A cleaning worker at the home of Defense Minister Gantz was indicted for espionage

The General Security Service will re-examine the security interrogation processes of workers in the vicinity of secure persons. This follows the filing of the indictment today (Thursday) against a cleaning worker at the home of Defense Minister Beni Gantz for espionage. According to the General Security Service statement, the worker - an Israeli citizen named Omri Goren Gurochovsky, 37, from Lod with a criminal record - "turned on his own initiative, via a social network, to an entity affiliated with Iran and offered to assist him in various ways, given his access to the minister's house."
The General Security Service said that lessons had already been learned from the organization following the incident, following which it was formulating new procedures in the field. "It is clear that in the process carried out there was a failure in the work of the individual, which should have been located even earlier and not allow such a person to work in the immediate vicinity of the Minister of Defense," the service said in a statement. The organization considers the security breach a serious security malfunction.
Once the loophole was discovered, the General Security Service contacted any person in charge of the security of the persons secured by the service, and asked them to pass on the list of employees who are in constant contact with the persons. The service is currently conducting a re-inspection of all employees. In addition to Ganz, the GSS secures Prime Minister Naftali Bennett, Foreign Minister Yair Lapid, Supreme Court President Esther Hayut and opposition leader Benjamin Netanyahu.
Goren is a convicted felon who, among other things, ran a prison for an armed robbery, and did not undergo a security investigation before starting work for Ganz in 2018. The network has visible information about his convictions. At one point, when Ganz became the deputy prime minister, a desire arose to conduct security investigations into workers at his home - but these were postponed due to the corona's restrictions for various dates. Once the restrictions were lifted, Ganz was no longer in the position of alternate prime minister, so it was decided to cancel the security investigations. The security team that accompanied Ganz when he was alternate prime minister in 2020 has since been replaced, but no proper overlap has been made for the new team, which could have exposed the security breach.
The request for an extension of Goren's detention stated that he has a "burdensome" criminal record, which includes cases of various offenses, including bank robbery incidents, house burglaries, thefts and more. For these offenses he was sentenced to four years in prison. During Goren's interrogation, it turned out that he had photographed several items in Ganz's home and sent them to a source from the hacker group, to prove seriousness and ability.
Among other things, photos of Gantz's computers, a desk, a phone, a tablet, a safe, framed photos of him and his family and more were sent. The GSS emphasized that Goren was not exposed to classified materials due to the information security procedures in the minister's home, and therefore did not transfer any classified material to the person he contacted. His safe is also in the desk with various documents on it.
According to the indictment, following media reports about cyber attacks against Israeli targets, Goren decided to turn to the hacker group Black Shadow. "Goren located, using the telegram software, the address of a representative of the Black Shadow group, contacted him under a false identity and introduced himself as someone who works for the Israeli Defense Minister, noting that he could help the group in various ways." After transferring the photos, Goren deleted all the correspondence from the telegram as well as the photos he took from his phone.