Vault 7 leak, the biggest data theft in CIA's history
A jury has found the Ex-CIA hacker guilty of leaking a set of critical intelligence tools of CIA to WikiLeaks around 2016.
The whistle-blowing platform Wikileaks published a series of reports on “Vault 7”, the CIA’s ‘zero-day’ covert hacking program in March 2017. The 2017 publication was a shocking revelation of how CIA used a cache of sophisticated software tools such as viruses, Trojans, and weaponized malware against Apple’s iPhone, Google’s Android, Microsoft’s Windows, and other US and EU-based company products to turn them into secret tapping devices. This is recorded as the single largest leak of classified documents in CIA’s history.
Read Wikileaks's 2017 publication on Vault 7 hacking tools here.
After a month-long jury trial in Manhattan federal court, Joshua is now facing decades behind
bars. Two years ago, an earlier trial
resulted in a hung jury as the previous jury failed to agree on count eight of
the 10 charges initially filed against Schulte. Schulte had been in confinement
since 2018 after his bail was revoked over pornography charges.
The US attorney for the Southern District of
New York Damian Williams said in a statement that Joshua’s case is one
of the most brazen and damaging acts of espionage in American history which
undermined US efforts to battle terrorist organization and other malign
influences around the world. According to him, the leak had a devastating
effect on the intelligence community. The data leaked could have fallen into the
hands of rival states, cyber mafia and even individual hackers who wish to do
any harm to US national security.
Schulte began working
for CIA as a software engineer in 2010 and climbed ranks to reach CIA’s highest
security clearance. At the time of the Wikileaks publication, he was involved
in designing a malware program for the agency to break into cell phones, smart TVs,
and computers, until he quit the agency in 2016 to work in the private sector. The
prosecutors alleged that the leak was motivated by a workplace dispute Schulte
had with another co-worker concerning one of his projects in which he failed to
meet deadlines. Schulte had been called names ‘Drifting Deadline’ among his
staff over his procrastinated
projects. Evidence of a restraining order Schulte had filed against the co-worker
was also brought in as evidence before the court. Schulte began to harbor resentment
toward the CIA after a new employee was hired to design a similar hacking tool to
the one he was building at the time when he was fired from the agency. He went on
to steal the agency’s classified software tools and source codes from two hacking programs he once had been given access to.
Schulte countered that
there is no evidence of revenge on his part and called the prosecution’s
version of the story a pure fantasy. Schulte’s position was that prosecution’s
case against him is riddled with reasonable doubt as many people had access to
the leaked hacking tools and anybody could have stolen them and passed to
Wikileaks. And he was being used as a scapegoat for CIA’s own embarrassing failings
to protect vital national security information. Throughout the trial, Schulte maintained
his innocence and described himself as a victim of political witch-hunt. “It was incredibly embarrassing for the
CIA. They did not know when their data was taken. They did not know how much of
their data was taken. They did not know how their data was taken. And they
certainly did not know who took their data. Nothing has changed to date, they
still don’t know what happened. Schulte said in his opening statements.
Schulte was prosecuted for 13 charges and he was convicted on eight espionage charges and one obstruction charge over obstructing a criminal investigation and grand jury proceeding. The charges included,
- theft of classified information from the CIA and transmission of that information to WikiLeaks
- unlawful disclosure and attempted disclosure of classified information from the MCC
- unauthorized accessing of CIA computer systems and theft of classified information and
- false statements made to the FBI.
Despite the conviction, Schulte’s
sentencing won’t be set until his trial for possession of child pornography is
over. He is facing separate child pornography charges after child
pornography materials were discovered inside his apartment at the time of his arrest in August
2017. Schulte has pleaded not guilty to these charges.
Schulte’s conviction
came at a time when the extradition of Wikileaks founder Julian Assange was approved
by UK Home secretary Priti Patel last month. Assange has appealed to the High Court of London against the UK government’s decision to extradite him and if his
application is refused Assange will be extradited to the US within 28 days.
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