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☆ Jack Teixeira: Accused Pentagon leaker's violent rhetoric raises fresh questions about top secret vetting process
▼ + stars: | 2023-04-28 | by ( Natasha Bertrand Sean Lyngaas Zachary Cohen Haley Britzky | Natasha Bertrand | Sean Lyngaas | ) edition.cnn.com time to read: +10 min

But that didn’t stop the Pentagon from granting a top-secret security clearance to Jack Teixeira, who prosecutors say had an arsenal of weapons at home and a history of violent online rhetoric. And the Air Force’s Inspector General investigation is specifically examining the Pentagon’s vetting process and whether any procedures were violated or ignored, Pentagon officials said. Gen. Patrick Ryder told reporters on Thursday that when vetting someone for a security clearance, the adjudicator examines “a sufficient period” in someone’s life to determine if they are eligible. That program – largely run by the Defense Counterintelligence and Security Agency (DCSA) – aims to continuously vet security clearance holders for warning signs than periodically investigate them every five to 10 years. “Social media is a new world that the government really hasn’t gotten ahold of yet,” said Brad Moss, a lawyer who specializes in national security and security clearance law.

WASHINGTON, April 19 (Reuters) - China and Iran are becoming increasingly brazen in their attempts to silence dissidents on American soil and influence U.S. policy, the FBI warned on Wednesday. In a news briefing with reporters about transnational repression, FBI counterintelligence officials urged victims to come forward, saying the bureau is tracking a growing trend of foreign authoritarian regimes breaching U.S. laws to intimidate certain communities. "A lot of these are new tactics and lines that are being crossed that we have not seen China and Iran do on U.S. soil in previous investigations," one FBI counterintelligence official said. Officials said the goals of transnational repression schemes are multifaceted, and at times also aim to influence U.S. policy decisions through "malign influence tactics." FBI officials declined to comment on the New York case or speak about any other open investigations.

☆ Russia has a plan to sabotage European wind farms, gas pipelines, and internet cables, report say
▼ + stars: | 2023-04-19 | by ( Sinéad Baker | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +4 min

Russia has been using ships to spy in Nordic waters, a joint investigation by four countries' public broadcasters found. They are collecting intel on wind farms, gas pipelines, and power and internet cables, report said. Norway's NRK reported at least 50 Russian ships gathered intelligence there in the last ten years. DR reported that intercepted Russian navy communications showed Russian ships who had turned off their transmitters sailing in Nordic waters. One of the ships, Russian marine research vessel "Admiral Vladimirsky," sailed near current and future offshore wind farms, and stayed there for a few days, the outlets found.

☆ Russian spies are using Tinder to ensnare German soldiers and politicians to get them to disclose Ukraine war secrets, counterintelligence warns
▼ + stars: | 2023-04-17 | by ( Sinéad Baker | Sophia Ankel | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +3 min

Russian spies are using Tinder to pursue intelligence about the Ukraine war, Germany warned. Spies are targeting German soldiers and politicians, the country's counterintelligence service said. Intelligence services like Russia's appear to be using the dating app to seek intel and recruits. Other governments have previously warned that spies and foreign intelligence bodies could be using dating apps like Tinder to find sources and gather information. But the dating app has also been used by others in relation to the ongoing war in Ukraine.

☆ F.B.I. Arrests Two on Charges Tied to Chinese Police Outpost in New York
▼ + stars: | 2023-04-17 | by ( William K. Rashbaum | Karen Zraick | ) www.nytimes.com time to read: +1 min

The outpost was one of more than 100 Chinese police operations around the world that have unnerved diplomats and intelligence officials. The case represents the first time criminal charges have been brought in connection with such a police outpost, one of the people said. The case against the men, Lu Jianwang, 61, and Chen Jinping, 59, grew out of an investigation by the F.B.I. and the U.S. attorney’s office in Brooklyn into the Chinatown outpost, which conducted police operations without jurisdiction or diplomatic approval. Last fall, F.B.I.

☆ Discord users say Jack Teixeira only leaked documents to show off. That's a problem for the US military, which uses the app as a conduit for recruitment: reports
▼ + stars: | 2023-04-16 | by ( Lloyd Lee | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +5 min

Jack Teixeira, a 21-year-old airman, was accused of leaking US intelligence documents on Discord. The US military uses Discord to recruit young people who are enthusiastic about video games. Jack Teixeira, a 21-year-old junior-ranking US National Guard airman, was arrested on Thursday in connection to the leak of classified Pentagon documents. Some Republicans — most prominently Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene — have hailed Teixeira as a national hero, but members of Thug Shaker Central said otherwise. A spokesperson for Discord and the Defense Department did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

