US military emails with highly sensitive info mistakenly sent to Russian ally Mali: Report

Due to a minor typing error, a vast number of US military emails, containing highly sensitive information, were inadvertently sent to Mali. It's worth noting that Mali, a West African country, happens to be an ally of Russia. The leak, as reported by the Financial Times, has exposed a plethora of critical data, such as diplomatic documents, tax returns, passwords, and travel itineraries of high-ranking officers.

The initial confusion stemmed from a straightforward domain name mix-up. Instead of using the correct ".MIL" domain, which is standard for the US military, the emails were mistakenly being sent to ".ML," the domain designated for Mali. 

Various parties were involved in sending them, including military staff members, travel agents associated with the US military, US intelligence personnel, private contractors, and others. One notable example was an email sent earlier in the year, which reportedly contained the travel itinerary for General James McConville, the Chief of Staff of the US Army, for his visit to Indonesia.

Dutch entreprenuer discovered the error: Report

Dutch internet entrepreneur Johannes Zuurbier, responsible for managing the domain for Mali, was the one who initially discovered the issue. He brought it to the attention of the Financial Times, revealing that this problem has persisted for over ten years, despite his numerous attempts to warn the US government about it.

Zuurbier took action to address the situation by collecting misdirected emails starting from January. As of now, he has accumulated an astonishing 117,000 misdirected messages, with nearly 1,000 of them being collected just last Wednesday.

Zuurbier took decisive action by writing a letter to US officials, sounding the alarm about the ongoing domain name mix-up issue. In the letter, he emphasised that his contract with the Mali government was nearing its end, saying "the risk is real and could be exploited by adversaries of the US".

Pentagon spokesperson Lt Commander Tim Gorman told Financial Times that the US Department of Defence “is aware of this issue and takes all unauthorised disclosures of controlled national security information or controlled unclassified information seriously".

Gorman added that emails sent from a .MIL domain to Mali are “blocked” and that the “sender is notified that they must validate the email addresses of the intended recipients.”