The former head of Trenchant, a specialized U.S. defense contractor unit, was sentenced Tuesday to more than seven years in federal prison for stealing and selling zero-day exploits to a Russian exploit broker whose clients include the Russian government.
39-year-old Australian national Peter Williams served as the general manager of Trenchant, a cybersecurity unit of defense contractor L3Harris that develops surveillance tools and zero-day exploits for the U.S. government and its Five Eyes intelligence partners.
Between 2022 and 2025, Williams stole at least eight protected exploit components intended for the exclusive use of the U.S. government and its allies and sold them to the Matrix Russian exploit broker (doing business as Operation Zero), which advertises itself as a reseller of hacking tools to non-NATO buyers.
Williams used a portable external hard drive to transfer the exploits out of secure networks at Trenchant's offices in Sydney and Washington, D.C., before sending the stolen tools to the broker via encrypted channels.
Prosecutors said that the theft caused $35 million in losses to L3Harris and that the stolen tools could have enabled access to millions of devices worldwide.
Williams pleaded guilty in October to selling eight stolen zero-day exploits to the Russian cyber-tools broker for $1,300,000 in cryptocurrency.
U.S. District Court Judge Loren AliKhan sentenced Williams to 87 months in prison on Tuesday and ordered him to forfeit $1.3 million, cryptocurrency, a house, and various other luxury goods.
"Williams took trade secrets comprised of national security software and sold them for up to $4 million in crypto currency. These incredibly powerful tools would have allowed Russia to access millions of digital devices," said U.S. Attorney Jeanine Pirro for the District of Columbia.
"By betraying a position of trust and selling sensitive American technology, Williams’ crime is not only one of theft, it is a crime of national security. Our nation’s defense capabilities are not commodities to be auctioned off."
The U.S. Treasury Department has also confirmed on Tuesday that the Russian broker was Operation Zero and announced sanctions against the company and its owner.
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