WASHINGTON (AP) — A former government space scientist was sentenced Wednesday to 13 years in prison after admitting he tried to sell space and defense secrets to Israel in what turned out to be an FBI sting operation.
Appearing in federal court in a prison jumpsuit, Stewart Nozette said he is “paying for a fatal lack of judgment.”
“I accept full responsibility,” Nozette told U.S. District Judge Paul Friedman.
Prosecutors and Nozette’s lawyers agreed to the 13-year sentence, with credit for the two years that Nozette has spent behind bars since his arrest.
Nozette had high-level security clearances during decades of government work on science and space projects at NASA, the Energy Department and the National Space Council in President George H.W. Bush’s administration.
Nozette pleaded guilty to one count of attempted espionage, admitting he tried to provide Israel with top secret information about satellites, early warning systems, methods for retaliating against large-scale attack, communications intelligence information and major elements of defense strategy.
In court, prosecutors played a videotape of Nozette telling an FBI undercover agent posing as an Israeli spy that “I’ve sort of crossed the Rubicon,” or passed a point of no return. On the video, Nozette said he would charge Israel “at most 1 percent” for passing information about an unspecified program that Nozette said cost the U.S. government $200 million.
Nozette, 54, was a “traitor” who engaged in attempted espionage with “unbridled enthusiasm,” Assistant U.S. Attorney Anthony Asuncion told the judge.
At the time of Nozette’s arrest for attempted espionage in 2009, he was awaiting sentencing on fraud and tax evasion charges.
On Wednesday, the judge sentenced him to 37 months on those charges, to be served concurrently with the sentence in the espionage case.
Nozette was known primarily as a defense technologist who had worked on the Reagan-era missile defense shield effort, nicknamed “Star Wars” and formally called the Strategic Defense Initiative.
As a leading scientist at the Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory in the 1990s, Nozette came up with the concept behind the Clementine space mission, which ultimately discovered ice on the moon, according to the sentencing memo in the espionage case by Nozette’s legal team.
One of Nozette’s lawyers, Bradford Berenson, called the espionage case “vindictive” and an illustration of “overreaching government conduct” at a time when Nozette was already enmeshed in the tax and fraud case.
The government suspected Nozette might be interested in spying after a search of his Chevy Chase, Md., home in February 2007 in the tax and fraud probe.
Nozette ran a nonprofit corporation called the Alliance for Competitive Technology that had several agreements to develop advanced technology for the U.S. government. But he was overstating his costs for reimbursement and failing to report the income on his tax returns. Berenson called that case “relatively minor” and a violation that “a lot of small businesses engage in.”
The search of his home turned up classified documents, though Nozette’s lawyers said in his defense Wednesday that they were not marked as such. Nozette was not allowed to have unsecured classified documents in his home.
Agents also discovered Nozette sent an email in 2002 threatening to sell information about a classified program he was working on to Israel or another country. The FBI decided to conduct an undercover operation to see how serious he was.
The attempted selling of secrets “never would have happened but for the tax and fraud case,” said Berenson.
“This was functional entrapment,” said Berenson. Entrapment is a defense to criminal charges when it is established that the agent originated the idea of the crime and induced the accused to engage in it.
Nozette also was ordered to pay $217,800 in restitution for fraudulent claims he made to the U.S. Naval Research Laboratory in Washington, D.C., the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency in Arlington, Va., and NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center in Greenbelt, Md.
America’s favorite spy movies often employ futuristic gadgets and high-tech devices to wow viewers, but according to a former officer in the CIA, technology may have some burdening effects on espionage.
Robert Grenier served 27 years in the CIA, formerly working as a station chief in Islamabad, a CIA representative to the White House, and most recently the head of the Counterterrorism Center. He spoke Wednesday night in Mitchell Hall as part of the Global Agenda speaker series “Spies, Lies and Sneaky Guys: Espionage and Intelligence in the Digital Age.”
Grenier said the title of the Global Agenda series struck him, having worked in the CIA Clandestine Service, donning numerous aliases to hide his true identity as he gathered intelligence from around the world.
He said the roles officers of the Clandestine Service have to undertake involve lying and cheating as well as misrepresenting oneself, essentially “everything your parents told you not to do.”
While he acknowledged these qualities could place the officers in the role of “sneaky guys,” he said most officers take morality very seriously and said the job requirements often help the officers be more moral since they are ultimately utilized to protect American citizens.
