NSA Employee Charged with Espionage

An ex-NSA employee has been charged with trying to sell classified data to the Russians (but instead actually talking to an undercover FBI agent).

It’s a weird story, and the FBI affidavit raises more questions than it answers. The employee only worked for the NSA for three weeks—which is weird in itself. I can’t figure out how he linked up with the undercover FBI agent. It’s not clear how much of this was the employee’s idea, and whether he was goaded by the FBI agent. Still, hooray for not leaking NSA secrets to the Russians. (And, almost ten years after Snowden, do we still have this much trouble vetting people before giving them security clearances?)

Mr. Dalke, who had already left the N.S.A. but told the agent that he still worked there on a temporary assignment, then revealed that had taken “highly sensitive information” related to foreign targeting of U.S. systems and information on cyber operations, the prosecutors said. He offered the information in exchange for cryptocurrency and said he was in “financial need.” Court records show he had nearly $84,000 in debt between student loans and credit cards.

EDITED TO ADD (10/5): Marcy Wheeler notes that the FBI seems to be sitting on some common recruitment point, and collecting potential Russian spies.

Tags: cryptocurrency, cyberespionage, espionage, FBI, NSA, undercover

Posted on October 4, 2022 at 6:30 AM • 33 Comments

Comments

JonKnowsNothing • October 4, 2022 7:36 AM

In theory, in the USA, we have Innocent Until…

In practice, it doesn’t work quite as well as it looks on paper.

There are lots of documented cases of what is termed: entrapment. This one smells badly. No one gets to that point of employment without full vetting.

It’s no surprise that folks are underwater with educational debt generated by Betsy DeVos and her chums. This are educational loans based on Federal Student Loan Guarantees designed for use by bogus For Profit Schools, that come with No Bankruptcy relief options. Besides tuition debt, people still need housing and food while studying. $84K is a droplet.

The vetting agencies would have known all about it.

wiredog • October 4, 2022 7:50 AM

The problem with vetting in the post Snowden era is that he didn’t raise any red flags. He saw himself as a patriot who was doing the right thing. You can’t really screen for that.

It’s really messed up the whole clearance process.

Peter A. • October 4, 2022 8:22 AM

On the surface of it, there’s no issue that this guy only worked for less than a month, as long as the purported family issue was true and unexpected. The agency didn’t want to sponsor leave of absence, bad news for the employee, shit happens in life. Also the person’s credentials seem ok: military service, security clearance from the military (a HR short cut compared to a candidate not having clearance already), relevant university grade etc. Something in the vetting for TS clearance might have gone wrong, however.

The dubious things are giving that much access rights to a freshman and reported “misconfiguration” allowing the guy to access more than he should had access to. Is NSA so short on workforce and desperate to bring new hires to speed? Is it still in disorder after Snowden? What about security procedures? Is it so easy just to print some material and take it home?

It could be FBI’s SOP to target bailouts from agencies, just in case, especially triggered by unusual career profile like this one. The unanswered question is how the agent got in touch with the guy, who had the initiative, how the agent knew what sentiments to invoke in the suspect and who to pose as etc. “Russians” is not a universal motivation for a disgruntled ex-employee.

GI JOE • October 4, 2022 9:48 AM

when we predispose an entire generation of Clandestine Service staff to foreign influence leverage, by recommending to every schoolchild they take on massive amounts of debt to finance what often turns out to be a less than useful education, what do we exactly expect to happen….?

RealFakeNews • October 4, 2022 10:10 AM

Simple solution: write off debts of those employed in these positions. Remove the need to make quick cash.

Wait… that doesn’t work as many are not motivated by finances but ideology.

This one stinks of a stitch-up by the Feds.

Daniel Speyer • October 4, 2022 10:16 AM

And, almost ten years after Snowden, do we still have this much trouble vetting people before giving them security clearances?

They probably adjusted the vetting process to exclude people with consciences. Which is now working out about as well as you’d expect.

tim • October 4, 2022 10:39 AM

I’m curious if the debt issue came up during the clearance check or if they just checked credit ratings. Such large amount of debt should of triggered a red flag to investigate. Then again – due to the US idiotic college loan system – a high percentage of college applicants would have similar debt issues.

