An NSA contractor is accused by US prosecutors of collecting dozens of hard drives of government data from the agency over more than two decades.
NSA intelligence contractor Harold T. Martin III is also accused of stealing thousands of highly classified documents, computers and other storage devices during his time with the agency. 
It is currently unknown what exactly Martin allegedly stole, but a report from the New York Times on Wednesday reported that recently leaked hacking tools used by the organization to conduct surveillance were among the stolen cache of files.
Prosecutors charged Martin on Friday with violating the Espionage Act. If convicted, he could face up to 10 years in prison on each count.
The charges, (first reported by the Washington Post), outline a much deeper and more serious case than a felony of simple theft or a misdemeanor of removing and retaining classified information.
According to the Post, citing a memo from U.S. Attorney Rod Rosenstein, the NSA foreign contractor poses “a high risk to aviation, a risk to the nation, and to the physical integrity of others.”
The note said that if he were to remain free he would “be able to access important, highly classified information, which he could easily disseminate to others.”
To date, there has been no official announcement from the state that sheds more light on the breach of the largest US intelligence agency.
