WASHINGTON —It is possible that a significant leak of highly sensitive American documents that has rocked Washington and revealed fresh information about its intelligence gathering began in a chatroom on a social media site that is popular with gamers.
A discussion that was originally intended to cover a wide range of topics turned to the conflict in Ukraine while it was being held on the Discord platform, which supports live voice, video, and text chats. One chat participant claimed that an anonymous poster shared documents that were allegedly classified as part of discussions about Ukraine, first typing them out with the poster's own thoughts and then, as of a few months ago, starting to post images of papers with folds in them.
It is possible that a significant leak of extremely private American papers that shocked Washington and exposed new details about the country's intelligence gathering started in a chatroom on a social media platform popular with gamers.
On the Discord platform, which supports live voice, video, and text chats, a discussion that was initially intended to cover a wide range of topics turned to the conflict in Ukraine. One chatter claimed that an anonymous poster shared documents that were purportedly related to discussions about Ukraine, first typing them out with the poster's own thoughts and then starting to post images of folded documents a few months ago.
John Kirby, a spokesman for the National Security Council, responded when asked if the American government was in fact anticipating the release of more intelligence documents online: "The truth and the honest answer to your question is: We do not know." And should we be concerned about that? It is, and you are damn right.
Top Pentagon spokesperson Chris Meagher advised caution when "promoting or amplifying any of these documents," adding that "it does appear that slides have been doctored."
The breach, however, highlights the challenges that the US government and other governments face in protecting classified information. Experts and Congressional reviews have long raised concerns about U.S. counterintelligence flaws, the difficulties of keeping track of the 3 million or so people with security clearances, and the fact that government agencies produce and over classify information to the point where the U.S. cannot reliably control it.
Kellen Dwyer, a former Justice Department prosecutor who was a member of the team that brought a federal case against WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange, said, "I think that the intelligence agencies have adjusted and gotten better at preventing all sorts of mass electronic leaks." But obviously, they still need to improve.
A person who claimed to be a member of the Discord chat group where documents had been appearing for months was spoken to by the Associated Press. The person declined to give his name because he feared for his safety. The AP looked at pictures of documents that had recently surfaced in discussion forums, including a top-secret analysis of growing ties between Russian intelligence agencies and those in the United Arab Emirates, an oil-rich nation in the Persian Gulf that is home to a U.S. air base and works closely with Washington on many security issues. The claims, according to a spokesman for the Emirati government, are categorically false. Several agencies working with U.S. officials declined to comment on the document.
According to an analysis by the AP, the death of either Russian President Vladimir Putin or Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy could result in the start of a war between the two countries. The secret is the analysis's classification level, which is lower than top-secret.
Putin may authorize the use of tactical nuclear weapons if he dismisses his top military advisers and the conflict intensifies, if elites cast doubt on his judgment, and if Russian forces are unable to make up for manpower and equipment shortages.
In the worst case, Zelenskyy's passing might lead Europe to impose restrictions on weapon shipments, but a "high-profile Ukrainian leader" might continue to enjoy support from both domestic and foreign audiences. In the Discord chatroom "Thug Shaker Central," Bellingcat, an investigative journalism organization, spoke with the same person and two other people.
According to Bellingcat, documents from Thug Shaker Central appear to have been shared in the "WowMao" chat room. As a result, a story in Tha Breach was written about the documents. According to the Discord user who spoke to the AP under the condition of anonymity, his main reason for doing so was to defend the reputation of a third party who goes by the screenname "Lucca."
Many of the documents were featured in posts from Lucca that were widely shared on Twitter and other social media, and The New York Times, The Washington Post, and other media outlets covered the story.
The poster who spoke to the AP described Lucca as a kid who was posting documents to Thug Shaker Central to mess with people. He declined to identify the person who originally uploaded the documents or confirm if they worked for the U.S. government. He referred to the original uploader with a nickname, “the O.G.” The poster said the person who first posted the documents did not appear to be driven by ideology or to expose government secrets broadly, but rather to impress people in their group. If the person were arrested, the poster said he had copies of “way past hundreds” of pages of files. He wanted to protect fellow posters in the chat but also believed the documents contained secrets that Americans should know.