(banks won’t generally hire people with low credit ratings in privileged positions)

Steve • October 4, 2022 10:44 AM

@bruce:

Still, hooray for not leaking NSA secrets to the Russians.

How about to Glenn Greenwald and Julian Assange?

Just askin’.

Quantry • October 4, 2022 11:01 AM

“It’s not clear how much of this was the employee’s idea, and whether he was goaded by the FBI agent.”

Need I tell you what the odds are under these untouchable facsist / Staatssi “ministries” of security? Such “heros” MUST climb the ladder.

‘https://cfe.ryerson.ca/blog/2021/08/consultation-racket-report-national-islamophobia-summit

‘https://rabble.ca/columnists/enduring-canadas-surveillance-regime/

‘https://www.ymlaw.ca/nutt

… it’s endless. A global mafia of mafias.

‘So, do you want us to go and pull them up?’ the servants asked him. ‘No, when you pull up the weeds, you might also uproot the wheat with them. …At harvest time I’ll tell the reapers: Gather the weeds first and tie them in bundles to burn them…’ -CSB

Clive Robinson • October 4, 2022 11:16 AM

@ ALL,

What concerns me is the four documents…

Aside from one, we know nothing about the content, or who wrote them.

If he was employed as indicated then they may well have been documents he wrote, and printed out and few if no others had access to.

The fact the FBI person skates around various things in the affidavit would to most appear suspicious, however it’s the sort of junk they write all the time, written full of irrelevances to convey suspicion etc…

But as @Bruce noted there is no indication of how the FBI agent initiated contact with the accused in the way they did.

The FBI would have known he had student debt, they also would have known he was nolonger working at his job due to illness in a family member.

However at his bankruptcy he had 33k of student debt and 51k of unsecured debt and just over 8k of assets. That is a long way short of a quater of a million with 85k payback iminent. The first guess would be medical bills for the partner (whom I’m assuming is the ill person in the familly).

Also what is not said is what was in the emails…

If he had printed out the documents and taken them home then how did he get them into the Email?

Type them in by hand? Take a photo/scan? Or “cut and paste” from an electronic version?

The affidavit gets very very vague about this and if you read it a couple of times most of it is unverifiable hearsay.

Look at it this way if you had printed versions, you would be stupid to scan in or image them, doing that is almost universialy known as a daft thing to do as it’s tracable.

A sensible person re-types the relevant parts and slightly rewords into a “text editor” and sends that within the email.

A less sensible person might OCR and then “tidy up” in a word processor (but word processor documents are tracable in a whole number of ways unless you take care).

Something “smells” about this case, and the affidavit has does not actually tie him to anything if you read it… It does not say it directly but the wording indicates the money was paid into his account via various auto teller machines in the area (that usually have cameras these days and timed transactions, so if he had paid the money in you would have expected any such image to have been produced).

All a bit odd…

Clive Robinson • October 4, 2022 11:22 AM

@ ALL,

Oh one other thing…

The “foreign Email Provider” much is made about it being beyond the US…

They don’t get named but the crypto coin exchange does… Why?

As we know from the past various US Federal Agencies have set up or taken control of foreign companies for various reasons.

It might be worth finding out who the Email company is and doing some OSint on them…

SeattleSipper • October 4, 2022 12:50 PM

> Court records show he had nearly $84,000 in debt between student loans and credit cards.

Thus, we have an unanticipated benefit of forgiving student loans. Anyone have any (real) data on what benefits the loan jubilee might bring to organizations like the FBI, NSA, and CIA?

Aaron • October 4, 2022 1:14 PM

I guess it’s a good thing that hundreds of thousands of dollars are spent every year ensuring employees, contractors, etc are staying compliant with DoD 8570

I mean…

I guess it’s a tragic waste of government spending every year ensuring corporations like CompTIA “help” to ensure people are trained to be good system users

Another classic case of, no matter what you do, there will always be somebody who just doesn’t care, doesn’t have the same perspective or is just malevolent

Wannabe techguy • October 4, 2022 1:56 PM

@steve
“How about to Glenn Greenwald and Julian Assange?”

