CV

• Selected projects
• Lawsuits
• Articles (series)
  • CIA activities
    • CIA and illegality
    • CIA and inequality
    • CIA against transparency
      • CIA’s 60 year war with the Government Accountability Office
    • CIA retirees
    • Election interference
  • FBI activities
  • FOIA, leaks and oversight
  • Interagency conflict and cooperation
    • Alaskan Stay-Behind program
  • WikiLeaks
  • Other
    • “Church” of Scientology
    • Danny Casoloro, Inslaw and PROMIS
    • Government psychics and other X-Files
    • JFK assassination
    • Watergate
• Articles (individual)

Selected projects

• That 1 Archive (September 2015 – November 2017) – A transparency project focused on preserving historical records. Resulted in over 2 million uploads (20 TB of data) to the Internet Archive (~2.5% of the archive’s text items as of July 2023)
• Iran-Contra, October Surprise and Reagan’s Wrongs (2015 – 2021) – A look into the wrongdoings of the Reagan administration and campaign, including the October Surprise, Debategate, MCA Records, the Inslaw and Wedtech scandals and the Iran-Contra scandal, which has been called Reagan’s unchecked abuse of Presidential power.
• TIME Magazine Archive (2016) – Made over 3,400 issues of TIME Magazine publicly available, prior to TIME making the archive available without a subscription
• CIA’s Declassified Database (2016 – 2017) – Successfully helped pressure CIA into making their declassified database of over 900,000 documents (13 million pages) available online
• Scientology is Fair Game (2016 – 2018) – A project focused on the Church of Scientology’s “Fair Game” practice was a way of targeting its enemies, including ruining their reputation, attempting to have them committed to a mental facility, trying to drive them to suicide and infiltrating dozens of government agencies.
• The War on Oversight (2017) – A series of articles documenting the government’s too-often successful attempts to minimize, evade or even eliminate government oversight.
• Unearthing CREST: CIA’s Declassified Archives (2017 – 2019) – A deep dive into the depths of the Agency’s seven-decade history following the public release of 13 million pages of declassified CIA records.
• Declassifying CIA’s Internal Histories (2018 – Present) – A project to identify, declassify and publish internally produced history of CIA’s activities
• Distributed Denial of Secrets (2018 – Present) – A non-profit platform for publishing and archiving leaked data in the public interest
• Hacking History (2019 – Present) – A FOIA project with Emily Crose to publish government documents on the use and investigation of hacking and hackers
• Thus Spoke Guccifer 2.0 (2022) – The most complete public transcript of Guccifer 2.0’s public postings and private messages with WikiLeaks and others

Lawsuits

Radar Online LLC et al v FBI (1:17-cv-3842) – In 2017, I filed a successful FOIA lawsuit in junction with Radar Online (who paid the legal fees) against the FBI for records on the Church of Scientology.

Best v Department of Justice (1:19-cv-00256) – In 2019, I filed another successful FOIA lawsuit over the FBI’s records on the Church Committee and the Pike Committee, which were three times as large as the public reports.

Articles (series)

