back to article Sysadmin jailed for a decade after slurping US military docs

A US Air Force contractor has been sentenced to 10 years in prison and three years of supervised release for stealing classified documents, in addition to conspiracy to commit naturalisation fraud. Christopher R. Glenn, 34, a South Florida resident, was sent down by District Judge Kenneth A. Marra, of the Southern District of …

  1. Destroy All Monsters Silver badge
    Big Brother

    Probably some bad things in there

    D. Information Paper on Qatar Key Issues

    E. Information Paper on Saudi Arabia Key Issues

    F. Information Paper on United Arab Emirates Key Issues

    G. Information Paper on Bahrain Key Issues

    The underbelly of the ISIS-finance hub? I would really like to see these...

    1. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      Re: Probably some bad things in there

      "The underbelly of the ISIS-finance hub? I would really like to see these..."

      Why? You hoping to get a job with ISIS as their financial advisor?

      1. Destroy All Monsters Silver badge
        Holmes

        Re: Probably some bad things in there

        Well, as interest is verboten, medieval-style (money has no price in Islam by decree, while the West tries to kill the price by printing money) there may not be much to do. One would have to expand into camel management and "interest-replacing-services".

      2. Anonymous Coward
        Anonymous Coward

        Re: Probably some bad things in there

        He already is with ISIS. Who do you think runs their web operations? He just wants to find out how much the CIA knows.

    2. Ian Michael Gumby
      Black Helicopters

      @ Destroy all Monsters... Re: Probably some bad things in there

      Can you say Honeypot?

      Iraqi?

      Want to be she's tied to Iran or Iranian interests?

  2. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    "Additionally, a Synclogy Network Attached Storage Device (SNASD) was also discovered. The SNASD contained all of the same classified documents which had been found on the DVD disc. The SNASD was encrypted."

    So, Synology's proprietary encryption found insecure ?? He should've used TrueCrypt ...

    1. Pascal Monett Silver badge

      Nothing in the article says that Synology's encryption was insecure. It just states that the disk was encrypted.

      Now, given the situation (post-Snowden the brass probably went ballistic), I'm pretty sure that disk was hustled to whatever NSA center they had available and decrypted in record time - National Security and all that - but that doesn't mean that the NSA didn't have to work at it a bit.

      1. Trevor_Pott Gold badge

        but that doesn't mean that the NSA didn't have to work at it a bit.

        Not nearly enough.

        If they were able to crack it at all then it was insecure.

  3. Trollslayer

    The American way?

    As typified by Oliver North. Smuggled cocaine into the US to finance a secret war and was treated as a hero.

    No wonder they have so many issues.

    1. Destroy All Monsters Silver badge
      Thumb Up

      Re: The American way?

      Later Ollie was embedded correspondent for operation Gulf War II. True story!

      Oliver North: amoral unkillable.

  4. Christoph

    "military operations in Central and South America and the Caribbean, in order to achieve "US national security objectives"."

    Gosh, I wonder why they don't like the Americans?

    1. This post has been deleted by its author

    2. Mark 85

      Nobody likes us. Hell, we don't even like ourselves. If we did, we wouldn't elect self-serving idiots or allow ourselves to be manipulated into societal warfare by the media*.

      *For a good example, look closely at who did the screaming about Ferguson and stirred that pot into what it became. Or for that matter, go back to the 60's and the anti-Vietnam war movement. We have a history of this type of thing.

  5. Elmer Phud

    But . . .

    "Glenn accessed a classified Department of Defence network without authorisation"

    And how did he manage that then?

    1. Mark 85

      Re: But . . .

      Government logic... "yes, we gave you the password and it's one of those areas you manage.. but you aren't supposed to look at anything".

  6. Henry Wertz 1 Gold badge

    Professional expectation

    "Government logic... "yes, we gave you the password and it's one of those areas you manage.. but you aren't supposed to look at anything"."

    Actually that's not some government-specific thing, as a professional I consider it to be a normal expectation to admin without looking through anything. When I was providing IT support a while ago for a business, I had the admin passwords for the PCs, I had the LogMeIn credentials, I had the admin password for the hosted E-Mail, and the admin password for the Carbonite backup. This means, yes, I *could* have remote desktop'ed in and snooped through documents *or* snooped via the Carbonite backup, and read through the E-Mail via the hosted E-Mail admin login. But, they wouldn't have expected their documents and E-Mail to be snooped on, and as a professional I didn't.

    This was of course a little more than glancing at something he wasn't supposed to, it sounds like he disabled an anti-copying system (will he be brought up on some dumb DMCA charge for defeating a copy-protection system?), and attempted to wipe logs indicating his actions.

    1. Robert Helpmann??
      Childcatcher

      Re: Professional expectation

      Government logic... yes, we gave you the password and it's one of those areas you manage.. but you aren't supposed to look at anything.

      I am not so sure about that. Those who have access to re-enable the ability to write to disk should not also have access to the documents of the nature Mr Glenn was attempting to steal. In environments such as this, administrative duties are supposed to be split between individuals and groups to prevent exactly this sort of thing.

      1. tom dial Silver badge

        Re: Professional expectation

        Division of responsibilities would be good practice, as the NSA discovered and I think corrected or is correcting. Those worthy of trust still will not perform unauthorized actions, as Mr. Glenn did, that go beyond what is necessary to perform their duties.

    2. Pascal Monett Silver badge

      Re: DMCA ?

      The military hardly needs to bring in copyright charges when they have the major charge of treason.

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