IC Technology & Surveillance — 2026-07-12

Surveillance Firm That Demonstrated Ability to Track CIA and NSA Officers Hired for Pentagon Havana Syndrome Investigation

BLUFHiring a firm already known to track CIA and NSA officers via commercial location data for a sensitive Pentagon investigation embeds the very surveillance vulnerability it should be examining.

Documents obtained by The Intercept through a Freedom of Information Act request show that Anomaly 6, a Virginia-based surveillance firm, has been contracted by the U.S. Air Force to assist the Pentagon's Anomalous Health Incidents Cross-Functional Team, the task force investigating Havana syndrome, which former Uber executive Emil Michael now leads after a reorganization 1. The contract, worth nearly $6 million and running through September, is designated Project Yellowfin and directs the company to apply its "location intelligence" to "identify actors and activities of interest" and produce data visualizations for senior decision-makers 1. Anomaly 6 previously drew scrutiny after a 2022 Intercept report on a business pitch in which it demonstrated the ability to track individual CIA and NSA employees, as well as Chinese and Russian military personnel, using bulk-purchased cellular location data 1. The Air Force redacted most of the released document and did not respond to requests for comment on the basis for selecting Anomaly 6 or whether its data factored into a prior intelligence community assessment finding it highly unlikely that a foreign adversary caused the symptoms 1.

Analysis
The Air Force's contracting of Anomaly 6, a firm that previously demonstrated it could geolocate individual CIA and NSA officers using bulk-purchased cellular data, to support the Havana syndrome task force creates a direct counterintelligence exposure inside the Pentagon's own investigation, though the selection may reflect routine reliance on an established location-intelligence vendor rather than disregard for its surveillance history. Heavy redaction and Air Force silence on the selection rationale leave unresolved whether comparable data could implicate the same commercial vulnerabilities the prior intelligence community assessment downplayed. The Intercept's FOIA-based reporting stands as the sole primary account, with no independent confirmation. Pentagon leadership faces pressure to renegotiate or impose vendor-vetting requirements only if congressional scrutiny emerges before the contract expires in September; absent that, Project Yellowfin proceeds unchanged.

2 sources

Company That Bragged It Could Track U.S. Spies Hired to Investigate Havana Syndrome - The Intercept
Company That Bragged It Could Track U.S. Spies Hired to Investigate "Havana Syndrome" - ChinaTechNews.com