Ex-L3harris Exec Pleads Guilty to Selling Zero-Day Exploits to Russian Broker
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A former L3Harris executive pleaded guilty to selling zero-day exploits to a Russian broker, raising concerns about the illicit trade of cybersecurity vulnerabilities; the discussion highlights the severity of the issue and potential implications for national security.
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From Wired’s coverage of the events in TFA:
https://www.wired.com/story/peter-williams-trenchant-trade-s... | https://archive.is/xuVuY
> According to the US attorney overseeing the case, Tejpal S. Chawla, the FBI alerted L3 Trenchant sometime in 2024 that some of its software had leaked. As TechCrunch reported last week, Trenchant was <investigating an alleged leak of its hacking tools>[0] by employees—an investigation that Williams, then general manager of the firm, oversaw, prosecutors said during Wednesday’s hearing.
[0] https://techcrunch.com/2025/10/21/apple-alerts-exploit-devel... | https://archive.is/4l1xC
> A month before he received Apple’s threat notification, when Gibson was still working at Trenchant, he said he was invited to go to the company’s London office for a team-building event.
> When Gibson arrived February 3, he was immediately summoned into a meeting room to speak via video call with Peter Williams, Trenchant’s then-general manager who was known inside the company as “Doogie.” (In 2018, defense contractor L3Harris acquired zero-day makers Azimuth and Linchpin Labs, two sister startups that merged to become Trenchant.)
> Williams told Gibson the company suspected he was double employed and was thus suspending him. All of Gibson’s work devices would be confiscated and analyzed as part of an internal investigation into the allegations. Williams could not be reached for comment.
The TechCrunch article above, previously on HN:
Apple alerts exploit developer that his iPhone was targeted with gov spyware - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=45657302 (Oct 21, 2025 / 290 points / 144 comments)