A former US government IT contractor has admitted to funneling top secret intelligence to the Ethiopian regime, and not all of it left on a drive.
Abraham Teklu Lemma, 53, pleaded guilty Tuesday to conspiracy to transmit national defense information to a foreign government. Prosecutors say that from 2021 until his arrest in August 2023, he passed classified material to senior officials in Ethiopia’s political, military, and intelligence branches.
Some of it took the high-tech route. Lemma used the access granted to him as an IT admin to pull electronic copies of classified information out of classified repositories and carry them out of the secure facilities where he worked. Some of it did not.
Low Tech, High Clearance
According to the DOJ, Lemma also wrote classified information out by hand and simply walked the notes out the door.
Data loss prevention tools are not known for their ability to read handwriting.
None of which would come as news to the folks at Carnegie Mellon’s CERT, who have been cataloging insider cases since 2001. In the 2021 edition of their insider-risk guide, built on roughly 3,000 incidents, paper ranked as the third most common way data walked out the door, behind only email and removable media.
A Closer Look at Related SPB Coverage
CERT’s advice is to stop treating the server room and the front door as separate problems, and to have physical security and IT correlate their logs. Its broader conclusion is less comforting: “not all insiders can be stopped.”
The plea also adds a line to Lemma’s resume. When he was charged in 2023, the DOJ said he took classified material from secure facilities at the State Department. Tuesday’s plea lists him as a former IT contractor at State, the Justice Department, and the National Reconnaissance Office, the agency that builds and operates America’s spy satellites.
The 2023 complaint alleged that what Lemma passed along included satellite imagery. The DOJ has not said where that imagery came from, and neither of its announcements connects it to the NRO.
The 2023 charges carried a potential death sentence.
‘Please Send Drones’
Much of what Lemma handed over concerned the armed conflict inside Ethiopia. And according to the DOJ, Lemma wasn’t just a courier. He also had opinions on how his intel should be used.
On Dec. 18, 2021, he told one co-conspirator, “We have to finish these people once and for all, otherwise there will never be peace in Ethiopia.” Later that day, according to prosecutors, he sent over more information along with a request: “Please send Dro[nes].”
The DOJ’s top national security official said Lemma handed over the classified material hoping Ethiopian officials would use that intelligence to target and kill paramilitary fighters. The FBI said Lemma admitted the officials did put what he gave them to use in military operations. The DOJ has not said what those operations were, or tied anything Lemma provided to a specific strike.
At the time, drones were central to Ethiopia’s effort to beat back a Tigrayan advance on Addis Ababa, used to hit targets, direct artillery, and feed intelligence to troops on the ground.
Betrayal, with a Discount
The public record does not say when investigators first got onto Lemma, or how.
“Today’s guilty plea makes clear that any attempt to betray the United States, violate the trust of the American people, and compromise our national security will not be tolerated,” said Darren Cox, assistant director in charge of the FBI Washington Field Office.
“Lemma abused his position of trust and access to some of our nation’s most highly classified information, conspiring with foreign government officials to unlawfully disclose materials protected to the highest level.”
The plea deal calls for between 120 and 262 months, assuming Senior Judge John D. Bates signs off at sentencing on April 14, 2027. That means Lemma could end up facing more than 20 years in federal prison. Which, all things considered, is still a better offer than the one on the table in 2023.
