Quick Take // By Ben FrankelSnowden fallout: Revelations forced U.K. to pull out agents from “hostile countries”
The British security services had to pull out agents from “hostile countries” as a result of information the Chinese and Russian intelligence services obtained when they gained access to the millions of top-secret NSA files Edward Snowed was carrying with him when he fled to Honk Kong and then to Russia. Snowden assured journalists who interviewed him that the Chinese and Russian intelligence services would not be able to access these files because he encrypted them with the highest encryption methods available. Security experts commented that he was either naïve or disingenuous – because he must have known, or should have known, that the cyber capabilities these two countries would make it relatively easy for them to crack the encrypted files he was carrying with him. We now know that these security experts were right.
The British security services had to pull out agents from “hostile countries” as a result of information the Chinese and Russian intelligence services obtained when they gained access to the millions of top-secret NSA files Edward Snowden was carrying with him when he fled in 2013 to Honk Kong and then to Russia.
When Edward Sonwden decided to flee the United States and go to Honk Kong, he was carrying 1.7 million top-secret NSA files on the hard drive of his lap top and several USB drives. He assured journalists who interviewed him that the Chinese and Russian intelligence services would not be able to access these files because he encrypted them with the highest encryption methods available.
Security experts commented at the time that he was either naïve or disingenuous – because he must have known, or should have known, that the cyber capabilities these two countries would make it relatively easy for them to crack the encrypted files he was carrying with him.
We now know that these security experts were right. The Sunday Times quotes anonymous senior officials in No 10 Downing Street, the U.K. Home Office, and the British security services who said that British secret agents had to be moved out of several countries because Russia gained access to classified information contained in files Snowden was carrying with him, information which reveals how these agents operate.
Other high-level sources, talking with the BBC, confirmed the Sunday Times’s story.
The Sunday Times and BBC do not say where China or Russia gained access to the files.
The Guardian reports that the British government and intelligence agencies in the United Kingdom and the United States issued warnings as far back as eighteen months ago that the Snowden disclosures had helped terrorists, costing GCHQ, the U.K.’s main surveillance agency, up to 30 percent of its capabilities and that agents had had to be moved.
The New York Times notes that the assessments of the damage Snowden has done to the ability of the United States and the United Kingdom to gather information about terror groups, and about adversaries such as Russia and China, are echoed in the Sunday Times. The paper quoted a source saying: “Agents have had to be moved and that knowledge of how we operate has stopped us getting vital information.”
