The Spy Who Couldn't Spell by Yudhijit Bhattacharjee

Brian Regan grew up in a underprivileged family. He did not do well in school due to his dyslexia and struggled with low self esteem. The only way out of his situation was to sign up for the military. There he found his strength in cybercrime related espionage support work. From it, he gained the respect from those who used to step on him, including his family.

But his autism issues caught up with him at work and he no longer was respected among younger colleagues. He was forced to change his posting at NRO and eventual retirement which he opted. Unhappy with his lot and mounting debts due to his mismanagement of his money, he did what would be considered treason.

Regan began a long period of collating the information that was freely available to him in the NRO for the purpose of selling them to the enemies of the country so that he could resolve his financial problems. However because of his lack of spy experience and poorly spelt extortion letter (due to dyslexia), he was never taken seriously by different foreign government whom he wanted to sell to.

With his coding abilities, he downloaded sensitive information that buried them all over the country with codes that were triple coded or trinomes that recorded their location. It was so complex and when the blackmail to the state was discovered, it took numerous agencies to work together to nab him. From then on, it was multiple layers of decrypting to relocate the materials before they fall into alien hands. The high point was when under incarceration, Regan forgot the key to his own codes. 

Regan was a foolish man with the smarts for certain tasks and his shortcomings were never fully known until he was found out doing the deed. Lack of help and financial counselling, mismatch of skills to job made him almost commit treason and a life sentence in jail. Had he been more fluent in the written word and contact was made with alien entities, he would have faced the death sentence.

The story is convoluted and almost too ridiculous to be true. Also, the US government did not fully learn their lesson . A decade or so later, Edward Snowden did the same and up to now, justice is not served.

Great story for those who love cybercrime, encryption, and the history of technology in espionage esp from space.