Applicants at NIH who require access to NIH resources such as physical access to facilities/doors and logical access to information systems will be assigned an Administrative Officer (AO) from their Institute or Center. Their AO will be sponsoring a request in the NIH Enterprise Directory (NED) for an NIH badge and account needed to access those resources. 

Applicants who require more than 6 months of physical and/or logical access to NIH resources are subject to a background investigation commensurate with the duties and responsibilities of the position they hold at NIH. Even applicants who do not require physical or logical access to NIH may require a background investigation due to the work they are performing on behalf of NIH. It is recommended that administrative officers sponsor these records at least 6-8 weeks in advance of the individuals start date, to allow time for DPS prescreening.

Badge Types:

The badge type requested is determined by employee classification, citizenship status and duration of access needed. There are mainly three types of badges:

1. Personal Identity Verification (PIV),

2. Personal Identity Verification-Interoperable (PIV-I), and

3. Short Term Access Credential (STAC).

There are subsets of badges with different colors under each of these three types of badges to differentiate the employee classification and citizenship status:

1. The PIV badge is for long-term (greater than 6 months) physical & logical access and has four different colored stripe badge:

A. Color: White Striped Only Badge
Employee Classification: Federal Staff / Full Time Equivalent (FTE)
Citizenship: U.S. Citizenship

B. Color: Green Striped Only Badge
Employee Classification: Contractor or Affiliate
Citizenship: U.S. Citizenship

C. Color: Blue Striped Only Badge
Employee Classification: FTE
Citizenship: Non-U.S. Person residing in the U.S. for over 3 years

D. Color: Green with Blue Striped Badge
Employee Classification: Contractor or Affiliate
Citizenship: Non-U.S. Person residing in the U.S. for over 3 years

2. The PIV-I badge has four different colored stripe badges:

A. Color: Orange Stripe Only Badge
Employee Classification: PIV-I FTE
Citizenship: U.S. Citizenship
Duration of Access: Less than 6 Months

B. Color: Green with Orange Stripe Badge
Employee Classification: PIV-I Contractor or Affiliate
Citizenship: U.S. Citizenship
Duration of Access: Less than 6 Months

C. Color: Blue Green with Orange Stripe Badge
Employee Classification: PIV-I Contractor or Affiliate
Citizenship: Non-U.S. Person residing in the U.S. for under 3 years
Duration of Access: Up to 3 years

D. Color: Blue with Orange Stripe Badge
Employee Classification: PIV-I FTE
Citizenship: Non-U.S. Person residing in the U.S. for under 3 years
Duration of Access: Up to 3 years

3. The STAC badge only has one kind of badge and is for short-term access.