Taliban Utilized Abandoned British Gear to Track Down Afghans Who Worked Alongside Western Forces, Inquiry Learns

A confidential source has told the Afghan leak inquiry that the UK failed to secure sensitive equipment enabling Afghanistan's rulers to identify Afghans who worked with western forces.

Information Leak Endangers Numerous in Danger

The source, called Person A, stated that people concerned by the information breach were told to move homes and change their phone numbers to protect themselves from the ruling authorities.

MPs are investigating the UK government's response of a catastrophic breach of personal details concerning approximately 19k Afghans who had requested to come to the UK to escape the regime.

How the Leak Was Discovered

A spreadsheet including private information, such as names, phone numbers and in some cases relative details, was mistakenly released by a staff member stationed at special operations center in last year.

The breach was discovered in late 2023, when the names of several individuals who had sought to settle in Britain surfaced on social media.

Regime's Resources

“There seems to be this misconception that Afghan rulers are without comparable resources that we have,” Person A informed MPs.

“We left it all behind in Afghanistan; they have it. Should they obtain your phone number, they can trace your exact position. This is exactly how specialized teams accomplished.”

When questioned about whether the Taliban had access to sophisticated technology, the whistleblower stated: “They have complete capability.”

Aftermath of the Security Lapse

Preliminary research presented to the investigation estimated that at least 49 relatives and co-workers of Afghans affected by the leak had been executed.

A superinjunction regarding the leak was put in force in last year and blocked all details about it from being made public until recently.

Safety Measures

Because she was restricted, the whistleblower and the aid group she was working with informed Afghan families they were supporting that they had “concerns that mobile communications had been breached”.

“Our suggestion was that they change residence if they could and switched their phone numbers. That constituted the crucial data that, if the Taliban had access to such data, would result in identification and capture,” the source testified.

Contested Findings

Person A argued that an official review carried out by a former official had been wrong to conclude that the acquisition of the dataset by militant forces was “minimally impact current risk levels”.

“The important fact is that these Afghans are not confronting the Taliban; they live secretly. Everything boils down to former occupations.”

Person A described terrible violence endured by at-risk Afghans, including electric shock torture, waterboarding, and severe beatings.

“We have had young kids who have had their arms broken to try to get relatives to say where someone is,” she testified.