• CIA activities
  • Amid scandal, former CIA Director admitted that you can never really know what the CIA’s up to
  • What happens when the CIA shuts down a front organization?
  • The stolen history of the CIA and the Asian Foundation
  • The Asia Foundation’s public distancing of its relation with the CIA didn’t end Agency’s ties
  • Robert Blum, the spy who shaped the world (Part 1) (Part 2)
  • Explore the aftermath of the CIA’s infamous “Halloween Massacre”
  • Spymaster James Angleton pushed back against argument that the CIA used too many cryptonyms
  • James Angleton and the author of report that “debunked” his work agreed on one thing – the report was libel
  • Even mandatory retirement couldn’t stop spymaster James Angleton’s influence
  • The mystery of disgraced CIA spymaster James Angleton’s “retirement”
  • Former House Majority Leader worked with the CIA to use a Congressional investigation for propaganda – and it backfired
  • CIA considered working with the creator of “Dragnet” on a TV show about the CIA
  • The CIA forgot about a bunch of classified documents stashed in the Rockefellers’ barn
  • The CIA’s plan under Reagan: more covert action, more excessive secrecy
  • Manual on protesting CIA drew the Agency’s ire
  • The CIA’s emergency Cold War cash reserves
  • Culprit behind 2014 CIA hack turned out to be … the CIA
  • CIA and illegality
    • The Justice Department refused to prosecute CIA for illegal surveillance
    • Dissecting the CIA’s lies regarding MKULTRA
    • Mexican spymaster’s car theft ring shows CIA’s tolerance for corruption
    • CIA’s asset in Mexico was architect of some of the worst atrocities of the Dirty War
    • In the ‘50s, CIA decried Soviet torture tactics that would later be used at Gitmo and Agency black sites
    • CIA worked with White House to kill probe into Noriega’s drug trafficking
  • CIA and inequality
    • The CIA’s chief recruiter of the ‘60s argued that hiring minorities meant racism against white people
    • CIA’s Director of Personnel refused to have a woman “policing” him on gender equality
    • CIA objected to the Federal Employee’s Bill of Rights on grounds it would interfere with Agency’s gay witch hunt
    • How does the CIA celebrate Black History Month?
  • CIA against transparency
    • Memo shows Kissinger and Rumsfeld in damage control mode following revelation of CIA domestic activities
    • Dead cats, fouled nests, and the book of horrors – inside the CIA’s darkest hour
    • CIA asked if they could drop “the myth of presidential plausible deniability”
    • Despite three separate instructions not to, the CIA still destroyed Iran-Contra evidence
    • To Kill a MOCKINGBIRD: Recently released records dispel old myths surrounding CIA program targeting journalists
    • In private, Intelligence Community compared the Church Committee to their own personal Holocaust
    • Memo offers a look into the CIA’s private press pool
    • The CIA’s private press pool was a secret even inside the Agency
    • One of the CIA’s private press contacts was a suspected Soviet spy
    • In internal memos, CIA Inspector General portrayed the media as Agency’s “principal villains”
    • As CIA Director, George Bush waffled on promise to not destroy records of Agency’s illegal activities
    • Kissinger and the CIA discussed ways to limit Congressional access to information regarding the Agency’s activities
    • The Senate’s final report on Iran-Contra showed extent to which the investigation had been stonewalled
    • CIA’s 60 year war with the Government Accountability Office
      • The ‘40s to The ‘60s (Part 1) (Part 2)
      • The ‘70s (Part 1) (Part 2)
      • 1975 (Part 1) (Part 2)
      • The ‘80s (Part 1) (Part 2)
      • The ‘90s (Part 1) (Part 2)
      • The New Millennium (Part 1) (Part 2)
      • The Conclusion
      • How KGB cowboys and a fictional plot against Reagan helped the CIA’s war on oversight
  • CIA retirees
    • Inside SIGNA: A look at CIA’s secret society of (not-so-retired) officers (Part 1) (Part 2)
    • Don’t call it the Deep State: CIA archive reveals existence of secret network of ex-spies
  • Election interference
    • Declassified Kissinger memo refers to American “major intrusion” in Vietnamese elections
    • CIA has been tracking Russian interference in U.S. elections since 1982
    • According to a declassified CIA memo, Moscow has been trying to influence U.S. elections since 1964

