The leak, which is being investigated by the Justice Department, reportedly includes assessments and classified intelligence reports that deal not only with Ukraine and Russia, but also with highly sensitive analyzes of US allies.
The documents shared online pose “a very serious threat to national security and have the potential to spread disinformation,” Assistant Secretary of Defense for Public Affairs Chris Meagher told reporters.
“We are still investigating how this happened and the extent of the problem. Measures have been taken to more closely examine how and to whom this type of information is distributed,” he said.
Dozens of photos of the documents have surfaced on Twitter, Telegram, Discord and other platforms in recent days, though some may have been online for weeks or even months before they began gaining media attention last week.
Mr. Meagher declined to comment on whether the documents were genuine, saying a Pentagon team was working to assess it, but noted that the photos circulating online appeared to show classified information.
“The images appear to show documents in a similar format to those used on a daily basis to update our senior leaders on Ukraine and Russia-related operations, as well as other intelligence,” he said, but some of them, he said , seems to change.
Among them is a document circulating online that appears to have been altered to show that Ukraine suffered more losses than Russia, even though the original version said otherwise.