Critics say background checks at U.S. Education Department are too intrusive

For about a year, contractors say, the U.S. Department of Education has been requiring employees of the thousands of contractors it hires to go through a level of security screening usually reserved for those working with very sensitive information. The policy is prompting critics to question when a prudent background investigation becomes an invasion of privacy. About 100 researchers have signed an open letter of protest calling the quest for information “far beyond bounds of reason, necessity, and decency.”

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