☆ Intelligence leak: NYT: Leader of online group where leak documents were posted is a 21-year-old Air National Guardsman
▼ + stars: | 2023-04-13 | by ( Kevin Liptak Jeremy Herb Natasha Bertrand Evan Perez | Kevin Liptak | Jeremy Herb | ) edition.cnn.com time to read: +4 min

CNN —A 21-year-old Massachusetts Air National Guardsman has been identified by The New York Times as the leader of an online gaming chat group where a trove of classified documents was posted. CNN has not independently verified the identity of the chat leader or the FBI’s interest in talking with him. 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. On Wednesday, the Washington Post reported that the person behind the leak worked on a military base and posted sensitive national security secrets in an online group of acquaintances. The Pentagon has begun to limit who across the government receives its highly classified daily intelligence briefs following a major leak of classified information discovered last week.

☆ Russia's President Vladimir Putin could be a 'dead man walking,' a former CIA counterintelligence chief told an interviewer
▼ + stars: | 2023-04-02 | by ( Isobel Van Hagen | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +3 min

A former CIA official laid out why he believes Putin will be 'eliminated' as leader of Russia. In an interview with The Sun, James Olson said, "I think Putin will be taken out." Olson said there is a "strong undercurrent of opposition to Putin" in the military and among oligarchs. He would not discount the most dramatic option in this possibility, saying, "I think Putin will be taken out. Olson believes Putin's generals are "disgusted" by the futility and the carnage of the fighting in Ukraine.

☆ Mistakes by the US's top spies allowed China to turn a deadly mid-air collision into an intelligence coup
▼ + stars: | 2023-03-22 | by ( James Bamford | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +36 min

On April 1, 2001, a US EP-3 spy plane collided with a Chinese fighter jet over the South China Sea. One of eleven left in the fleet, the tired 1960s-era spy plane bristled with porcupine-like antennas. Within minutes, however, the fighters had reached the lumbering spy plane, and while Zhao Yu hung back about a half-mile, Wang Wei rapidly closed in. In severe trouble, he immediately radioed the base, telling them he was unable to maneuver and being sucked in by the spy plane. "You are not allowed aboard the aircraft," Osborn said.

☆ Notable legal clouds that continue to hang over Donald Trump in 2023
▼ + stars: | 2023-03-20 | by ( Dan Berman | ) edition.cnn.com time to read: +15 min

Trump has denied having an affair with Daniels and says the probe by Bragg, a Democrat, is politically motivated. According to the lawsuit, the Trump Organization deceived lenders, insurers and tax authorities by inflating the value of his properties using misleading appraisals. A federal judge ruled that Trump and FBI Director Christopher Wray can be deposed for two hours each as part of the lawsuit. “What (Trump’s lawsuit) lacks in substance and legal support it seeks to substitute with length, hyperbole, and the settling of scores and grievances,” US District Judge Donald Middlebrooks wrote. Woodward later released “The Trump Tapes,” an audiobook featuring eight hours of raw interviews with Trump interspersed with the author’s commentary.

☆ Ukraine said it was 'watching with pleasure' as footage showed a lethal fire at a building of Russia's FSB security service near border
▼ + stars: | 2023-03-16 | by ( Alia Shoaib | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +2 min

A fire broke out at a Russian FSB building on Thursday, causing fuel tanks to explode. At least one person has been killed and two injured, Russian media reported. The FSB is Russia's primary security agency and the main successor to the Soviet Union's notorious KGB. It is responsible for internal security, counterintelligence, border security, and counter-terrorism. The building where the fire broke out belonged to the FSB's regional border patrol section, according to the BBC.

☆ Justice Department Hiring Dozens of New Prosecutors to Enforce Russian Sanctions
▼ + stars: | 2023-03-02 | by ( Dylan Tokar | Ian Talley | ) www.wsj.com time to read: +5 min

The new prosecutors will work with corporations to investigate sanctions and export control evasion, and also bring criminal charges against companies when they commit violations, he said. Some of the additional prosecutors are new hires, while some are being reallocated from different sections, according to officials. The U.A.E.’s enforcement of sanctions differs between the emirates, officials say, as the separate governments treat the sanctions with varying degrees of compliance. For their part, Justice Department officials have pointed to a growing nexus between their work on corporate crime and national security. In addition to hiring more prosecutors, Mr. Olsen said the counterintelligence section would also hire a lawyer to advise on investigations involving corporations.

☆ ‘True Lies’ Review: A Counterintelligence Couple Comes Back
▼ + stars: | 2023-03-01 | by ( John Anderson | ) www.wsj.com time to read: +1 min

The old James Cameron / Arnold Schwarzenegger collaboration “True Lies” has needed a reboot since, oh, about the time it was released. Its premise was close to preposterous: A long-married woman wouldn’t know her husband was a globe-trotting, veteran counterterrorism agent? Linguistics professor, yoga enthusiast and mother of two Helen Tasker (Ms. Gonzaga) has been married to Harry Tasker (Mr. Howey) for 17 years. Yet she has no idea that all his business travel for that job in “computer sales” really involves him and his cohort saving the world. This doesn’t earn her a lot of our respect, but the show wisely dispenses with the whole façade in the first episode: Helen becomes an agent, too.

