Federal contractor charged with leaking classified NSA information

An NSA workstation.
(Image credit: Paul J. Richards/Getty Images)

A federal contractor has been charged with leaking a classified National Security Agency document on Russian hacking before the 2016 presidential election to an online media outlet, the Department of Justice announced Monday.

Reality Leigh Winner, 25, of Pluribus International Corporation in Georgia, admitted to purposely leaking the information, prosecutors said, and she was arrested on June 3. "Releasing classified material without authorization threatens our nation's security and undermines public faith in government," Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein said in a statement Monday. "People who are trusted with classified information and pledge to protect it must be held accountable when they violate that obligation."

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Catherine Garcia, The Week US

Catherine Garcia is night editor for TheWeek.com. Her writing and reporting has appeared in Entertainment Weekly and EW.com, The New York Times, The Book of Jezebel, and other publications. A Southern California native, Catherine is a graduate of the University of Redlands and the Columbia University Graduate School of Journalism.