Defense lawyers for former CIA software engineer Joshua Adam Schulte say that the CIA and federal prosecutors do n’t in reality know for certain who was behind a 2017leak of cyber espionage documents , allow alone whether it was their client , theWall Street Journal reportedon Tuesday . Instead , they said he really pissed off the entire CIA , making him a natural scapegoat for their incompetency .
Wikileaks release the nearly9,000 pages of documentsin March 2017 , claiming they were from an “ isolated , high - security measures web situated inside the CIA’sCenter for Cyber Intelligencein Langley , Virgina [ sic ] . ” The material dealt with a issue of cyber tools the U.S. news community of interests had developed for espionage purposes , include waysto bypass encryption on Android and iOS twist to break out into Signal , WhatsApp , and Telegram messages ; a tool called Weeping Angel that turn Samsung TVs into hearing gadget ; and a “ reverse applied science environs created by the NSA ” called Ghidra . Further leaks , which WikiLeaks together with called Vault 7 , include document related to malware evolution and even hinting at inquiry into hacking smart railcar .
In April 2017 , surety firm Symantec lent credence to the authenticity of the documents by releasingevidence of Vault 7 toolsused in the wild by unknown wheeler dealer that fathom a lot like members of the U.S. intelligence community of interests . Australian surety researcher Wayne Ronaldson later said he used the documents as the foundation to buildhis own usage hacking shaft .
Photo: Andrew Harnik (AP)
consort to the Journal , Schulte ’s Department of Defense lawyer Sabrina Shroff had a simple explanation as to why her client is face Union prosecutors : Everyone else at the CIA hated him , make him an “ easy target . ” say Schulte had “ antagonize almost every undivided individual ” at the agency , she add “ was a difficult employee . But being a hard employee does not make you a criminal . ”
Union prosecutors allege that Schulte , raging over personal difference with other CIA co-worker and recently re - assigned to a job in another department , reinstated his own security credentialsin April 2016 to download the a backup written matter of the tools from a badly protect computer meshing . after that year , he leave the agency for a dissimilar job . When WikiLeaks start releasing the papers in March 2017 , prosecutors say , CIA staffers quickly identified him as a possible culprit .
Schulte is nowfacing 11 charge , seven of which are directly related to his say involvement in the escape , as well asunrelated child pornography chargesarising from over10,000 images and videosof child sex abuse authorities say they discovered on his estimator during a foray in March 2017 . ( Those charges have been separated into their own tryout . ) Prosecutors also say they have evidence Schulte tried tocommunicate with reportersfrom his jail cell , as well as access logs show he download the data and tried to enshroud up his engagement .
Schulte ’s defense team is instead debate that the connexion between Schulte and WikiLeaks is “ pure speculation ” and that the CIA ’s protect meshwork , DEVLAN , has nasty cybersecuritythat makes it out of the question to determine whether he was involved or it was some other intruder . Shroff tell in court on Tuesday that Schulte was a “ talented , hardworking employee ” who was “ a pain in the ass to everybody , ” accord to the Journal .
Assistant U.S. Attorney David Denton , the newspaper wrote , also characterized Schulte as a jerk . Denton said the former CIA staffer “ is not some kind of whistle blower ” but alternatively compromise interior security “ out of venom ” during a “ spiraling out of control , his pursuance for retaliation . ”
public prosecutor said they bear the trial to last about four hebdomad , according to Cyberscoop .
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