September 30th, 2008
Top Secret MI6 Info Shows Up on Camera Sold on eBay
By Michael Santo
Editor-in-Chief, RealTechNews
While it’s surprising that secret MI6 (AKA SIS) documents should show up in something sold on eBay, it shouldn’t be that surprising. After all, personal banking information showed up on a hard drive sold on eBay, and so did Democratic party data, on a different hard drive.
But a camera?
According to The Sun, an unidentified 28-year-old resident of Hertfordshire, U.K. bought a Nikon Coolpix camera on eBay for a mere £17 (or a little over $30), only to find it contained:
- A document marked “top secret” that detailed an MI6 encrypted computer system
- Pictures of rocket launchers and missiles
- A hand-drawn graphic revealing links between active al-Qaeda cells, including names and occupations of suspected terrorists
- Information about Abdul al-Hadi al-Iraqi, one of al-Qaeda’s highest-ranking lieutenants, who was captured by the CIA in 2007 and is currently being held at Gitmo.
Poor guy. He did the right thing and went to the police with the information. They apparently didn’t take him seriously — at first. Then Special Branch descended on his home, taking the camera and his PC — but giving him £1,000 (about $1,800) in exchange.
Terrorism author Neil Doyle said:
“These are MI6 documents relating to an operation against al-Qaeda insurgents in Iraq. It’s jaw-dropping they got into the public domain.
Not only do they divulge secrets about operations, operating systems and previously unheard-of MI6 departments, but they could put lives at risk.”
Problem with all of this: it’s all about the human factor. Obviously someone screwed up. But as long as we have humans involved in any activity, it’s going to happen occasionally. On the other hand it seems to happen all too often, doesn’t it?
LZW says:
This shows a real failure in the European Union… Their money might be worth more than our American money but they have stuck to being a trade union.
The camera was likely sold off as surplus government junk along with crates full of other junk, happens in America all the time… The difference is, things like hard drives and flash memory are physically removed and destroyed (with drill/hammers/etc..)
Sounds like these pictures were not even erased, much less destroyed… Even if Europe has a lax data security policy, it must have been completely ignored in this case.
Where America always screws up is they give all their government employee’s notebook computers which the employee’s always allow to be stolen. (a gold mine for identity theft criminals)
I guess the point I’m trying to make is…
If Europe has pics of your secret missiles, they aint safe!
If America has your ID on file, it aint safe!
September 30th, 2008 at 5:16 pm
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October 10th, 2008 at 5:53 am