The National Security Agency (NSA) has taken the unusual step of looking to recruit new employees through Twitter.
On Monday 5th May, the NSA released a tweet on its ‘@NSACareers’ account which appeared to be random letters and spaces. The tweet was ended with the following hashtags: #MissionMonday #NSA #News.
At first, Twitter users believed that the account had been hacked or that it was an NSA employee playing a trick on everyone. However, it soon became a realisation that it was actually a legitimate tweet and the start of a recruitment process.
Marci Green Miller who is a spokeswoman for the NSA confirmed that it was a legitimate tweet.
Marci Green Miller told the Daily Dot, “The NSA is known as the code makers and code breakers. As part of our recruitment efforts to attract the best and the brightest, we will post mission related coded Tweets on Mondays in the month of May.”
It didn’t take long for the code breakers to work their magic as the code was deciphered in a matter of minutes. The deciphered code read, “Want to know what it takes to work at NSA? Check back each Monday in May as we explore career essentials to protect our nation.”
It is expected that the codes will become more complex each week with its aim to whittle down the number of candidates to leave only those that may be of interest to the NSA recruiters.
This isn’t the first instance where intelligence agencies have used usual methods to recruit new members of staff. Britain’s intelligence services have placed cryptic adverts in newspapers and last year, MI5 advertised for a health and safety officer but didn’t actually provide any details about the job.
This method of recruitment that the NSA has undertaken is unusual but may pay dividends as it may unearth some code breakers who are completely unknown to them or those who would have never dreamt of working for the NSA.
