Information security

Anti-Intelligence


Binney’s analysis contradicted the conclusion of the CIA, the FBI, the NSA, and the Office of the Director of National Intelligence that Russia had hacked the Democratic National Committee’s emails during the 2016 presidential campaign. Instead Binney told Pompeo it was his view, based on a variety of technical factors, that a DNC insider leaked the data. If that conclusion were true, it would discredit the findings of the intelligence community and let the Russians—and Trump—off the hook.

Despite Binney’s reputation as a courageous whistleblower, however, his analysis was widely disputed and apparently changed few minds within the intelligence community—a fact made clear by Special Counsel Robert Mueller’s indictment, in February, of 13 Russians and three companies involved in the scandal. In the indictment, Mueller laid out a detailed picture of how the Russian government attempted, time and again, to influence the U.S. election, forcefully undermining Trump’s charge that the claims were a “hoax.”