☆ U.S. prosecutors seize properties, charge Russian on Ukraine invasion anniversary
▼ + stars: | 2023-02-24 | by ( ) www.reuters.com time to read: +2 min

NEW YORK, Feb 24 (Reuters) - U.S. prosecutors on Friday said they were seeking to forfeit six properties in New York and Florida allegedly belonging to a sanctioned Russian oligarch, and separately charged a Russian national with illegally exporting counterintelligence equipment. The announcements came on the anniversary of Russia's invasion of Ukraine, which Moscow calls a "special military operation." The Department of Justice has sought to use asset seizures and criminal charges to squeeze business executives aligned with Russian President Vladimir Putin to press him to stop the war. Two of the properties - an apartment on Park Avenue in Manhattan and an estate in Southampton, New York - had been searched by FBI and Homeland Security Investigations agents last year. Reporting by Luc Cohen in New York and Susan Heavey in Washington; Editing by Chizu Nomiyama and Daniel WallisOur Standards: The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles.

☆ China says U.S. refused to share information on downed Chinese balloon
▼ + stars: | 2023-02-24 | by ( ) www.reuters.com time to read: +2 min

[1/2] The suspected Chinese spy balloon drifts to the ocean after being shot down off the coast in Surfside Beach, South Carolina, U.S. February 4, 2023. "China early on through protected consular channels clearly demanded the United States notify (China) on the progress (of recovery of the balloon), but the United States refused to respond." China said that the alleged spy balloon is a civilian airship used for meteorological purposes, and that it was accidentally blown off course into U.S. airspace. The United States has said a Federal Bureau of Investigation Laboratory in Virginia is analysing debris from the balloon for "counterintelligence exploitation." The Chinese defence ministry later said it declined a proposed phone call with the Pentagon because the United States had not created the "appropriate atmosphere".

☆ Trump, FBI Director Wray can be deposed in lawsuits by ex-officials Strzok and Page, judge rules
▼ + stars: | 2023-02-23 | by ( Kevin Breuninger | ) www.cnbc.com time to read: +2 min

FBI Director Christopher Wray speaks during a Senate Select Committee on Intelligence hearing about worldwide threats, on Capitol Hill in Washington, DC, U.S., April 14, 2021. Trump regularly attacked Strzok and Page starting in 2017, following the revelation that the pair sent anti-Trump texts while they were employed by the FBI and having an affair. Strzok and Page filed separate civil lawsuits in 2019 against the Justice Department and FBI. Strzok alleged he was fired "because of his protected political speech" in violation of his constitutional rights. The decision "was the result of unrelenting pressure from President Trump and his political allies in Congress and the media," Strzok's legal complaint alleged.

☆ Merrick Garland's stonewalling about multiple investigations is annoying lawmakers on both sides of aisle ahead of his Capitol Hill visit
▼ + stars: | 2023-02-23 | by ( Warren Rojas | Mattathias Schwartz | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +4 min

Lawmakers on both sides of the aisle want Merrick Garland to debrief them about DOJ investigations. Garland is scheduled to join the Senate Judiciary Committee on March 1 for a general oversight hearing — his first of the 118th Congress. In early February, both Durbin and his Republican counterparts leading the House Judiciary Committee requested briefings about McGonigal. The Senate letter requested information from Garland and FBI Director Christopher Wray; the House letter was addressed to Wray but not Garland. "Everything is on the table," a staff member from House Judiciary told Insider.

But U.S. and Canadian authorities also announced they had called off searches for three unidentified objects shot down over last weekend, without locating any debris. The last of the debris from the Chinese balloon, which was downed by a Sidewinder missile, is heading to an FBI laboratory in Virginia for analysis, the U.S. military's Northern Command said. Reuters was first to report the conclusion of the recovery efforts for the suspected Chinese spy balloon, which were halted on Thursday. Kirby said the United States had already learned a lot about the balloon by observing it as it flew over the United States. "We will maintain the perspective that we have in terms of what should be the relationship between China and the United States," she said.

