BAGRAM, Afghanistan – American investigators armed with a box full of cash paid thousands of dollars to buy back stolen computer flash drives – many of which contained sensitive military data, shopkeepers outside the main U.S. military base in Afghanistan said Friday.
But dozens are still for sale, including memory sticks with information ranging from U.S. troop resumes to photographs of Air Force One during President Bush’s visit in March.
The stolen computer devices have sparked an urgent probe to discover how security could have been breached at the heavily guarded Bagram base, which coordinates the fight against Taliban and al-Qaida militants and includes one of the military’s main detention facilities for suspected terrorists.
Though workers are searched coming in and out of the base, the flash drives are the size of a finger and can easily be concealed.
U.S. military spokesman Lt. Mike Cody said he could not comment because an investigation was ongoing.
Shopkeepers let a reporter review about 40 of the drives on a laptop computer Friday. Most were blank or did not work, but three contained data, including a soldier’s military discharge certificate, troop resumes and photographs of Air Force One during Bush’s visit.
The Los Angeles Times reported that some drives contained classified military secrets, including maps, charts and intelligence reports that appeared to detail how Taliban and al-Qaida leaders have been using southwestern Pakistan as a planning and training base for attacks in Afghanistan.
The documents, which seemed to be based on conversations with Afghan informants and official briefings, outlined how the U.S. military came to focus its search for militants on both sides of the Afghan-Pakistani border, according to the newspaper.
The Times also said the drives appeared to contain the identities of Afghan sources spying for U.S. Special Forces that operate out of Bagram.
One shopkeeper said soldiers went around the market outside the base Thursday carrying “a box full of afghanis (the Afghan currency), buying all they could find.”
He said he sold about 50 for $2,000, or about $40 each. A day earlier, he was selling them for half that price.
“They said they wanted them all and price wasn’t important,” the shopkeeper said.
The shopkeepers have said they were not interested in the data and were only selling the drives for the value of the hardware.
They say the drives were stolen by some of the 2,000 Afghans employed as cleaners, office staff and laborers at Bagram.
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