Grenier said questions have arisen with the recent boom in technology about whether human espionage should still be employed for intelligence gathering. He said the human element could not be lost, even with advancing electronic intelligence.
“At the end of the day, it is people who make decisions,” Grenier said.
But there may be legitimate concerns about challenges technology poses for the practice of espionage. When he began his career in Clandestine Service, Grenier said an identity could be created with very little concern ones cover would be blown by a suspicious individual. Nowadays, Grenier said just about anyone can do a background check and possibly discover holes in one’s alias.
Grenier said he came to realize the practice of espionage would have to change when he received a standard form letter at a hotel overseas, while undercover, thanking him for visiting again. When he realized electronic records now tracked where he had been for certain date ranges, he said he knew the practice of espionage was going to have to change.
“It was like the future in a flash that opened up before my eyes,” Grenier said.
A challenge has also arisen in the form of “information overload,” and Grenier said analysts are now faced with having to prioritize which individuals they monitor and which ones they do not.
Grenier said this problem materialized with the “underwear bomber” incident of late 2009, in which a man tried to blow up a plane approaching Detroit. Though the agency received information the man posed a threat, they did not act upon it due to the abundance of other intelligence. In hindsight in this case, Grenier said one could argue the intelligence was not prioritized appropriately, but the event, regardless, was a consequence of having more electronic intelligence than human analysts.
Even with the challenges, Grenier said the technology still presents many advantages, including greater ease in identifying targets for intelligence information. He recounted an experience in North Africa where he needed to gain information about radical leftist student leaders, and he said he did so by picking up hitchhikers and asking if they knew anything about the group.
“This was really primitive, and this was difficult, and it was not at all efficient,” Grenier said.
In modern espionage, Grenier said the people of interest could have been located first by technology, and then the officers on the ground could have formed the intelligence relationships necessary.
And the amplification of communications technology may also be a blessing for the agency, including its ability to use “open source” intelligence information from the same social networks and websites average citizens use every day.
Grenier said he experienced some bad events during his time in the CIA, but never had a bad day at work. He said if he could do it all over again, he would still join the CIA, finding the profession somewhat irresistible.
“There is a seduction in the work,” Grenier said.
China’s reputation for cyber-espionage has cost the country’s largest network equipment manufacturer a shot at billions of dollars in infrastructure sales to Australia. The Australian government has moved to block Huawei from bidding on Australia’s approximately $36 billion-dollar National Broadband Network project.
The decision by Australia’s attorney general, reported March 26, was based on concerns raised by the Australian Security Intelligence Organization over the number of cyberattacks coming out of China, and that the company’s equipment would provide the Chinese government backdoors into the network.
“The National Broadband Network is the largest nation-building project in Australian history,” a spokesperson for Australian Attorney General Nicola Roxon said in a statement, “and it will become the backbone of Australia’s information infrastructure. As such, and as a strategic and significant government investment, we have a responsibility to do our utmost to protect its integrity and that of the information carried on it.”
The Australian government has cause for concern. In 2011, the computers of Australian Prime Minister Julia Gillard and then-Foreign Minister Kevin Rudd were reportedly hacked by Chinese intelligence agents. And the US defense and intelligence community have continued to warn about China’s involvement in industrial espionage.
Huawei has been alleged to have benefitted from that espionage in past: Cisco accused the company of stealing technology from Cisco, but dropped its legal claims in 2004 after Huawei stopped producing a contested product. And the US Department of Defense expressed concerns about Huawei in a 2011 report to Congress (PDF) on Chinese military and security issues, because of the company’s close ties to the People’s Liberation Army.
Those connections haven’t stopped Huawei from selling network gear elsewhere. The company has won a number of large network infrastructure supply contracts in Europe, including equipment for the deployment of LTE wireless in the UK. And Huawei has been hoping to replicate that success in Australia by bringing in local political muscle: the board of the company’s Australian subsidiary is stacked with former government officials, and chaired by the former commander of the Australian Navy, retired Rear Admiral General John Lord. The company also sponsored trips to China for members of the leadership of Australia’s Liberal Party. In fact, it was believed that Huawei was the internal favorite after the technical team for the NBN visited the company’s headquarters in Shenzen in 2010.
