By Christopher Bing
(Reuters) – Three former U.S. intelligence operatives, who went to work as mercenary hackers for the United Arab Emirates, face federal charges of conspiring to violate hacking laws, according to Justice Department court documents filed on Tuesday.
The three men, Marc Baier, Ryan Adams, and Daniel Gericke, were part of a clandestine unit named Project Raven, first reported by Reuters https://www.reuters.com/investigates/special-report/usa-spying-raven, that helped the United Arab Emirates spy on its enemies.
The defendants are being charged also with military export restriction violations.
“Defendants used illicit, fraudulent, and criminal means, including the use of advanced covert hacking systems that utilized computer exploits obtained from the United States and elsewhere, to gain unauthorized access to protected computers in the United States and elsewhere and to illicitly obtain information,” the court document states.
(Reporting by Christopher Bing; Editing by Howard Goller)