• FBI activities
  • FBI had trouble deciding how often it had used its drones
  • FBI file reveals the Bureau’s liaison with one of America’s largest anti-Muslim groups
  • FBI leadership claimed Bureau was “almost powerless” against KKK, despite making up one-fifth of its membership
  • J. Edgar Hoover once called the Bill of Rights “literature favorable to Russia and in opposition to the U.S. foreign policy.”
  • When it came to the FBI, J. Edgar Hoover was both a source and ‘fact checker’ for the media
  • J. Edgar Hoover’s gambit to force his enemies into retirement came close to ending his career
  • J. Edgar Hoover’s real-estate war with the Soviets
  • How the Texas prison system created a terror group: FBI files on the Aryan Brotherhood of Texas
  • FBI claims roots of Puerto Rico terrorism lie in the U.S.’ own foreign policy
  • Long before WikiLeaks, the FBI spent decades obsessing over Gavin MacFadyen
  • FBI never investigated man court found culpable for Martin Luther King Jr. assassination
  • FBI can’t find its files on the investigation into Reagan’s “Debategate”
  • The FBI considered planting a story painting “Ramparts” as anti-Semitic in response to CIA exposé
  • FBI file shows just how easy it was for governments to listen in each other’s phone calls in the ‘50s
  • Senator James Eastland’s allegations about “Red spy rings” debunked by his own aide in FBI file
  • The FBI goes to war: Building Fortress Hoover
    

• FOIA, leaks and oversight
  • FBI Considered Espionage Act Charges Against WikiLeaks Over Declassified Files
  • The 11 questions the Justice Department wants answered in leak cases
  • NSA wanted to use the Espionage Act to prosecute a journalist for using FOIA
  • While investigating a DOJ leak to the mafia, the FBI appear to have overlooked a known mafia mole at the telephone company
  • FBI suspected “Ramparts” was a foreign agent that provided propaganda and intelligence services
  • FBI investigation shows the DOJ’s surprising tolerance for leaks … when they come from the DOJ
  • The FBI investigated The Village Voice and RCFP for espionage in 1976
  • Documents shed light on FBI’s investigation of The Village Voice and RCFP
  • The journalist and the stolen CIA documents
  • The journalists and the case of the stolen BIA documents
  • CIA included FOIA in its war on leaks
  • Nixon study resulted in CIA creating a database of intelligence leaks
  • Former CIA Director compared prosecuting leakers under the Espionage Act to “driving tacks with a sledge hammer”
  • Intelligence Community ignored task force recommendations that could have prevented Snowden leaks
  • FBI circumvents FOIA laws by claiming info about FOIA processing would result in people circumventing the law
  • How FOIA exposed the CIA’s false claim that FOIA helped Soviet spies more than American journalists
  • The CIA had a policy of ignoring declassification requirements
  • The CIA and the State Department conspired to exploit a bureaucratic loophole to keep records hidden
  • FBI and the Terrible, Horrible, No Good, Very Bad FOIA Redaction
  • FBI appears to have investigated – and considered prosecuting – FOIA requesters
  • CIA came up with 126 reasons to deny your FOIA request
  • FBI attempted to retroactively use the PATRIOT Act to sidestep FOIA
    

• Interagency conflict and cooperation
  • CIA internal history blamed interagency conflicts on the National Security Act being “purposefully vague”
  • Cold War feuds led to the FBI investigating accusations that the government was compromised by a network of secret socialists
  • J. Edgar Hoover feared a cabal of ultra-liberal economists with CIA ties would hijack the American economy
  • After retiring, CIA’s first director warned J. Edgar Hoover of Agency’s “corruption”
  • The interagency CACTUS program served as the conduit between CIA’s Operation CHAOS and FBI’s COINTELPRO
  • FBI file indicates the Bureau had better information sharing with phone companies than with the White House
  • Alaskan Stay-Behind program
    • Loose lips nearly sank the FBI’s Stay-Behind plan to fight the Soviets
    • Air Force tried to get CIA and FBI to cooperate on the Alaskan Stay-Behind network
    • CIA studied Alaskan Stay-Behind efforts for tips on waging guerrilla war
    • The CIA was warned of a potential “Red Dawn” scenario in Alaska
      