So the announcement has come as something of a shock to the company’s Australian executives. “This sort of whole concept of Huawei being involved in cyber warfare, presumably that would just be based on the fact that the company comes from China and everybody in China is—who’s involved with information technology is involved in cyber warfare,” said Alexander Downer, an independent director of Huawei Australia and a former Australian foreign affairs minister, told reporters for an Australian TV network. “This is just completely absurd.”
Britain is to allow one of its intelligence agencies to monitor all phone calls, texts, emails and online activities in the country to help tackle crime and militant attacks, the Interior Ministry says.
“It is vital that police and security services are able to obtain communications data in certain circumstances to investigate serious crime and terrorism and to protect the public,” a Home Office spokesman said.
The proposed law has already drawn strong criticism, from within the ruling Conservative Party’s own ranks, as an invasion of privacy and personal rights.
“What the government hasn’t explained is precisely why they intend to eavesdrop on all of us without even going to a judge for a warrant, which is what always used to happen,” Member of Parliament David Davis told BBC News.
“It is an unnecessary extension of the ability of the state to snoop on ordinary people,” he said.
New legislation is expected to be announced in the legislative agenda-setting speech given by the Queen in May.
Currently, British agencies can monitor calls and e-mails of specific individuals who may be under investigation after obtaining ministerial approval, but expanding that to all citizens is certain to enrage civil liberties campaigners.
Internet companies would be required to instal hardware which would allow the Government Communications Headquarters (GCHQ), referred to as Britain’s electronic ‘listening’ agency, to gain real-time access to communications data.
The new law would not allow GCHQ to access the content of emails, calls or messages without a warrant, but it would allow it to trace who an individual or group was in contact with, how frequently they communicated and for how long.
The Sunday Times newspaper, which first reported the story, said some details of the proposals were given to members of Britain’s Internet Service Providers’ Association last month.
“As set out in the Strategic Defence and Security Review we will legislate as soon as parliamentary time allows to ensure that the use of communications data is compatible with the government’s approach to civil liberties,” the Home Office spokesman said.
Any proposed legislation changes are likely to face stiff opposition in both houses of the British Parliament.
A similar proposal was considered by the then-ruling Labour party in 2006 but was abandoned in the face of fierce opposition by the Conservatives and Liberal Democrats, who are junior partners in the ruling coalition.
The proposed legislation could reflect the US Patriot Act, controversially introduced six weeks after September 11 in 2001, to expand the government’s authority to monitor the communications activity of its citizens.
The plan, the official said, was developed in response to a classified study completed last year by the director of national intelligence that concluded that the military’s espionage efforts needed to be more focused on major targets beyond the tactical considerations of Iraq and Afghanistan.
The new service will seek to “make sure officers are in the right locations to pursue those requirements,” said the official, who spoke on the condition of anonymity to describe the “realignment” of the military’s classified human espionage efforts.
The official declined to provide details on where such shifts might occur, but the nation’s most pressing intelligence priorities in recent years have included counterÂterrorism, nonproliferation and ascendant powers such as China.
Creation of the new service also coincides with the appointment of a number of senior officials at the Pentagon who have extensive backgrounds in intelligence and firm opinions on where the military’s spying programs — often seen as lackluster by CIA insiders — have gone wrong.
Defense Secretary Leon E. Panetta, who signed off on the newly created service last week, served as CIA director at a time when the agency relied extensively on military hardware, including armed drones, in its fight against al-Qaeda.
Michael Vickers, the undersecretary of defense for intelligence and the main force behind the changes, is best known as one of the architects of the CIA’s program to arm Islamist militants to oust the Soviets from Afghanistan in the 1980s. He is also a former member of U.S. Special Operations forces.
The realignment is expected to affect several hundred military operatives who already work in spying assignments abroad, mostly as case officers for the Defense Intelligence Agency (DIA), which serves as the Pentagon’s main source of human intelligence and analysis.
The official said the new service is expected to grow “from several hundred to several more hundred” operatives in the coming years. Despite the potentially provocative name for the new service, the official played down concerns that the Pentagon was seeking to usurp the role of the CIA or its National Clandestine Service.
This “does not involve new manpower . . . does not involve new authorities,” the official said. Instead, the official said, the DIA is shifting its emphasis “as we look to come out of war zones and anticipate the requirements over the next several years.”
Congressional officials said they were seeking more details about the plan.