensible;

c) if you do find this officially-sanctioned fraud acceptable, how long you think the charade can continue?

Quote:


Again, I remind you that the FBI assumes that every applicant who "passes" the "test" has been less than truthful in his or her responses to the probable-lie "control" questions. This procedure is in-principle designed to pass through people who would lie to the FBI cover up a mistake.

Quote:


This website was created by people who went in and told the truth on their polygraph examinations and were wrongly branded as liars. Perhaps you won't believe  that honest people can fail a polygraph "test" until it happens to you, but you might consider Drew Richardson's 1997 testimony before the U.S. Senate Committee on the Judiciary's Subcommittee on Administrative Oversight and the Courts. Until his retirement last year, Dr. Richardson was the FBI's senior scientific expert on polygraphy. He testified that polygraph screening "is completely without any theoretical foundation and has absolutely no validity" and that "because of the nature of this type of examination, it would normally be expected to produce large numbers of false positive results (falsely accusing an examinee of lying about some issue)."

This being the case, it is only prudent for honest people to do what they can to protect themselves against the risk of a false positive outcome. You write:

Quote:


You make a false analogy. To begin with, a polygraph "test" is not a genuine "test" at all: it has no scientific basis and no validity. Using polygraph countermeasures to protect oneself from the risk of error is not the same as lying with regard to the relevant issues, and there is every reason for the honest but informed examinee to employ them. It is because of the significant risk of a false positive outcome that Professor David T. Lykken concludes at p. 277 of A Tremor in the Blood: Uses and Abuses of the Lie Detector (2nd ed., Plenum Trade, 1998):

Quote:


Finally, you wrote:

Quote:


Your reasoning here is flawed. AntiPolygraph.org indeed exists for the purpose of protecting the innocent from polygraph abuse. That's why we created it. That's why all the information on this website is provided for free. We're under no illusions regarding the fact that the information provided here may also be helpful to liars seeking to beat the system, but that can't be helped, and we make no apology for it.

George,
     My control questions weren't ones designed for me to lie. They were "known truth" questions. And there were only 3 of them. Do you live in blank state? Is your name so and so? Are you blank years old? The answer was yes to all three. 
     I can only stress this: the polygrapher was working with me and around my profession. I passed the poly using truth. I've shown it can be done and therefore people need to be aware that being truthful will not damn you, as it has been posted on this site. 

Netnin: I responded to your foul language filled private post already. There is no need to discuss anything with you further.

Gino,
    I was expecting to get flamed. That being said, my point of posting was to also show that honest people can pass the test. If you were like me and have never taken the test before, go onto the internet, then find a site like this that tells people to lie, because honesty will kill you on the poly, blah blah (run on sentence)... it can scare people. They may have nothing to hide, but now they doubt whether they should use these counter-measures. 
    It's not neccessary to use the counter-measures (IMHO) if you know you have nothing to hide. You can pass the test.
    I only brought up the fact that I know agents, who know the polygrapher, because I wanted to find out if the polygrapher was a straight up kind of guy. They say he is, and I believe them.
    Unlike Netnin, I'm not here to throw around insults and foul language. I'm throwing in my point of view on the whole process. 
    Here's what Netnin sent me via instant message:
"You are a totally unreasonable piece of crappity smacking dog shit.
Are you one of those people who has been absolutely and totally brainwashed by society?  Be a crappity smacking individual you god damned piece of crappity smacking crap."
    As you can see, unfortunately, these are the type of people that can be attracted to your site. 
    By the way, I actually did read chapters 3 and 4 of your book, just to get a sense of what this site was about. I found it interesting reading. Although polygraphs may not be completely scientific, I think you'll see technology advance and new "polygraphs" will come on line. i.e. pupil dialation.