Ex-Pentagon general target of leak investigation, sources say

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Ex-Pentagon general target of leak investigation, sources say


James Cartwright, a retired general and trusted member of President Barack Obama's national security team, has been informed that he's the target of a Justice Department criminal investigation into a leak about a covert cyberattack on Iran's nuclear program. NBCs Mike Isikoff reports.

By Michael Isikoff
National Investigative Correspondent, NBC News

Legal sources tell NBC News that the former second ranking officer in the U.S. military is now the target of a Justice Department investigation into a politically sensitive leak of classified information about a covert U.S. cyber attack on Iran's nuclear program.

According to legal sources, Retired Marine Gen. James "Hoss" Cartwright, the former vice chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, has received a target letter informing him that he's under investigation for allegedly leaking information about a massive attack using a computer virus named Stuxnet on Iran's nuclear facilities. Gen. Cartwright, 63, becomes the latest individual targeted over alleged leaks by the Obama administration, which has already prosecuted or charged eight individuals under the Espionage Act.

Last year, the New York Times reported that Cartwright, a four-star general who was vice chairman of the Joint Chiefs from 2007 to 2011, conceived and ran the cyber operation, called Olympic Games, under Presidents Bush and Obama. According to the front-page story by chief Washington correspondent David Sanger, President Obama ordered the cyber attacks sped up, and in 2010 an attack using the Stuxnet worm temporarily disabled 1,000 centrifuges that the Iranians were using to enrich uranium.

http://investigations.nbcnews.com/_news/2013/06/27/19174350-ex-pentagon-general-target-of-leak-investigation-sources-say?lite

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Blackout: Defense Department Blocks All Articles About NSA Leaks From 'Millions' of Computers


The Defense Department's news blackout affects millions of computers around the world.

By STEVEN NELSON
June 28, 2013

The Department of Defense is blocking online access to news reports about classified National Security Agency documents made public by Edward Snowden. The blackout affects all of the department's computers and is part of a department-wide directive.

"Any website that runs information that the Department of Defense still considers classified" is affected, Pentagon spokesman Lt. Col. Damien Pickart told U.S. News in a phone interview.

According to Pickart, news websites that re-report information first published by The Guardian or other primary sources are also affected.

[BROWSE: Editorial Cartoons About the NSA Surveillance Scandal]

"If that particular website runs an article that our filters determine has classified information... the particular content on that website will remain inaccessible," he said.

Pickart said the blackout affects "millions" of computers on "all Department of Defense networks and systems."

The spokesman told U.S. News that original reports about the leaks may be specifically targeted for the blackout. He admitted that "automated filters are never perfect," and some reports may slip through the cyber blockade.

Pickart declined to identify the source of the military-wide dictate.

"This is the same as what we did during the WikiLeaks situation," he said. Personal computers used by military employees aren't affected, Pickart said. One of the primary rationales for the blackout is money: "it's costly, it takes a lot of time" to scrub computers of unauthorized, classified material viewed by servicemen while reading online news reports, Pickart said.

"Should any website choose to post information the department deems classified, that particular content on the website will be filtered and remain inaccessible from DoD networks so long as it remains classified," Pickart reiterated in an emailed statement.

"The department does not determine what sites its personnel can choose to visit while on a DoD system, but instead relies on automated filters that restrict access based on content concerns or malware threats. The DoD is also not going to block websites from the American public in general, and to do so would violate our highest-held principle of upholding and defending the Constitution and respecting civil liberties and privacy."

The Monterey Herald reported Thursday that the Army was restricting access to The Guardian's website. A spokesman for the Army Network Enterprise Technology Command confirmed that the policy affected The Guardian, but the scope of the military's blackout wasn't immediately clear.

http://www.usnews.com/news/blogs/washington-whispers/2013/06/28/blackout-defense-department-blocks-all-articles-about-nsa-leaks-from-millions-of-computers

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US Army restricts access to Guardian website over secrets in NSA leak stories

Gordon Van Vleet, spokesman for the Army Network Enterprise Technology Command, or NETCOM, said in an email to the Monterey Herald that the Army is filtering "some access to press coverage and online content about the NSA leaks."

The spokesman said the procedure was routine part of "network hygiene" measures to prevent unauthorized disclosures of sensitive information.

"We make every effort to balance the need to preserve information access with operational security," he wrote, "however there are strict policies and directives in place regarding protecting and handling classified information."

"Until declassified by appropriate officials, classified information - including material released through an unauthorized disclosure - must be treated accordingly by DoD personnel," Van Vleet explained.

In a later phone conversation he clarified that the filtering was "Armywide" rather than restricted to some US Army facilities.

Van Vleet said NETCOM, which is part of the Army Cyber Command, does not determine what sites its personnel can have access to, but "relies on automated filters that restrict access based on content concerns or malware threats."

The Guardian's website has posted classified information regarding the NSA's surveillance activities, including PRISM, the massive domestic spying program that has Internet companies collude with military intelligence to keep tabs on Americans' online habits.

The source of the leaks is Edward Snowden, a former CIA employee and ex-staff member of a private contractor working for the NSA, who disclosed secret documents about US surveillance to several newspapers, including The Guardian.

The Herald inquired about the issue after staff at the Presidio of Monterey, a military installation in California, told the newspaper that they were able to access The Guardian's US site, www.guardiannews.com, but were prevented from accessing articles on the NSA that redirected to the British site.

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