A document from Washington, D.C.’s Metropolitan Police Department leaked by cybercriminals details the FBI’s concerns over two extremist groups in the wake of the Jan. 6 riot at the Capitol.
The Babuk ransomware gang on Thursday released a large cache of files it had stolen after attempts to extort the department for $4 million fell through.
As reported by the Daily Dot on Tuesday, alleged screenshots of the group’s negotiations with police showed the department offering $100,000 in an effort to keep Babuk from releasing their files.
In their Thursday post on the dark web, the group, which released 250GB of data in total, criticized police for refusing to agree to their terms.
“We publish the full data of the police department, including HR, Gang Database, you will find a full range of all data in the amount of 250GB in all parts, this is an indicator of why we should pay, the police also wanted to pay us, but the amount turned out to be too small,” Babuk wrote.
One folder from the cache of documents details a Jan. 18 briefing at the FBI Command Post that centered on concerns over the Boogaloo Boys, an anti-government militia group.
The document notes that the extremist group had shared a map online of Washington, D.C., titled “Operation Stormbreaker,” that featured “colored triangles at various locations representing ‘High’ and ‘Low’ priority targets.”
The high-priority targets listed by the Boogaloo Boys include the buildings for the U.S. Treasury and World Bank, while low-priority targets include the White House and the Lincoln Memorial.
The map also included the date of Jan. 19, a reference to “National Popcorn Day.” The law enforcement document further notes that the day was of particular focus to the QAnon movement, the far-right conspiracy theory that claims then-President Donald Trump was secretly battling an international cabal of child-eating pedophiles.
National Popcorn Day was yet another failed QAnon prediction in which the movement’s followers believed Trump would arrest his enemies and secure a second term in office.
“This date is ‘National Popcorn Day’ and members of QAnon have posted that they want their members to ‘pop’ or ‘storm’ on this day,” the document reads, somewhat missing the thrust of what the QAnon movement believed.
The document goes on to warn that “Boogaloo Boys may also attempt to target data centers, liberal churches, and power plants” before noting that the National Guard, who was still in D.C. following the failed insurrection, had been deployed “to the power plant behind the US Capitol.”
The Daily Dot reached out to the Washington, D.C. Metropolitan Police Department to inquire about the leaked documents but did not receive a reply by press time.
In a separate document leaked by the ransomware group, which details an intelligence briefing at the department on Jan. 19, police note that despite the rhetoric online, extremist groups ultimately stayed away from the nation’s capital.
“The MPD Intelligence Division is monitoring posts on multiple social media platforms calling for armed protests in Washington, DC on January 16, 17, 19, and 20, and have shared this information with our local and federal law enforcement partners,” the briefing reads. “However, there is no credible information to confirm that these events will actually occur at this time.”
Ironically, many of the extremist groups who had planned to protest in the days leading up to the inauguration of President Joe Biden backed off after becoming convinced that they would be framed by government “false flags.”
The document dump by Babuk comes after the group previously released two small portions of the data in an effort to get police to pay the ransom. The first leak surrounded full background checks on more than 22 officers and included everything from their SSNs and home addresses to medical histories and psychological evaluations.
