White House denies clearance to tech researcher with links to Snowden

Pulitzer prize-winning journalist and security researcher Ashkan Soltani says he has been denied security clearance for his new job with White House

The White House has denied a security clearance to a member of its technology team who previously helped report on documents leaked by Edward Snowden.

Ashkan Soltani, a Pulitzer prize-winning journalist and recent staffer at the Federal Trade Commission, recently began working with the White House on privacy, data ethics and technical outreach. The partnership raised eyebrows when it was announced in December because of Soltani's previous work with the Washington Post, where he helped analyze and protect a cache of National Security Agency documents leaked by Snowden.