October 5, 2016

The FBI Has Arrested an NSA Contractor for Allegedly Stealing Classified Material

He even worked at Edward Snowden’s old company.

Juliet Linderman/AP

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The FBI has arrested Harold Thomas Martin III, a contractor at the National Security Agency, for stealing “highly classified information,” according to a Department of Justice statement released on Wednesday.

News of an arrest was first reported by the New York Times, which wrote on Wednesday that an unnamed contractor “stole and disclosed highly classified computer codes developed to hack into the networks of foreign governments.” Martin was an employee of Booz Allen Hamilton, the consulting firm that also employed Edward Snowden while he was pilfering classified information from the NSA in 2013.

It’s not clear if the arrest and the alleged theft of code are linked to an incident in August when a hacking group called Shadow Brokers released a batch of what it said were NSA hacking tools designed to breach computer networks and firewalls. Cybersecurity experts said the tools were likely genuine but outdated. The group has tried to sell the tools for as much as $611 million but complained over the weekend that no buyers were interested.

The DOJ’s statement said Martin’s arrest took place at his home in Glen Burnie, Maryland, at the end of August, and that searches of Martin’s house and property turned up “six classified documents obtained from sensitive intelligence and produced by a government agency in 2014,” as well as other classified documents and more that $1,000 in government property. Martin faces up to one year in prison for taking the classified documents and up to 10 years for theft of government property.

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WHO DOESN’T LOVE A POSITIVE STORY—OR TWO?

“Great journalism really does make a difference in this world: it can even save kids.”

That’s what a civil rights lawyer wrote to Julia Lurie, the day after her major investigation into a psychiatric hospital chain that uses foster children as “cash cows” published, letting her know he was using her findings that same day in a hearing to keep a child out of one of the facilities we investigated.

That’s awesome. As is the fact that Julia, who spent a full year reporting this challenging story, promptly heard from a Senate committee that will use her work in their own investigation of Universal Health Services. There’s no doubt her revelations will continue to have a big impact in the months and years to come.

Like another story about Mother Jones’ real-world impact.

This one, a multiyear investigation, published in 2021, exposed conditions in sugar work camps in the Dominican Republic owned by Central Romana—the conglomerate behind brands like C&H and Domino, whose product ends up in our Hershey bars and other sweets. A year ago, the Biden administration banned sugar imports from Central Romana. And just recently, we learned of a previously undisclosed investigation from the Department of Homeland Security, looking into working conditions at Central Romana. How big of a deal is this?

“This could be the first time a corporation would be held criminally liable for forced labor in their own supply chains,” according to a retired special agent we talked to.

Wow.

And it is only because Mother Jones is funded primarily by donations from readers that we can mount ambitious, yearlong—or more—investigations like these two stories that are making waves.

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