US intelligence contractor charged with leaks

The move is seen as one of the first concrete efforts by the Trump administration to crack down on leaks to the media.

Reality Leigh Winner, 25, a federal contractor charged by the US Department of Justice for sending classified material to a news organisation, poses in a picture posted to her Instagram account.
TRT World and Agencies

Reality Leigh Winner, 25, a federal contractor charged by the US Department of Justice for sending classified material to a news organisation, poses in a picture posted to her Instagram account.

A US intelligence contractor has been charged with leaking to a news organisation classified National Security Agency material about Russian interference in the 2016 American presidential election, the Justice Department and officials said.

The US Justice Department on Monday charged Reality Leigh Winner, 25, with removing classified material from a government facility in Georgia. It said she was arrested on Saturday.

It was one of the first concrete efforts by the administration of President Donald Trump to crack down on leaks to the media.

The charges were announced less than an hour after The Intercept published a top-secret document from the NSA.

The document described Russian efforts to launch cyber attacks on at least one US voting software supplier and send "spear-phishing" emails, or targeted emails, that try to trick a recipient into clicking on a malicious link to steal data, to more than 100 local election officials days before the Nov. 8 US election.

While the charges do not name the publication, a US official with knowledge of the case said Winner was charged with leaking the NSA report to The Intercept.

A second official confirmed The Intercept document was authentic and did not dispute that the charges were directly tied to it.

The Justice Department declined to comment on the case beyond its filing.

The Federal Bureau of Investigation did not immediately respond to a request for comment. Winner's mother also did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

Russian intelligence seeking to infiltrate

The Intercept report carried details it said supported the conclusion of US intelligence agencies that Russian intelligence services were seeking to infiltrate state voter registration systems as part of a broader effort to interfere in the election, discredit Democratic presidential candidate Hillary Clinton and help the Republican Trump win the election.

The new material does not suggest that actual votes were manipulated.

The Intercept co-founding editor Glenn Greenwald did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

While partially redacted, the NSA document is marked to show it would be up for declassification on May 5, 2042.

The indictment against Winner alleges she "printed and improperly removed" classified intelligence reporting that was dated "on or about May 5, 2017."

Classified documents are typically due to be declassified after 25 years under an executive order signed under former President Bill Clinton.

The NSA opened a facility in Augusta in 2012 at Fort Gordon, a US Army outpost.

The FBI and several congressional committees are investigating how Russia interfered in the election and whether associates of President Donald Trump may have colluded with Russian intelligence operatives during the campaign.

Focus on leaks

Trump has dismissed the allegations as "fake news" and sought to focus attention on leaks of information to the media.

Winner graduated from basic military training at Lackland Air Force Base in San Antonio in 2011. Investigators determined she was one of only six individuals to print the document in question and that she had exchanged emails with the news outlet, according to the criminal complaint.

The complaint said that on Saturday, Winner told an FBI agent she had intentionally printed classified intelligence and mailed it to a news organisation while knowing "the contents of the reporting could be used to the injury of the United States and to the advantage of a foreign nation."

US intelligence agencies including the NSA and Central Intelligence Agency have fallen victim to several thefts of classified material in recent years, often at the hands of a federal contractor.

Former NSA contractor Edward Snowden in 2013 disclosed secret documents to journalists, including Greenwald, that revealed broad US surveillance programmes.

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