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Exposing the corruption of privatised intelligence

The recent arrest of a Booz Allen Hamilton employee on charges of stealing top-secret hacking codes from the National Security Agency has cast more light on the vast privatization of US intelligence and the cozy relations between contractors and their government overseers.

As reported last week, Harold Thomas Martin III, a 51-year-old computing expert working for Booz Allen, was arrested on August 27 by the FBI after investigators searched his home in Glen Burnie, Maryland, and discovered a cache of classified material he had stolen. Martin was arrested three years after another Booz Allen contractor, Edward Snowden, leaked thousands of NSA documents revealing details of the agency’s massive global surveillance system.

“Booz has dropped the ball again,” a former Pentagon official who works on security issues and was briefed on the case, told me. “It’s long past time someone brought attention to this company. This is corporate malfeasance and a direct threat to national security.”

He said Martin’s offense—if proven—could be far more serious than Snowden’s, who was acting out of principle and sparked a public debate about government surveillance and the powers of the NSA. In contrast to Snowden, “this guy did not want to do the right thing,” the official said, taking offense at analysts who are calling Martin a “second Snowden.”

To continue reading, please refer to – https://www.thenation.com/article/a-new-spy-scandal-exposes-the-corruption-of-privatized-intelligence/