Administration leaks secret Al Qaeda video

SITE Intelligence Group -- a private intelligence company that monitors Islamic terrorist groups -- obtained a new Osama bin Laden video ahead of its official release last month. It gave two senior officials access on the condition that the officials not reveal they had it until the al-Qaeda release.

It didn't take long -- from 7 am to mid-day the same day -- before someone in the administration leaked the video and a transcript of its audio track to cable television news and broadcast networks, The Washington Post reports.

The founder of the company, the SITE Intelligence Group, says this premature disclosure tipped al-Qaeda to a security breach and destroyed a years-long surveillance operation that the company has used to intercept and pass along secret messages, videos and advance warnings of suicide bombings from the terrorist group's communications network.

"Techniques that took years to develop are now ineffective and worthless," said Rita Katz, the firm's 44-year-old founder, who has garnered wide attention by publicizing statements and videos from extremist chat rooms and Web sites, while attracting controversy over the secrecy of SITE's methodology.

While the exact source of the leak is unknown, officials did not challenge Katz's version of events, but said there was no effect on U.S. intelligence-gathering efforts.

Presumably since the government had done so well at gathering Al-Qaeda intel, official essentially said SITE is of marginal assistance. "We have individuals in the right places dealing with all these issues, across all 16 intelligence agencies," said Ross Feinstein, spokesman for the Office of the Director of National Intelligence.

But privately, some intelligence officials called the incident regrettable, and one official said SITE had been "tremendously helpful" in ferreting out al-Qaeda secrets over time.