• WikiLeaks
  • A statistical analysis of WikiLeaks publications
  • Leaked chat reveals WikiLeaks thought Assange would personally benefit from a Trump presidency
  • Over 11,000 messages from private WikiLeaks chat released
  • Why is WikiLeaks’ “entire raw dataset” of Podesta emails incomplete, and exactly how many are there?
  • Sealed transcripts allege Assange and WikiLeaks solicited hacks against governments, politicians and corporations – and received files as a result
  • Technical report shows Russian hacking began hours after WikiLeaks mentioned a reward
  • Fidel Narváez’s complaint challenges The Guardian’s reporting about Assange
  • The Complete List of 140 Things You Can’t Say About Assange or WikiLeaks
  • Leaked FBI Docs: Hackers used WikiLeaks’ “Spy Files” as a Hit List
  • Renowned hacker and WikiLeaks source Phineas Fisher says organization misled people about their files
  • FBI Considered Espionage Act Charges Against WikiLeaks Over Declassified Files
  • The U.S. Government Has Amassed Terabytes of Internal WikiLeaks Data
  • Documents Reveal New Details in WikiLeaks’ Exchanges with Guccifer 2.0
  • WikiLeaks’ Million Missing e-Mails: Syria
  • WikiLeaks’ Million Missing Documents: US, UK and Ecuador
  • The Videos and Chat Logs Behind the Assange Indictments
  • Russia, Assange and WikiLeaks: 1998-2023
  • Vault 7 ruined WikiLeaks “perfect record” – if it ever existed
  • WikiLeaks’ Missing Media Ops: Vault 7
  • Over 1 million records that disappeared from WikiLeaks are still missing

• Other
  • “Church” of Scientology
    • While hunting Soviet spy, FBI feared angering Scientologists
    • Recently released FBI files show L. Ron Hubbard offering to inform on his own organization
    • What L. Ron Hubbard’s son said about Scientology and the KGB
    • FBI teletype reveals a brief counterintelligence investigation into Scientology
    • A tip about Scientology infiltrators led DEA to change their hiring practices
    • FBI investigated decades of allegations against Scientology, both foreign and domestic
    • In the early ‘90s, Scientology tried to dictate to the FBI what information could be released about them through FOIA
  • Danny Casoloro, Inslaw and PROMIS
    • FBI file casts doubt on Bureau’s investigation into the suspicious death of journalist Danny Casolaro
    • The Undying Octopus: FBI and the PROMIS affair (Part 1) (Part 2)
    • FBI continues to delay release of files on the 1981 “Octopus Murders”
    • The Vanishing Octopus: Justice Department changes the FBI’s story on Danny Casolaro’s file
    • The Enduring Octopus: What FOIA withholdings reveal about the PROMIS scandal (Part 1) (Part 2)
    • Justice Department records confirm PROMIS scandal’s ties to Israel
    • DOJ ordered police notes contradicting the suicide narrative for Danny Casolaro be sealed
    • The Danny Casolaro Primer: 13 reasons to doubt the official narrative surrounding his death
    • Recently released evidence shows FBI may have investigated Danny Casolaro’s death through 2017
    • Memo shows the CIA was offered PROMIS software in 1981
    • NSA’s empty PROMISes
    • FBI cites mystery FOIA exemption to withhold Danny Casolaro death video
    • DOJ ordered police notes contradicting the suicide narrative for Danny Casolaro be sealed
    • Sir Robert Maxwell’s FBI file is getting more classified by the minute
      
  • Government psychics and other X-Files
    • CIA feared a widening “psychic gap” with the Soviets
    • Veterans of the NSA’s psychic wars
    • Senate worried CIA’s psychic program was part of mind control plot
    • Life imitates Akira: the NSA’s fear of psychic nukes
    • DIA worried the Soviets might try to “Incept” them
    • Watch the video that sparked a CIA debate over psychic phenomenon
    • Read the Justice Department’s guide to using psychics in police investigations
    • Conspiracy Weary: FBI’s real-life “X-Files” document one of the Bureau’s laziest investigations
    • Government’s psychic research may have resulted from a misunderstanding of Middle School math
    • Intelligence agency takes on intelligence agency in the “Astral Projection Caper”
    • In the ‘70s, the U.S. Government thought almost everything was Soviet mind control
    • Whatever “suggestology” is, the Pentagon was terrified of it
    • From the department of “Nailed It:” Army psychics take on the Nazca lines
    • The Pentagon collected research that warned Soviets with “super-human abilities” could shoot lightning out of their hands
    • That time Secret Service asked government psychics to predict the future to prevent an undefined disaster (that never happened)
    • FBI’s real-life “X-Files” documents strange connection between UFOs and the JFK assassination
      
