(FreedomBeacon.com)- The Department of Justice has filed espionage charges against a former National Security Agency employee for allegedly attempting to sell confidential material to what seems to be Russia’s government.
Jareh Sebastian Dalke, a former NSA employee, was identified by the DOJ on Thursday. According to the charges, Dalke “used an encrypted email account to transmit excerpts of three classified documents he had obtained during his employment” between August and September 2022, but the recipient turned out to be an undercover FBI agent.
According to the prosecution, the FBI apprehended Dalke on Wednesday after he arrived at the designated location, claiming that Dalke “subsequently organized to deliver further secret information in his possession to the undercover FBI agent” in Denver.
From June 6 to July 1 of this year, Dalke worked as an information systems security designer at the NSA, where he was based at a location close to the capital. This summer, he announced his resignation and communicated with a secret agent.
Dalke stated his opinion that he was speaking with an individual linked with a particular foreign government, a country with many interests that are contrary to the United States,” according to the indictment.
The foreign country is clearly identified as Russia, yet the FBI special agent who wrote the document did not name it by name.
According to the indictment, Dalke sent two emails on August 23 and 24 asking the FBI’s online covert agent to take measures to ensure that the person he spoke with was actually a foreign government representative. Dalke allegedly said that in order to get a response, he had used “several published routes,” which “included submission to the SVR TOR site.”
The SVR, or Foreign Intelligence Service, is described as “the Russian government’s external intelligence service” in a footnote to the indictment. The internet user’s location is hidden via TOR, which stands for “The Onion Router.”
According to Dalke’s stated CV, “he has elementary competency in Russian and Spanish.”
According to the accusation, Dalke wanted confirmation that the undercover FBI agent was actually a representative of the “[Foreign Government-1] entity rather than Americans [sic] seeking to silence a patriot.”
The Espionage Act makes it illegal to transmit national defense information to a foreign country with the intent or reason to believe that information could be used against the United States. The statute carries a potential death penalty or a life sentence if convicted.
