A whistle-blower anonymously published a highly sensitive report obtained from an Australian spy agency on the website 4chan, but his document was soon automatically deleted after it failed to gain much attention. Those 4chan users who did view the document dismissed it as “fake and gay”. The Defence Intelligence Organisation assessment contained information that could have been exploited by foreign intelligence services and risked causing serious harm to Australia’s national security interests, according to the Australian Department of Defence.
Michael Scerba, a Department of Defence graduate, faces two charges after allegedly disclosing the document in 2012 in a 4chan post titled “Julian Assange is my hero”.The post allegedly made by Scerba read: “I release what I feel should be in the media: bombings, civilian deaths, actions of the ‘terrorists’ that just aren’t reported in the media.”
Court documents reveal that a former Defence Signals Directorate officer made the “fortuitous” discovery of the leak on the notorious chat forum after it was posted, but by then people had already commented on the report.
A subsequent post that prosecutors claim was made by Scerba stated: “To my dismay I just got a bunch of ‘fake and gay’ remarks and the secret documents went 404 [website not found] about 4 comments and 1 hour later.
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Spy agency whistle-blower posted top secret report to 4chan but users called it ‘fake and gay’