Just askin’.
Are you saying they leaked to the Russians?
Just askin’

Ted • October 4, 2022 3:05 PM

Was Jalke – having completed a BS, MS, and now going for a Doctorate (according to his resume) – planning to enhance his career trajectory by selling his country’s secrets?

Also, did he not study Reality Winner’s case? Printed documents are trackable. Come on.

Some of the statements Jalke made to the OCE (FBI Online Covert Employee) really have me wondering about his state of mind:

“recently learned that my heritage ties back to your country, which is part of why I have come to you as opposed to others.”
“[t]here is an opportunity to help balance scales of the world while also tending to my own needs.”
“will have to find alternative means to remove my debt in the near future so that it does not threaten my employment . . . .”

I hope more comes out about this.

SpaceLifeForm • October 4, 2022 3:34 PM

@ Clive, Ted

ProtonMail, EXIF, and yellow dots come to mind.

CryptoCurrency is not as anonymous as some think.

As to the non-clarity in this case, in the main it probably exists so as to not reveal sources and methods.

Ted • October 4, 2022 5:33 PM

@SpaceLifeForm, Clive,All

Sorry. I meant Dalke not Jalke.

Yes, also, per the affidavit:

This affidavit is intended to show merely that there is sufficient probable cause for the requested warrant and does not set forth all of my knowledge about this matter.

I think there is a detention hearing for Dalke this week.

Your coverage of CIA leaker Joshua Schulte’s trial was great. That was a wild development.

ResearcherZero • October 4, 2022 9:33 PM

@Bruce

And, almost ten years after Snowden, do we still have this much trouble vetting people before giving them security clearances?

As we still have identified foreign spies from the 1980’s free to recruit assets, and know that most of their assets are still happily working in government departments, this would be a certainty.

If you ignore it long enough – eventually it will go away.

The two Russian spies responsible for targeted harassment in the 1980’s in Australia, were repeatedly set free after being caught, charged and found guilty. Immediately set free, although a long list of victims were identified as being still at risk.

A significant number of assets were known to be assisting in harassment of the victims and stealing and selling government records. Some of those assets were also caught, charged, found guilty and set free.

The crimes they engaged in were quite significant. Fraud, theft, abduction, assault, and attempted murder for example.

It all sounds like a considerable bureaucratic headache. And as one of those two spies was caught with microwave equipment, even more of a headache.

Thermoelastic pressure waves and MAE
https://ieeexplore.ieee.org/ielx7/7397573/8000303/09366412.pdf

“The human head acts as a receiving antenna for microwaves in the low gigahertz frequency range.”

These types of directed energy microwave devices came on the scene in the late 1960s in the US and the Soviet Union. They were enabled by the development of pulsed power in the 1960s.

Directed energy microwave weapons convert energy from a power source – a wall plug in a lab or the engine on a military vehicle – into radiated electromagnetic energy and focus it on a target.
https://asiatimes.com/2022/02/microwave-weapon-behind-havana-syndrome-report/

I suspect that the problem was not just the microwave problem, but that there was a significant amount of impropriety in the legal process, and that a number of victims were violently assaulted and murdered.

It is always difficult for government officials to explain why victims and their families were left at risk. Explaining away mysterious symptoms is easy, but unexplained deaths -surrounded by corruption and espionage- that is not so easy.

When I was told they were going to award me with a medal for courage, I had the suspicion that it was a ‘full stop’ on any further investigation, accompanied by feelings of furious f__king anger.

All attempts at getting further action taken were met with indifference from members of parliament and senators.

After showing all of the evidence to the federal police their faces returned expressions of abject terror, and I was given the response, “we don’t want to happen to us what happened to you.”

–

Here are the last couple of reports on the situation…

“We did not meet key performance indicators agreed with the Australian Government Security Vetting Agency (AGSVA) as a result of the significant growth (129 per cent increase) in assessment demand for Top Secret positive vetting (PV) clearances.”
https://apo.org.au/sites/default/files/resource-files/2017-10/apo-nid114751.pdf

“An Australia-based foreign national was working with a team of foreign intelligence officers, who were trying to recruit multiple Australian security clearance holders,”

“They successfully cultivated and recruited an Australian government security clearance holder who had access to sensitive details of defence technology.”

