While out of the public eye, Mitre’s history is remarkable. “I’d never heard of it.” Valle ended up working on cybersecurity for the Air Force and looking for security issues in Google’s Android operating system during his five years there. “It was just miles away from where I was living and had been there since the mid-50s,” says Shawn Valle, who went to the campus for the first time for a job interview in 2008. Even locals who live near its large office complex often have no idea it’s been such a stalwart supporter of American national security and defense over the last six decades. Mitre’s HQ is situated just up the road from the McLean Washington Metro stop and right next door to another of America's biggest defense suppliers, Northrup Grumman.įew have heard of Mitre or know its mission, despite its vital importance to the security of the nation. The FBI and DHS acknowledged requests for comment but have not provided any. Despite multiple requests to meet with Mitre executives in person and visit its headquarters, Mitre declined to provide comment for this article. ![]() But some of the same projects are setting off alarm bells among human rights organizations and privacy advocates like the ACLU, which are concerned about surveillance overreach from Mitre’s sophisticated technology. government, providing tools for surveillance of criminals, diseases and immigrants illegally trying to enter the country. What we found is an elite institute that has proved a major boon to the U.S. As its promo material says: “You may not know it, but Mitre touches your life most every day.” Wanting to know the extent of Mitre’s touch, Forbes launched an investigation to pull Mitre’s staggering range of work from the shadows. Mitre’s history is full of such uncredited public service. “The prospect of law enforcement agencies being able to cheaply, easily and quickly obtain people’s fingerprints off of social media is extraordinarily chilling.” Edman was also at Mitre when it helped the FBI hack and monitor users of multiple child exploitation sites as part of Operation Torpedo, in what then attorney general Loretta Lynch hailed as a landmark dark web investigation. Shortly after he left Mitre, he was allowed to finish the job in October 2013, and was in Reykjavik, Iceland, alongside FBI agent Ilhwan Yum, to shutter the site run by the Dread Pirate Roberts (real name: Ross Ulbricht), who is now serving a life sentence. During his time at Mitre, Edman partnered with the FBI, using his hacking skills to help take down the infamous Silk Road dark web drug bazaar. Bald, bearded and baritone-voiced, Edman could have worked at his pick of hot Silicon Valley tech companies, but instead focused his talents on challenging national security problems. “If there’s a national security or public interest, Mitre probably has a hand in it,” says former Mitre cybersecurity engineer Matt Edman. ![]() While at Mitre, engineer Matt Edman partnered with the FBI to take down the infamous online drug bazaar, Silk Road.
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