Jenna McLaughlin
Jenna McLaughlin is NPR's cybersecurity correspondent, focusing on the intersection of national security and technology.
McLaughlin, who joined NPR in September 2021, aims to tell the human stories behind the hackers — taking listeners beyond the technical details and diving into the reasons why technology's vulnerabilities and the people who exploit them matter to both the individual and the world.
Before joining NPR, McLaughlin covered national security, intelligence and technology for a range of publications, including Mother Jones Magazine, The Intercept, Foreign Policy Magazine, CNN and Yahoo News.
For example, in 2016, she uncovered startling details concerning a wave of former U.S. intelligence officials performing offensive cyber and other intelligence activities for the U.A.E. government, several of whom in 2021 brokered a deferred prosecution agreement with the Justice Department. In 2018, McLaughlin was part of a team that exposed how a flaw in a CIA covert communication tool led to the imprisonment and death of CIA human sources in China and Iran.
In addition to serious national security stories, McLaughlin has interviewed high school debate teams on their views about privacy and surveillance in the wake of NSA contractor Edward Snowden's disclosures in 2013, toured the NSA's Hawaii outpost on the North Shore of Oahu beneath the pineapple fields, and sampled a meal made with Blackwater Beef, an attempt made by infamous military contractor Erik Prince to rebrand into the food industry in rural Virginia.
McLaughlin's work has earned her national recognition, including the Gerald R. Ford Award for Reporting on the National Defense in 2019 and a finalist nomination in 2020 for the University of Michigan's Livingston Awards honoring the best journalists under the age of 35.
Her reporting has taken her from Abu Dhabi to Estonia, and she hopes to regularly travel outside Washington in her role at NPR.
McLaughlin in based in Washington and has appeared as an analyst on MSNBC and CBSN, in addition to frequently moderating expert panels. She is a graduate of Johns Hopkins University's Writing Seminars Program, where she was a sea kayaking instructor and Wilderness First Responder.
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Car dealerships across the U.S. and Canada are at a standstill after a cyberattack on a software platform. It's one example of an ongoing global crisis.
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Cyberattacks against journalists are on the rise. That’s according to a cybersecurity company that offers free digital defenses to civil society.
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There’s finally a consensus that ongoing digital attacks on the U.S. healthcare system constitute a crisis. The U.S. government is trying to work with partners to staunch the bleeding.
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Modern human life relies on a stable internet connection. But threats to internet connectivity are varied — from underseas rock slides and technical errors to war and geopolitical conflict.
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Cybersecurity experts want more federal protections for good faith security researchers, or "good "hackers, arguing the government shouldn't prosecute good faith efforts to find vulnerabilities.
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Pharmacies have a backlog of insurance claims waiting to be paid after the payment system was hacked in February. Experts aim to push for better cybersecurity standards across critical infrastructure.
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The National Security Agency's outgoing director of cybersecurity says the intelligence agency is still uncovering a massive Chinese hacking campaign into critical U.S. infrastructure.
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Because one company, Change Healthcare, has been hit with a cyberattack, people across the country are having trouble filling prescriptions, and doctors haven't been able to bill insurance providers.
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Cybersecurity researchers are poring over a massive new leak of sensitive documents about Chinese hacking operations.
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Gen. Paul Nakasone, who retired as director of the NSA on Feb. 1, speaks about his tenure battling Russian and Chinese hackers, defending U.S. elections and regaining Americans' trust.