Reference · cleared use
What to Paste / What NOT to Paste
A two-column quick reference for the moment before you hit Ctrl+V. Left column is hard no. Right column is fine if you sanitize first. Print it. Bookmark it.
The two columns
| NEVER paste into a public AI tool | OK with discipline |
|---|---|
| Anything with a classification marking. SECRET, TS, SCI, NOFORN, ORCON, or any portion marking. | Generic technical questions. "How does retrieval-augmented generation handle citation?" |
| CUI in any form. CUI//SP-PRVCY, CUI//SP-PROPIN, CUI//ITAR, etc. | Open-source code with no customer or program identifiers. |
| Program names, code names, or nicknames not in public press. | Public-domain doctrine. FM 3-0, joint publications, NIST documents. |
| Specific contractor-program pairings not publicly announced. | Generic resume bullets that describe a type of problem and a type of impact, with no program names. |
| Site names, FOB locations, embassy or ship deployments, ranges, exercise locations. | Public job descriptions you are studying for an interview. |
| Network diagrams, IP ranges, system architectures of fielded systems. | Reference architectures from vendor docs you can link to publicly. |
| Source code from a classified or CUI program. Even snippets. | Your own open-source side projects. Personal repos with no employer code. |
| Sensor capabilities, performance numbers, ranges, accuracies, error rates of fielded systems. | Textbook math. Linear algebra problems, statistics homework, public benchmark numbers. |
| Adversary order of battle, targeting data, intelligence reporting summaries. | Public threat reports from CISA, NSA, vendor blogs. |
| Names, ranks, units, or roles of cleared colleagues. | Your own job title at your level of public disclosure. |
| Vendor proposal pricing, evaluation scores, source-selection material. | Public RFP text from SAM.gov. |
| Personnel security files, polygraph notes, investigation details. | Generic clearance process questions. "How long does a TS reinvestigation usually take?" |
| Anything from a SCIF screen. Photos, transcribed notes, paraphrased findings. | Notes from a public conference, with attribution. |
| Health, finance, or family details about another cleared person. | Your own public LinkedIn content. |
The rule when you are unsure
When in doubt, do not paste. Ask your security officer.
There is no prompt urgent enough to justify guessing. The tool will be there in an hour. Your clearance might not be.