☆ U.S. military completes recovery of Chinese balloon downed off South Carolina
▼ + stars: | 2023-02-17 | by ( ) www.cnbc.com time to read: +1 min

The U.S. military said on Friday it had successfully concluded recovery efforts off South Carolina for a suspected Chinese surveillance balloon shot down by a U.S. fighter jet, and the last of the debris was being shipped to a laboratory for analysis. Recovery operations concluded on Thursday and Navy and Coast Guard vessels have left the area and safety perimeters around the site have been lifted, the statement said. The U.S. military said earlier this week it had recovered all of the priority sensor and electronics pieces identified as well as large sections of the balloon's structure. The Chinese balloon, which Beijing denies was a government spy vessel, spent a week flying over the United States and Canada before being shot down off the Atlantic coast on orders from President Joe Biden. The episode has strained ties between Washington and Beijing, leading America's top diplomat to postpone a trip to China.

☆ Exclusive: British authorities surveilled FBI spy chief Charles McGonigal's secret 2018 meeting with a Russian contact
▼ + stars: | 2023-02-16 | by ( Mattathias Schwartz | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +5 min

An FBI spy chief's secret meeting with a Russian contact was detected by UK officials. McGonigal should have realized that the London meeting would be noticed, one source said. During his years in New York, McGonigal oversaw 150 FBI agents tasked with shadowing foreign operatives and turning them into spies for the US. He would have had intimate knowledge of surveillance penetration in world capitals, which makes the London meeting all the more mystifying. McGonigal had investigated Russian operatives earlier in his career, but it is unclear whether he was involved with the FBI's Deripaska recruitment effort.

WASHINGTON, Feb 12 (Reuters) - The U.S. Air Force general overseeing North American airspace said on Sunday after a series of shoot-downs of unidentified objects that he would not rule out aliens or any other explanation yet, deferring to U.S. intelligence experts. It was the third unidentified flying object to be knocked out of the sky by U.S. warplanes since Friday, following the Feb. 4 downing of a suspected Chinese weather balloon that put North American air defenses on high alert. "We're calling them objects, not balloons, for a reason, said VanHerck, who is head of the joint U.S.-Canadian North American Aerospace Defense Command (NORAD) and the U.S. Air Force Northern Command. However, the government's effort to investigate anomalous, unidentified objects — whether they are in space, the skies or even underwater — has led to hundreds of reports that are being investigated, senior military leaders have said. But so far, the Pentagon has not found evidence to indicate Earthly visits from intelligent alien life, those officials have said.

☆ US general refuses to rule out aliens after third suspicious flying object is shot down by the military over its airspace
▼ + stars: | 2023-02-13 | by ( Tom Porter | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +3 min

The US has shot down three objects flying over North America in as many days. A top US general said he wasn't ruling out an extra-terrestrial origin for the objects. It comes after the US shot down a spy balloon it alleged was sent by China. The remarks come after the US military shot down three objects flying in North American airspace over the last 3 days. An object flying at high altitude had been shot down on Biden's orders over northern Alaska Friday, while another was downed over Yukon in north-western Canada Saturday.

☆ FBI investigating Chinese spy balloon, but much of the evidence is still under water
▼ + stars: | 2023-02-09 | by ( Dan Mangan | ) www.cnbc.com time to read: +3 min

FBI Special Agents assigned to the Evidence Response Team process material recovered from the High Altitude Balloon recovered off the coast of South Carolina. "It's very early for us to assess what the intent was and how the device was operating," a senior FBI official told reporters in a briefing Thursday, according to NBC News. FBI Special Agents assigned to the Evidence Response Team process material recovered from the High Altitude Balloon recovered off the coast of South Carolina. A senior FBI official later Thursday said, "This is a large scale scene," according to NBC. An FBI Evidence Response Team Photographer captures images of recovered material.

☆ Exclusive: The FBI's McGonigal labyrinth
▼ + stars: | 2023-02-08 | by ( Mattathias Schwartz | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +28 min

She never saw McGonigal pay. "The notion that Mr. Deripaska is some proxy for the Russian state is a blatant lie," Ruben Bunyatyan, a spokesperson for Deripaska, told Insider by email. McGonigal was not charged with espionage, and although there is currently no evidence that McGonigal committed espionage, an FBI source told Insider that the investigation is ongoing. At the FBI, McGonigal racked up a string of big cases and promotions. "He said he needed to make more money," Guerriero told Insider.

REUTERS/Dado Ruvic/IllustrationWASHINGTON, Feb 3 (Reuters) - China's flight of a suspected surveillance balloon over the United States appears to mark a more aggressive - albeit puzzling - espionage tactic than relying on satellites and the theft of industrial and defense secrets, security experts said. Both the United States and China have for decades used surveillance satellites to keep an eye on each other from the air. The uproar over the balloon comes as China has been building up its military capabilities and challenging America's military presence in the Pacific. The United States also believes Beijing routinely seeks to capture proprietary information and knowledge from U.S. companies. It has previously rebuffed accusations of espionage and said the United States holds a Cold War mentality and hypes up the 'China threat.'

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