“The spies developed targeted relationships with current and former politicians, a foreign ¬embassy and a state police service.”

“Any person in political office was a potential target …with the full impact perhaps not apparent for decades.”

ASIO has seen espionage and foreign interference attempts against all levels of Australian politics, and in every single state and territory.
https://www.asio.gov.au/publications/speeches-and-statements/director-generals-annual-threat-assessment-2021.html

ResearcherZero • October 4, 2022 10:05 PM

@Bruce

I was personally disappointed to see a number of victims and their families left uniformed and unprotected from the microwave attacks in Australia that took place from around 1985 through to 1992.

It may be easy to excuse as a “psychological problem”, though the incidents that followed involving physical assaults, abduction, shootings, and bombs placed under vehicles by those same Russian spies may be a little harder to explain.

Also of concern is operational security, given the device is line-of-sight (LOS) and reportedly can operate within 500M using passive listening devices planted to retrieve audio from within the vicinity targeted by the beam.

Those exposed to the beam long term were left in harms way. Future or current victims remain in harms way, and there is no government policy outside of the U.S. to address this. Quite a few victims who were not assisted or warned of the danger developed cancer in Australia, and died as a result. Only two individuals who left one property shortly after it was targeted, successfully recovered following treatment for cancer that later developed. Hence time is of the essence, along with monitoring of the victims health.

Short range high powered contact is also of concern. Though the capacitors seemed to discharge quite quickly when I was targeted by one of the Russian spies with the directional antenna from within 10 feet, it almost instantly disabled my sense of balance, and as I quickly began steaming, it left me quite vulnerable. Being hit directly in the eyes could do at least some short term damage, leaving someone temporally blinded.

ResearcherZero • October 5, 2022 2:44 AM

Paul Whyte and his partner were both assets. They were caught in the 1990’s stealing government documents, later found guilty of kidnapping and aggravated assault, but then mysteriously released without any sentence, only to be caught again many years later.

“A picture was emerging and suspicions in respect to Mr Whyte were growing but it was still unknown how his lifestyle was funded, although he was clearly living beyond his apparent means.”

Paul Ronald Whyte, a former assistant director general of corporate operations at the WA Department of Communities, was to all appearances “the epitome of a successful senior public servant”. Whyte, who oversaw large-scale government procurement, internal governance, integrity and corporate assurance in his role, has since pleaded guilty to 564 charges of corruption and money laundering and will be sentenced in the Supreme Court.

The CCC says red flags relating to Whyte’s lifestyle and finances already abounded included expensive property, interests in 87 racehorses, heavy gambling and mystery payments to his bank accounts. Since 2009 Whyte had been using his corporate credit card to transfer $50,000 a month. Subsequent surveillance found he was personally authorising pament of false invoices to the value of $100,000 a month to a number of shell companies.

Two Mosman Park properties worth $4.26 million have been confiscated, as well as Whyte’s interest in a government superannuation fund of $1.4 million, with taxes and fees to be deducted from that amount. Whyte’s interest in his father’s deceased estate — which includes a Scarborough property — and “other monies arising from his interest in horses” have also been confiscated. Mr Whyte and Mr Anthonisz were heavily-invested in the Australian horseracing industry, resulting in 100-plus thoroughbreds being included in asset freezing orders.
https://www.ccc.wa.gov.au/system/files/2021-11/Media%20release%20-%20How%20the%20CCC%20exposed%20the%20corrupt%20activities%20of%20Paul%20Whyte.pdf

Paul Whyte’s brother has also been charged with money laundering.
https://www.watoday.com.au/national/western-australia/wa-bureaucrat-paul-whyte-s-brother-charged-with-money-laundering-as-probe-uncovers-more-alleged-corruption-20201202-p56jyj.html

