Peter Williams, an experienced executive in cybersecurity who led the hacking and surveillance technology division at U.S. defense contractor L3Harris, has been mandated to pay $10 million to his prior employer. Williams was a key player in one of the most significant leaks of sophisticated hacking tools in the history of the United States and its closest allies.

On Wednesday, a court ruled that Williams must pay this restitution in addition to the $1.3 million he was previously required to pay to L3Harris. Williams, a 39-year-old Australian national with a background in one of Australia’s intelligence entities, served as the general manager of Trenchant until last year. Formed from the merger of two sister startups, Trenchant is L3Harris’ unit that creates cutting-edge spyware and hacking solutions and markets them to the U.S. government and its partners within the Five Eyes intelligence alliance—five English-speaking nations that exchange classified information. Alongside the U.S., the alliance comprises Australia, Canada, New Zealand, and the United Kingdom.

Renowned cybersecurity journalist Kim Zetter initially reported the new restitution ruling in her newsletter. 

Williams’ legal representatives have not replied to a request for comment.

Last year, Williams was apprehended and accused of misappropriating seven unspecified trade secrets—most likely cyber exploits, which are codes designed to take advantage of software weaknesses, and surveillance technology—from Trenchant, subsequently selling them to Operation Zero. The Russian entity operates as a broker, facilitating the buying and selling of hacking tools and claims to exclusively collaborate with the Russian government and domestic enterprises.

Williams admitted guilt and received a sentence of over seven years in prison. 

Williams generated $1.3 million from the sale of the trade secrets, which he utilized to purchase luxury timepieces, a residence near Washington, D.C., and family vacations. Trenchant informed authorities that it faced losses up to $35 million due to Williams’ actions. 

U.S. prosecutors accused Williams of having “betrayed” the United States and its partners by supplying Operation Zero, which the U.S. government labels as “one of the world’s most nefarious exploit brokers,” with tools that could potentially hack “millions of computers and devices globally.” 

As previously mentioned by TechCrunch, Williams exploited his privileged “full access” to Trenchant’s internal network to extract the tools from the company’s premises. After selling the hacking tools to Operation Zero, some were reportedly used by Russian government agents in Ukraine and later by Chinese cybercriminals, as identified by former L3Harris employees who recognized the stolen code in cybersecurity findings published by Google following their investigation into the cyberattacks where these tools were utilized.

Additionally, Williams attempted to implicate one of his employees in the theft.