NEW YORK (CNNMoney) — The firm Booz Allen Hamilton announced that it has fired Edward Snowden, the 29-year contractor who exposed the National Security Agency’s phone and Internet monitoring program.
Booz Allen’s statement, which said Snowden was fired on Monday, confirmed reports that Snowden was an employee of the firm for less than 3 months, working in Hawaii. It said he was being paid an annual salary of $122,000, a figure substantially less than has been previously reported.
Booz Allen repeated the assertion that it made over the weekend that it was shocked by the reports that one of its employees was the leaker and that it was working with authorities on the criminal investigation of the leak.
Snowden told the British newspaper the Guardian that he revealed the extent of the NSA’s collection of telephone and Internet data because he believed the program to be “an existential threat to democracy.”
Snowden’s admission poses problems for Booz Allen, which gets 99% of its revenue from a variety of government contracts, providing cyber security services and technical support for both intelligence and defense agencies as well as civilian branches of government.
Shares of Booz Allen tumbled on the news of Snowden’s role, closing down 2.6% on Monday, and continued to decline on Tuesday.
