Wikileaks Posts Documents Allegedly Hacked From CIA Director's Private E-Mail Account

CIA Criticizes Posting of Hacked Documents

ByABC News
October 21, 2015, 8:00 PM

— -- Wikileaks, the anti-secrecy website, has posted documents it claims were obtained from a private email account used by CIA Director John Brennan from 2005 to 2008 when he was not serving in government.

The CIA says none of the posted documents are classified and calls the hacking of the Brennan family account a crime where “the private electronic holdings of the Brennan family were plundered with malicious intent and are now being distributed across the web.”

Earlier this week sources told ABC News that a personal AOL email account associated with Brennan had been hacked and that it contained personally identifiable information.

The sources said it did not appear that Brennan used the account for government business after he became CIA Director in March, 2013. Sources also said that an account linked to Homeland Security Secretary Jeh Johnson had been compromised. The FBI is investigating both incidents.

“Over the coming days WikiLeaks is releasing documents from one of CIA chief John Brennan's non-government email accounts,” said a brief statement on the website. “Brennan used the account occasionally for several intelligence related projects.”

A spokesman for the CIA said the attack on Brennan "is something that could happen to anyone and should be condemned, not promoted.”

“There is no indication that any of the documents released thus far are classified," the spokesman added. "The documents released are those that a private citizen with national security interests and expertise would be expected to possess.”

It was not clear how Wikileaks got the documents.

Among the six documents posted by Wikileaks is a draft of a national security clearance form that requires the applicant to provide personal information.

Other documents include a response from the CIA’s General Counsel to an appeal about a government contract made by a company Brennan headed while out of government service.

There was also a draft of a position paper on challenges facing the U.S. Intelligence Community post 9/11 and another document making recommendations for how a future president should deal with Iran.

Brennan had been a CIA analyst for 25 years before retiring in 2005, when he started his own security consulting firm. In 2008 he became a foreign policy adviser to the Obama campaign and the presidential transition.

In 2009 he became President Obama’s chief counterterrorism adviser, a position he held until early 2013 when he was nominated to become CIA Director.