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Navy officer is subject of security probe
From: William Knowles <wk () C4I ORG>
Date: Fri, 24 Nov 2000 20:07:06 -0600
http://www.uniontrib.com/news/military/20001123-9999_7m23secrets.html By James W. Crawley UNION-TRIBUNE STAFF WRITER November 23, 2000 Federal agents seized a computer and disks from the Chula Vista home of a naval officer who is suspected of downloading classified military information and trying to shut down the computer system of a local defense contractor. No charges have been filed against the officer, Lt. John Eric Larson, who is assigned to the San Diego headquarters of the Space and Naval Warfare Command, known as Spawar. Although Larson remains free and continues working at Spawar, his access to computers and classified information has been revoked. A search warrant affidavit filed in U.S. District Court here says Larson is being investigated for possibly mishandling classified information and disobeying military regulations. During the search of Larson's condominium Tuesday, Naval Criminal Investigative Service agents seized at least one computer and disks, according to Navy sources. Earlier, a Navy-owned laptop computer and 40 computer disks were turned over by Larson and Navy officials to NCIS agents. Navy officials gave few details about the investigation, referring instead to the search warrant affidavit. Larson declined to comment, said Lt. Cmdr. Greg Geisen, a Navy spokesman. The investigation started when officials at Intelesis, a Mira Mesa defense contractor, contacted the Navy about an attempted hacker attack on its computer on Sept. 29. The previous afternoon, someone using a computer at Spawar headquarters on Pacific Highway had tried to crash the Intelesis Web site with a so-called denial-of-service attack. Such an attack floods a targeted Internet-connected computer with requests until the computer slows or stops. A computer "fire wall" stopped the attack before any damage was done. The attack was traced to a Spawar computer that was connected, via a dial-up telephone line, to Larson's home phone number and computer, according to the affidavit. Following a Nov. 8 interview by two NCIS agents, Larson handed over his Navy laptop computer to the agents, who sent it for forensic testing, according to the affidavit. Larson told the agents he planned to leave the Navy and work for Intelesis, which designs computer software and does consulting work for Spawar and a variety of civilian firms. Intelesis officials were unavailable yesterday to comment on the investigation. About a week after his interview with NCIS agents, the court filing says, Larson told another officer that classified information was loaded on the seized laptop and that he had downloaded more classified information from the Pentagon's top-secret SIPRNET computer network onto various computer disks. Larson was sent home and told to bring the information back to the office. He returned with nine CD-ROMs, 26 diskettes and five Zip-brand high-capacity computer disks, which were later given to NCIS for analysis. Last week, NCIS agents obtained a search warrant for Larson's condominium in the 1000 block of La Vida Court in Chula Vista. Larson was commissioned an ensign in June 1994 after graduating from San Diego State University. A surface-warfare officer, he served on the destroyer Oldendorf and the aircraft carrier George Washington before being assigned to Spawar in December 1998, said spokesman Geisen. He was assigned to a Spawar division that handled specialized computer software purchases. Before the investigation began, Larson filed a request to resign from the Navy in December. Naval regulations allow such requests to be placed on hold during an investigation. If charges are pressed, Larson would probably be tried under military law in a court-martial. *==============================================================* "Communications without intelligence is noise; Intelligence without communications is irrelevant." Gen Alfred. M. Gray, USMC ================================================================ C4I.org - Computer Security, & Intelligence - http://www.c4i.org *==============================================================* ISN is hosted by SecurityFocus.com --- To unsubscribe email LISTSERV () SecurityFocus com with a message body of "SIGNOFF ISN".
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- Navy officer is subject of security probe William Knowles (Nov 27)