Three former US intelligence operatives, who went to work as mercenary hackers for the United Arab Emirates, face federal charges by the US Justice Department, according to a court docket created yesterday.
Reuters reported the three men, Marc Baier, Ryan Adams, and Daniel Gericke, were part of a clandestine unit named Project Raven that helped the United Arab Emirates spy on its enemies.
According to reports from 2019, the American hackers helped the UAE spy on a BBC host, the chairman of Al Jazeera and other prominent Arab media figures during a tense 2017 confrontation pitting the UAE and its allies against the Gulf state of Qatar.
The nature of the charges was not immediately clear.
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![A man on his laptop on 5 August 2018 [Liam Carlier/Flickr]](https://i0.wp.com/d2.middleeastmonitor.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/10/2018_08-5-laptop30083627298_3b7965b437_o.jpg?fit=920%2C613&ssl=1)