NSA Contractor With Top Secret Clearance Indicted For Stealing, Hoarding Classified Documents
What do you collect? Rare stamps? Falcons fans’ tears? How about classified national defense documents? Former National Security Agency (NSA) contractor Harold Thomas Martin III was recently indicted by a federal grand jury on the charge that he purposely collected classified information regarding national defense. He faces twenty criminal accounts, each punishable by up to 10 years in prison.
Rod J. Rosenstein, the United States attorney for Maryland, remarked, “The indictment alleges that for as long as two decades, Harold Martin flagrantly abused the trust placed in him by the government by stealing documents containing highly classified information.”
Martin spent over twenty years hoarding confidential documents at his home in Glen Burnie, Maryland. The FBI found fifty terabytes of electronic files in his home, shed, and car. One of the documents was even dated just a few days prior to his arrest. He was employed as a private contractor for at least seven different companies and several government agencies during a two-decade span. Martin was most recently employed at Booz Allen Hamilton Holding Corp until his arrest this past August. Booz Allen is also known for having employed Edward Snowden.
The indictment cataloged a long list of documents that Martin supposedly pilfered. These documents include information regarding counter-terrorism operations, foreign intelligence targets, satellite tracking, agencies’ daily operations, and many more documents from the NSA, U.S. Cyber Command, the CIA, and the National Reconnaissance Office. Martin may have also stolen 75 percent of the NSA’s access operations hacking tools. It is unclear what Martin did with or intended to do with all of these documents.
Booz Allen rakes in billions of dollars a year from contracts with American intelligence agencies. The company has since hired former FBI Director Robert Mueller to also lead a review of its management processes, practices and personnel. Representatives from the company have not yet commented on Martin’s indictment.
Editor's Note, 2/10/17: This article was updated to more accurately reflect the nature of Booz Allen's self-initiated review process.
Rod J. Rosenstein, the United States attorney for Maryland, remarked, “The indictment alleges that for as long as two decades, Harold Martin flagrantly abused the trust placed in him by the government by stealing documents containing highly classified information.”
Martin spent over twenty years hoarding confidential documents at his home in Glen Burnie, Maryland. The FBI found fifty terabytes of electronic files in his home, shed, and car. One of the documents was even dated just a few days prior to his arrest. He was employed as a private contractor for at least seven different companies and several government agencies during a two-decade span. Martin was most recently employed at Booz Allen Hamilton Holding Corp until his arrest this past August. Booz Allen is also known for having employed Edward Snowden.
The indictment cataloged a long list of documents that Martin supposedly pilfered. These documents include information regarding counter-terrorism operations, foreign intelligence targets, satellite tracking, agencies’ daily operations, and many more documents from the NSA, U.S. Cyber Command, the CIA, and the National Reconnaissance Office. Martin may have also stolen 75 percent of the NSA’s access operations hacking tools. It is unclear what Martin did with or intended to do with all of these documents.
Booz Allen rakes in billions of dollars a year from contracts with American intelligence agencies. The company has since hired former FBI Director Robert Mueller to also lead a review of its management processes, practices and personnel. Representatives from the company have not yet commented on Martin’s indictment.
Editor's Note, 2/10/17: This article was updated to more accurately reflect the nature of Booz Allen's self-initiated review process.