  • JFK assassination
    • The CIA assets that worked for Castro – and assassinated a Panamanian president
    • The CIA gave Congress a report on the JFK assassination that was edited to remove human rights violations – and mention of JFK
    • Solving the mystery of the Hunt/Dallas CIA memo hoax
    • After he shot Lee Harvey Oswald, Jack Ruby’s psychosis was diagnosed by the same CIA doctor who had once killed an elephant with psychedelics
    • No, CIA’s counterintelligence chief didn’t mastermind a JFK assassination cover-up weeks in advance
  • Watergate
    • FBI Documents on Roger Stone Reveal Sabotage, Espionage, and the Life of a Serial Bagman
    • Memo in CIA’s Kissinger archive hints Jack Anderson was informing on Bob Woodward
    • FBI evidence points to journalist Jack Anderson’s role in Watergate
    • FBI file reveals some of the secrets of Howard Hunt’s White House safe
    • FBI file dismisses conspiracy theories surrounding a Watergate-connected plane crash
    • Read newly released CIA transcripts of FBI and DC police calls regarding Watergate
    • Declassified records show extent of CIA’s involvement in efforts to discredit Daniel Ellsberg
    • He’s in charge: FBI file reveals Alexander Haig as architect of the Saturday Night Massacre
    • Ahead of Watergate, J. Edgar Hoover gave Richard Nixon’s campaign political intelligence warning of an emerging Democratic conspiracy
    • Jim Garrison’s incendiary JFK probe protected him from fraud charges
    • CIA abandoned logic to clear Soviet defector Yuri Nosenko
      

Articles (individual)

• A counterintelligence success years in the making was framed as a lucky break fueled by drunk driving
• Uncensoring the Cult of Intelligence
• CIA’s report on the “The World Situation in 1970” shows a shift in focus towards soft power
• FBI can neither confirm nor deny investigations into darknet markets that it confirmed are ongoing
• Terabytes of Enron data have quietly gone missing from the Department of Energy
• Don’t fear the Green Reaper: The story of the Department of Energy’s dubious mascot
• The CIA’s dank Soviet meme stash
• State Department cable shows exposure of Lockheed bribes threatened NATO’s stability
• If you belong to an online group, you may end up secretly recruited by intelligence agencies
• FBI’s file on Accuracy In Media is just a bunch of kvetching
• FCC complaints allege “Lucifer” is a plot to bring about the apocalypse
• Homeland Security used a modified version of the Anonymous logo in a presentation on surveillance
• National Treasure: the CIA hid historical artifacts in the walls of their headquarters – twice
• The Atomic Space Bug: FBI files show a wiretapped phone was found at the Nuclear Regulatory Commission’s predecessor
• LBJ’s “hullabaloo” made the FBI decide to avoid doing security checks for Congress
• Win friends and destroy your enemies with CIA’s wartime guide to bribery and blackmail
• Before NSA’s slides were made with PowerPoint, they looked like this …
• The strange death, and even stranger life of “Cocaine Cowboy” Andrew Carter Thornton II
• As governor, Trump’s Energy secretary pick tried to harness the power of prayer
• Government Accountability Office stalled after Senator Warren’s call for an investigation into Trump transition team
• Trump’s Treasury pick appears to be part of a federal investigation
• Fact-checking Steven Mnuchin’s comments on his FBI probe
• A look through CIA’s declassified Bilderberg files
• Behind the scenes with the hacktivists who took on Microsoft and the FBI
• Leaker, Liar, Hacker, Hoaxer: The Russian contractor who infiltrated Anonymous