JRL NEWSWATCH: “New Details on Intelligence Leak Show It Circulated for Weeks Before Raising Alarm” – WSJ
“The secret documents were first posted in January to a small group on a messaging channel that trafficked in memes, jokes and racist talk.”
“One of the most significant leaks of highly classified U.S. documents in recent history began among a small group of posters on … [the] [Discord] messaging channel that trafficked in memes, jokes and racist talk. Sometime in January, seemingly unnoticed by the outside world, an anonymous member of a group numbering just over a dozen began to post files — many labeled as top secret — providing details about … Ukraine, intercepted communications about U.S. allies, such as Israel and South Korea, … details of American penetration of Russian military plans, … [and] other topics. … [Apparently hundreds of] documents … stayed among the members of the tiny group … until early March, when another user reposted several dozen … to … a larger audience. … [A]t least 10 files [then] migrated to a much bigger community focused on the Minecraft computer game. On Wednesday, with the U.S. government apparently still unaware, a Russian propaganda account on Telegram posted a crudely doctored version of one of the documents, alongside a few unedited ones. The [FBI] and [DOJ] are now … hunt[ing] for answers on how … dozens of images … purport[ing] to show secret documents surfaced online. A government probe, launched Friday at … [DOD’s] request … is searching for the source ….”