Paul Whyte’s partner Christine Seiver, convicted fraudster Craig Dale, and co-accused Jacob Daniel Anthonisz, shareholders in company. (paywalled)
https://thewest.com.au/news/court-justice/corruption-accuseds-paul-whytes-partner-christine-seiver-convicted-fraudster-craig-dale-and-co-accused-jacob-daniel-anthonisz-shareholders-in-company-ng-b881384019z

His co-accused is Jacob Daniel Anthonisz, a 43-year-old physiotherapist, who has also been charged with two counts of official corruption.
https://www.watoday.com.au/national/western-australia/the-syndicate-the-public-servant-the-conman-and-a-racehorse-called-hysteria-20191116-p53b72.html

ResearcherZero • October 5, 2022 3:05 AM

@Bruce

Australian spies are also disposable, and as I found out, quite a few civilians also. Clearly none of them were diplomatic staff, so I can only reason they were targeted as a means of intimidation.

I can say that burying friends, colleagues and relatives in the cold hard ground did not impress me too much, and that probably should have also raised a few ‘red flags’.

ResearcherZero • October 5, 2022 3:23 AM

@Bruce

Microwave weapons could be one reason they don’t want talk about ‘Havana Syndrome’…

https://www.forbes.com/sites/davidhambling/2020/10/20/the-microwave-weapons-that-could-explain-why-havana-syndrome-report-is-not-being-released/

…but more than likely it was all the corruption and murder that went along with it, and that it was also clearly understood what was happening and who was responsible by the late 1980’s.

And thanks to this program…
https://thebrushpass.projectbrazen.com/coldwarbuggingsovietunion/

…and a number of other programs including targeted collection, confirming who authorized the targeting of civilians and their families was not that difficult.

ResearcherZero • October 5, 2022 5:01 AM

@Bruce

Paul Whyte and his partner were providing medical records to the Russian operatives.

Similarly these two also intended to provide medical information to Russia…

“Two physicians — including a U.S. Army major — were indicted on federal charges amid accusations that they passed along confidential medical information to a person they thought was working for the Russian government.”

Thinking they were talking to a Russian operative, the doctors met the undercover agent at hotels in Baltimore and Gaithersburg to demonstrate “their willingness to provide” confidential medical records and show “the potential for the Russian government to gain insights into the medical conditions of individuals associated with the United States government and military in order to exploit this information.”

Federal authorities described Henry as a major in the U.S. Army with secret-level security clearance. During the time of the alleged conspiracy, Henry worked as a staff internist stationed at Fort Bragg, the home of the Army’s XVIII Airborne Corps, headquarters of the U.S. Army Special Operations Command and the Womack Army Medical Center.

Authorities described Gabrielian as an anesthesiologist at an unnamed “medical institution” in Baltimore. Online records for Johns Hopkins Medicine list Gabrielian as an instructor of anesthesiology and critical care medicine.

“Gabrielian told the [undercover agent] she was motivated by patriotism toward Russia to provide any assistance she could to Russia, even if it meant being fired or going to jail.”
https://www.washingtonpost.com/dc-md-va/2022/09/29/maryland-spy-couple-russia-leak/

AL • October 5, 2022 11:20 AM

Former judge Andrew Napolitano defends Edward Snowden
https://www.creators.com/read/judge-napolitano/09/22/an-american-in-moscow

When Snowden began his work at the CIA and the NSA, he took two oaths. The first was to keep secret whatever his bosses told him was secret. …
The second oath that Snowden took was to preserve, protect and defend the Constitution. …

What to do when one’s sworn legal obligations clash? How can one comply with two oaths when they fundamentally conflict with each other? Which is the greater and higher oath — the one to politicians and spies or the one to constitutional ideals?

jimbo • October 5, 2022 10:30 PM

Mr. Dalke has no case for entrapment. He was legally required to report any contact with a foreign agent or suspected one. When contacted by an FBI agent claiming to be a foreign agent he was obligated to report this and instead tried to sell classified informantion. He illegally increased his access for the sole purpose of stealing secrets.

