Federal Police Plan Arrest and Fake Confession of Vaza Jato Hacker, Says Intercept

RIO DE JANEIRO, Brazil –  The Vaza Jato scandal takes on increasingly bizarre traits. After yet another lot of shocking conversations in the Vaza Jato series of reports released last weekend, the Intercept now claims that the Federal Police, during a leave of absence of Minister of Justice, Sérgio Moro, are about to deploy a Machiavellian plan that could come straight from a Hollywood screenplay.

They are alleged to be preparing for an offensive into The Intercept Brasil website this week through the arrest of a supposed hacker, who would then issue a false “confession” to having tampered with the recorded conversations.

The information, obtained from “close sources”, was released on Monday afternoon, July 15th, by Glenn Greenwald’s own website.

“Despite the abundance of evidence on the authenticity of the material, published by different outlets, several sources told The Intercept over the last few days that the Federal Police are considering carrying out an operation this week which would target an alleged hacker, the purported source of the files.”

This alleged hacker would be encouraged to confess that he sent the material to the Intercept and that the content had been tampered with, explains the website in an editorial.

In the text, the outlet that has disclosed the biased performance of former judge Moro in collusion with prosecutors of the Federal Prosecutor’s Office in conducting the Lava Jato investigations, reiterated that countless Brazilian news outlets, including the largest in the country, and even an international one like El País, have confirmed the authenticity of the conversations, after a thorough investigation.

“This misguided tactic will fail. The reason is simple: the evidence proving the authenticity of the material is so overwhelming and coming from so many sources of known credibility, that no confession of any kind would be plausible,” guarantees The Intercept Brasil.

In this Monday’s editorial, the website describes the verification methods used by all outlets that have focused on the disclosed dialogues. “In light of all the evidence, put forward by different means of communication, which testifies to the authenticity of the material, there is literally no evidence — or even a single factual claim — that any published messages have been tampered with, much less forged,” reads the text.

In addition to the alleged hacker’s arrest, the credibility of the stories published by The Intercept Brasil has been attacked through the investigation that the Financial Activities Control Council (Coaf) purportedly had conducted to examine Glenn Greenwald’s finances.

The news on the alleged investigation generated concern from news organizations and even from the Brazilian Bar Association (OAB), which eventually sent a formal letter to Coaf.