Incident details
- Date of incident
- January 2017
- Targets
- Charles Glass (Freelance)
- Case number
- 1:22-cv-06913
- Case status
- Dismissed
- Type of case
- Civil
- Equipment searched or seized
- Status of equipment
- In custody
- Search warrant obtained
- No
Equipment Search or Seizure
WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange speaks in 2017 from the balcony of the Ecuadorian Embassy in London, where he sought asylum from 2012 to 2019. Journalist Charles Glass alleged his phone data was copied and sent to the CIA while he visited Assange there.
Journalists’ appeal of suit against the CIA dismissed
A federal appeals court dismissed an attempt by journalists Charles Glass and John Goetz to revive their suit against the CIA on May 23, 2025, due to missing paperwork.
The suit, filed in 2022, accused former CIA Director Mike Pompeo of recruiting a private security company to illegally collect the journalists’ phone data during meetings in 2017 and 2018 with WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange, at the Ecuadorian Embassy in London, England.
In February 2025, a U.S. district judge dismissed the suit, ruling that the CIA need not confirm or deny that it had seized the data, under the state secrets privilege. In April, the plaintiffs appealed the dismissal to the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 2nd Circuit.
In May, the appeals court dismissed the suit because the journalists’ attorneys did not file the proper forms with the court.
Attorneys for Glass and Goetz did not respond to a request for comment from the U.S. Press Freedom Tracker.
Journalists appeal dismissal of suit accusing CIA of copying their phone data
Journalists Charles Glass and John Goetz on April 15, 2025, appealed the dismissal of their federal suit against the CIA over illegal phone data collection during meetings with WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange.
In 2022, Glass and Goetz, along with two attorneys who had also visited Assange, filed suit in federal court for violations of their Fourth Amendment rights. They accused former CIA Director Mike Pompeo of recruiting a private security company to illegally collect their phone data while they were visiting Assange at the Ecuadorian Embassy in London, England, between January 2017 and March 2018.
A U.S. district judge dismissed the suit in February 2025, ruling that the CIA was protected by the state secrets privilege from being forced to confirm or deny whether it had seized the data.
In April, the plaintiffs appealed the dismissal to the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 2nd Circuit. Their attorney did not respond to a request for comment.
Journalists Charles Glass and John Goetz alleged that their phone data was collected and sent to the CIA while they were visiting WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange at the Ecuadorian Embassy in London, England, between January 2017 and March 2018.
The allegations were part of a 2022 suit that cited Fourth Amendment violations by the CIA and a private security company, and which was dismissed on Feb. 15, 2025, when the court ruled that the spy agency was protected by the state secrets privilege.
Assange, who was the target of a long-running case by the U.S. Department of Justice over charges he violated the Espionage Act, lived in the embassy from 2012 to 2019 after Ecuadorian President Rafael Correa granted him asylum from extradition to Sweden on a rape allegation.
Glass and Goetz sued the CIA in August 2022, along with two attorneys who had also visited Assange in 2017 and 2018. Glass is a freelancer and former correspondent for ABC News; Goetz is an editor at German radio and TV broadcaster NDR.
The suit accused former CIA Director Mike Pompeo of recruiting Spanish private security company Undercover Global to illegally collect information from Assange and his visitors at the embassy, beginning in January 2017 and ending when the Ecuadorian government terminated the company’s contract around April 2018.
The suit alleges that the plaintiffs were required to leave their electronic devices with an embassy security guard, and that the information on the devices — including personal photos, emails, texts and GPS data — was then copied and sent to the CIA.
It also claims that the journalists’ meetings with Assange were surreptitiously recorded, and that those recordings were sent to the CIA as well.
The plaintiffs asked the court to order the CIA and UC Global to delete their private communications.
In December 2023, U.S. District Judge John Koeltl dismissed the part of the suit related to the meeting recordings, ruling that the journalists’ expectation of privacy in their conversations with Assange was “unreasonable.”
And in February 2025, Koeltl dismissed the remaining claims related to seizure of their device data, agreeing with the CIA that confirming or denying whether it had seized the data “reasonably could be expected to cause serious—and in some cases, exceptionally grave—damage to the national security of the United States.”
Koeltl acknowledged the plaintiffs’ argument that the data seizure had already been reported on in the media and discussed in Spanish court proceedings against UC Global. But, he argued, public information can still be covered by state secrets privilege.
Neither the journalists nor their attorney responded to requests for comment.
The U.S. Press Freedom Tracker catalogues press freedom violations in the United States. Email tips to [email protected].
