The U.S. Supreme Court is agreeing to decide how much personal information the federal bureaucracy may acquire on its workers.

The justices, without comment, decided Monday to review a lower-court decision surrounding the concept of so-called "informational privacy." The 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in San Francisco struck down intrusive background checks last year on nearly three dozen National Aeronautics and Space Administration contractors as being too invasive – calling them an unconstitutional, "broad inquisition."

The checks sought information from any source surrounding their sex lives, finances and even drug use. The contractors being investigated were not privy to classified information.

The Obama administration, in seeking review of the lower-court decision, told the justices the checks were the same type conducted on all federal government workers -– now numbering about 14 million. The background checks are part of a 2004 security directive from President George W. Bush.

"The ramifications of the decision below are potentially dramatic," the Obama administration told the justices in its petition to the court. The justices likely will hear the case this fall.

The NASA contractors worked at the Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Southern California, which generally engages in the scientific study of the earth and solar system. They sued, successfully stopping the government from delving so extensively into their backgrounds.

The administration said collecting the information, as opposed to disseminating it, was constitutionally acceptable.

See Also: