The Washington Post reports that a US military informant had a gun enthusiast’s day inside a secure facility and shared his love of guns
“I am intrigued by the idea of a small, pinpoint leak phenomenon,” says Dan Meyer, a partner at the law firm Tully Rinckey who works on federal employment and national security matters. Meyer was formerly a federal investigator and whistleblowing expert within the US government. Top officials have been using strategic leaks for a long time, according to Meyer. The ability to move documents in ways the government didn’t anticipate is a real issue thanks to the technology.
Initial reporting about the situation—including by the New York Times, which broke the story—has focused on roughly 100 documents, but some reports indicate that even more secret documents may have been shared on Discord over the past few months. The documents are photographs of printed-out presentation slides. Some of the papers were folded before being photographed, and some of the photos show small objects on the desk with the papers.
The Washington Post reported that the person behind a leak of US military documents worked for a military base and posted national security secrets on the internet.
CNN cannot verify the new ground in identifying the suspected leaker of highly classified documents, but the report by The Post provides the first known details about who may be behind a major national security breach.
The Post reported an interview with the leaker that he was lonely and gun enthusiast, but he was part of a group of friends on the social media platform that shared a love of guns.
According to the Post, OG told the member that he had brought home near-verbatim transcripts of classified intelligence documents from his job, but the member wasn’t willing to identify them.
“OG claimed he spent at least some of his day inside a secure facility that prohibited cellphones and other electronic devices, which could be used to document the secret information housed on government computer networks or spooling out from printers,” according to the Post.
The Pentagon Protects its Users from the Public: An Investigation into the Discord Detection of a Coronavirus Anomaly
A Discord spokesperson told CNN on Sunday that the company is cooperating with law enforcement on the investigation but declined further comment. CNN has reached out to Discord following The Washington Post reporting.
“He wanted to ‘keep us in the loop,’” the group member told the Post. The Post report said thatOG thought that his knowledge would offer protection from the troubled world around them.
According to a CNN review of Discord’s server, the chatroom disappeared after news of the leaks broke. Some of the documents were posted to another invitation-only server. Some Discord users thought the documents were fake because they didn’t think anyone would be brazen enough to post them online, according to a CNN review of messages on the platform.
During a coronaviruses outbreak that kept people out of their homes, the number of users on Discord went up, and so did its popularity.
The leak of highly classified information discovered last week forced the Pentagon to limit who it gives daily intelligence briefs to.
Previously, slides from the Joint Staff briefing deck could be accessed by hundreds, if not thousands, of people across the government, officials said. The Pentagon has now stopped distributing the updates to as many people across different government agencies.
Prior to the leak, the Joint Staff’s intelligence arm had been trying to get the other joint staff directorates to improve their information security practices, in part so that the chairman’s daily intelligence brief could be shared more broadly, according to a source with knowledge of the matter.
All the email lists have been reviewed, a senior defense official said, and some restrictions may only be temporary. Everyone on the lists had proper clearance, but not everyone needs to receive that information daily, the official added.
Pentagon spokesman Brig. In a News Nation interview, Gen. Pat Ryder stated that the Pentagon is looking atmitigation measures to prevent further unauthorized leaks.
Senior Pentagon officials are provided with tablets every day with the latest intelligence and email distribution lists. Several senior US officials, as well as a source familiar with the process, have said that many Pentagon officials are given binders of printed intelligence daily.
According to a former US official familiar with the Pentagon’s classified systemColonels and generals want to read in between meetings so they kill trees because they like paper and want to hold it closer with their reading glasses on.
Because it appears that the documents were printed out and photos of them were taken, investigators will be looking into the printer logs from recent months.
“All classified systems have multiple levels of risk controls, but a determined insider will find the weak points over time,” said the former US official. Paper is a liability perpetuated by senior ranks.
“I think one of the things that will probably come out of this will be more of a move to providing information on tablets,” the former official said. Some senior leaders like to have the papers because they like to write on the margins.
Since Russia invaded Ukraine last year, demand for the Pentagon’s daily intelligence briefing has risen, another official said, as multiple people at agencies across the government are eager for updates on Ukraine’s military capabilities and plans, which the Joint Staff tracks and analyzes closely.
One former official who was once allowed to see the daily brief while he was working at an agency outside of the Pentagon told CNN that there will likely be restrictions on who can view it now that it has been leaked.
The FBI believes they are close to identifying the person behind the leak. Another source familiar with the criminal investigation said that they expect it will move along much more quickly than the Pentagon’s damage assessment.
Pentagon officials are working with those investigators on a damage assessment that could be used to prosecute anyone that results from the case.
In its aftermath, federal agencies including the NSA, FBI and others overhauled their computer systems to better track access to sensitive documents. Some systems now record which employees open access to specific documents and agencies use printers that record which employee print specific documents.
In recent years, the NSA and other agencies have also improved their capabilities to detect anomalies in internet traffic from US-based systems, aimed in part at helping to deter foreign hackers moving large amounts of data from US computers. They don’t monitor internet traffic from the US.
Some of the changes that came afterSnowden have been slower to adopt by the Defense Department, due to it’s large size and some of its operational needs.
FBI investigators are now facing the prospect of sifting through a vast forensic trail left by thousands of people who had access to the Defense Department documents.
If the documents posted to social media sites were photographs, it could be that a camera phone could allow investigators to find troves of data that could help them.
Investigating the Social Media Leakage: Biden and the Associated Intelligence Source in the U.S. Army (the Conversation on the Leaked Papers)
President Joe Biden appeared to suggest Thursday that the US government is close to identifying the leaker responsible for the disclosure of sensitive government secrets posted to social media.
“There’s a full-blown investigation going on, as you know,” Biden said when asked for comment about the leaks. “The intelligence community and the Justice Department. And they’re getting close. I don’t have an answer for you.”
The FBI has narrowed the number of people they think could be behind the leaks and are interviewing them, according to two people briefed on the matter. While there’s a large number of people who had access to the documents, investigators have been able to home in on a small number for closer scrutiny thanks to the forensic trail left by the person who posted the documents. People familiar with the matter say investigators are building a case for prosecution.
Jeffrey Castro, a spokesman for the Army Criminal Investigation Division, told CNN that the division is assisting the Defense Department in their investigation of the leak. It’s unclear whether the alleged leaker works for the US Army.