ResearcherZero • October 6, 2022 3:35 AM

In 1990’s a group of American nationals traveled to Australia and met with the Russian operatives. The group included Harriet Hageman, Sydney Powell, Steve Bannon and other associates. Hageman was very candid about why they were meeting when she was interviewed. Hageman was the fiercest and most effective opponent of the Clinton roadless forest rule. From 2001 to 2003, she worked for Wyoming’s government as an outside counsel shaping the state’s lawsuit against the roadless rule.

Their ideological differences with members of the Democratic Party, along with personal grievances against the Clintons and other political identities, were identified as a potential area for clandestine influence by Russia.

More recently they have continued influence operations via targeting organizations such as the NRA.
https://www.mcclatchydc.com/news/nation-world/national/article195231139.html

“we should let them express their gratitude now, we will put pressure on them quietly later”
https://www.npr.org/2018/12/13/676406084/maria-butina-guilty-in-foreign-agent-case-admits-clandestine-influence-scheme

Potential common recruitment points would be many. Observation has been taking place for a long time.

Clive Robinson • October 6, 2022 7:46 AM

@ jimbo, ALL,

Re : legal process

You say,

blockquote>”Mr. Dalke has no case for entrapment.

You then go on with three statments,

1, “He was legally required to report any contact with a foreign agent or suspected one.”

2, “When contacted by an FBI agent claiming to be a foreign agent he was obligated to report this and instead tried to sell classified informantion.”

3, “He illegally increased his access for the sole purpose of stealing secrets.”

These are at best assumptions made by you only some of which can be bassed on an affidavit for an arrest warrent made by a Federal Agency with a very notable reputation for providing such full of lies and half truths to courts.

Further Mr Dalke, has not made a public statment nor is in a position to do so or in any way to drfend himself. Also I doubt that his legal advisor when he gets a competent one will either, beyond the usuall No comment because…” or “My client denies…” etc.

One of the most significant failings of the US Criminal Justice process is that the LEO’s and Prosecutors are alowed to “Run their Mouths Off in Public without restraint”, with no recourse possible from the defendant or their representative.

It’s why other countries do not alow such behaviour as it’s totally prejudicial and unjust.

Because basically it means the agencie and prosecutors can sow not just doubt, but false facts, and outright lies, into the public mind creating a cognative bias ratchet against the defendant. They do this quite deliberately knowing full well that their stayments will be heard by any future jury members thus pre-prejudice any trial into the prosecutions favour, so the “presumption of innocence” is destroyed.

Just as they apparently have done with you, from your statments and the tone they are set in.

Nick Levinson • October 7, 2022 8:47 PM

Pretty much anyone old enough to be hired by the NSA is supposed to know not to sell secrets to the Russians even if the NSA hadn’t mentioned it yet, so it doesn’t matter if an FBI undercover agent planted the entire idea and not just part of it. The plantee is supposed to know to refuse or ignore the idea.

Some laws don’t fall under that umbrella. For some laws, notice of what constitutes a violation must be provided in advance. But failure to give you that notice of the law before you undertake a murder is no defense and I’ve never heard of anyone raising that as a defense (like, “gee, my Mafia boss never told me, but, thanks, copper, I won’t do it again”). A pet dog gets one free bite. A murderer does not get one free murder.

Entrapment (including @jimbo & @Clive Robinson) in the U.S. likely requires evidence that the person who allegedly was entrapped knew or reasonably believed that the alleged entrapper was a law enforcement officer. Otherwise, no plainclothes, undercover, or informant case could go forward. If a uniformed police officer, whom you see, silently concerned that a building behind you is about to collapse and launch bricks in all directions, tells you to run across the street and then another police officer tickets you for doing so, that’s entrapment.

Nick Levinson • October 7, 2022 8:55 PM

@Steve & @Wannabe techguy:

The press in the U.S., although those two may not have been in the U.S. when they published, operates under legal and political protection that differentiates publication with general availability that is not against the national interest from covert dissemination to an enemy agent that is against the national interest, a differentiation that does not exempt all secrets, such as friendly troop locations in a theater of battle, as many journalists recognize and will say.

Jimbo • October 11, 2022 9:36 PM

Clive
“These are at best assumptions made by you only some of which can be bassed on an affidavit for an arrest warrent made by a Federal Agency with a very notable reputation for providing such full of lies and half truths to courts.”

