WP: Trumpʼs National Security Advisor Waltz and his team used gmail instead of secure government email

The US President Donald Trumpʼs national security adviser Mike Waltz and his National Security Council team conducted government business through personal Gmail accounts, which are considered far less secure than even the Signal messenger, which was the subject of a recent incident.

This is reported by The Washington Post, citing sources.

Mike Waltzʼs senior aide used Gmail to communicate with colleagues from other government agencies about important military positions and weapons systems, while his colleagues from other agencies used special government accounts.

Mike Waltz received less sensitive but potentially vulnerable information, such as his schedule and work documents, on his personal Gmail account. The Trump adviser also sometimes copied and pasted parts of his schedule into Signal to coordinate meetings. At the same time, National Security Council spokesman Brian Hughes said that Waltz "has not sent and will not send classified information through an unsecured account".

Using personal email is risky, as foreign intelligence services highly value the communications and schedules of high-ranking government officials. Gmail accounts can be vulnerable to hacking, phishing, and other threats.

Cybersecurity experts are concerned that American national security officials are not using government-protected systems such as JWICS (Joint Worldwide Intelligence Communications System).

What preceded

The editor-in-chief of The Atlantic magazine Jeffrey Goldberg said that he was accidentally added to a chat on the Signal messenger, where the American operation against the Houthis was being discussed.

He was added to the chat by an account under the name Mike Waltz, the name of the US Presidentʼs national security adviser. According to Goldberg, the chat contained information about targets, the weapons the US would use, and the sequence of attacks. Shortly after, direct attacks on Yemen took place.

There were only 18 people in this chat, including accounts writing on behalf of the Vice President JD Vance, the Pentagon chief Pete Hegseth, the Secretary of State Marco Rubio, the Director of National Intelligence Tulsi Gabbard, the CIA Director John Ratcliffe, Trump advisor Steve Witkoff, and others.

Waltz later took responsibility for the incident and said that someone else was supposed to be added to the chat instead of the journalist, but the number was mistakenly added to someone elseʼs list. Trump considered firing Waltz for the Signal chat leak, but did not want to please his critics.

The head of the Pentagon, the directors of the US National Intelligence and CIA, as well as President Donald Trump, denied that military plans and classified information were discussed on the Signal messenger. Therefore, journalists at The Atlantic decided to publish this correspondence.

• Der Spiegel journalists have discovered that the personal data of senior US national security officials is freely available. Among them are White House National Security Advisor Michael Waltz, Director of National Intelligence Tulsi Hubbard, and Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth.

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