Having had a security clearance in both the military and industry for over a decade my statements are not assumptions but legal requirments plainly stated in documents I signed.

Clive Robinson • October 12, 2022 2:49 AM

@ Jimbo,

“Having had a security clearance in both the military and industry for over a decade my statements are not assumptions…”

If you actially have had the clearance and also belive that, then heaven help anyone who comes into contact with you.

As I originally said,

“You say,
”Mr. Dalke has no case for entrapment”.

You then go on with three statments,”

Which I detailed, then said,

“These are at best assumptions made by you only some of which can be bassed on an affidavit for an arrest warrent made by a Federal Agency with a very notable reputation for providing such full of lies and half truths to courts.””

Your unsubstantiated claims, without knowledge, do not change this in anyway.

You have “pre-judged” a person without evidence based solely on a fabricated presentation by a “bonus driven” thus “biased” individual working in a Federal Agency known for such behaviours.

The fact you appear to claim to also follow such behaviours and believe they excuse any kind of perjury must make people wonder about which bit of the “Guard Labour” you are an “Authoritarian follower” for, and how best to avoid them because as has been oft observed,

“Where there is one rotten apple, the rest of the barrel is sure to follow.”

If you think I’m being unkind to you please remember two things,

1, I am judging you solely on your written words you freely chose to write.
2, You still have the right of reply.

Which makes you quite unlike Mr Dalke who’s right to be “presumed innocent” you chose to trash with a bunch of assumptions based on at best a questionable affidavit from a federal agency with a reputation for such documents.

One thing you should remember history shows us that those that follow the “might is right” argument eventually end up on the wrong end of the stick as a larger “might” arises. Dictators, Tyrants, and their Empires all fall, and those that were their authoritarian followers, one way or another frequently did not survive the fall. Not learning from history as the wheel goes around is not a survival trait.

Jonah sneedstein • October 12, 2022 7:46 AM

>>>>>REPLY TO – wiredog • October 4, 2022 7:50 AM

The problem with vetting in the post Snowden era is that he didn’t raise any red flags. He saw himself as a patriot who was doing the right thing. You can’t really screen for that.

It’s really messed up the whole clearance process.

>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>

Maybe the US goverment should stop trusting every fool, who got is clearance from a Military service. Giving someone access to even some or little. Is a big issue. If no real person really sign on them

ResearcherZero • October 13, 2022 2:48 AM

“In the field of legislation and law enforcement, attention should turn to the issue of agents of influence, and confidential contacts in particular.”

Active Measures: Agent-operational measures aimed at exerting useful influence on a wide variety of subjects in the political life of the target country.

Agent of Influence: An agent operating under intelligence instructions who uses his official or public position, and other means, to exert influence on policy, public opinion, the course of particular events, the activity of political organizations, and state agencies in target countries.

Confidential Contacts: Individuals of foreign nationality who, without being agents, communicate to intelligence officers information of interest to them and carry out confidential requests.

Russia’s Intelligence Services (RIS) are a key instrument in the country’s toolbox of hostile influence exerted abroad. As such, they are no mere ad hoc arrangement by some spy chief, nor a paranoid delusion of the West, but rather an integral function in accordance with Russian legislation and based on a long tradition. Indeed, their activities have extended far beyond information-gathering for the purpose of Russia’s decision-making.
https://www.hybridcoe.fi/wp-content/uploads/2020/07/Strategic-analysis-7-April.pdf

Sergey Naryshkin, the director of Russia’s Foreign Intelligence Service, is convinced that the current era will see a boom in the recruitment of Westerners to serve Russia’s Foreign Intelligence Service.
https://www.memri.org/reports/russian-foreign-intelligence-head-naryshkin-believes-thoughtful-westerners-disgusted

“We can do nothing about KGB agents stationed beyond our border. But we can prevent their colleagues from coming into our own homes to hang us, our spouses and our children with our own cords.”
https://www.cia.gov/readingroom/docs/CIA-RDP90-00552R000100170046-4.pdf

Schneier on Security

NSA Employee Charged with Espionage

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