When a Sex Offender and a Former Prime Minister Backed a Surveillance Startup
By Rachel Hurley Updated
Epstein used Ehud Barak to embed himself in the surveillance industry
Yesterday, news outlets started reporting on more than 100,000 emails from former Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Barak’s inbox - emails a hacker group called Handala stole and leaked last year. The emails span 2007 to 2016, covering the years when Barak served as Israel’s Defense Minister and afterward.
Buried in those emails are exchanges with Jeffrey Epstein. Casual, informal exchanges about trips to Epstein’s island, business ventures, and dinners with people like Woody Allen and Peter Thiel.
But what stands out isn’t the socializing. It’s what they were building together. In 2015, seven years after Epstein’s conviction for soliciting prostitution from a minor, he partnered with Barak to invest in a security tech startup called Reporty Homeland Security. The company is now known as Carbyne.
Carbyne is a 911 technology platform. It can send dispatchers a caller’s exact location, plus live video and other phone data once the caller says yes. By 2018, Peter Thiel’s Founders Fund had joined a $15 million funding round for it. The company now has contracts with U.S. police departments and emergency services.
Think about that. A company seeded by a convicted sex offender and a former Israeli prime minister ended up embedded in American emergency response systems. Capturing data on 911 calls in the places that use it. Every location. Every emergency.
Epstein wasn’t just dabbling in surveillance tech. The emails show he was actively using Barak to build connections across the surveillance industry. In May 2014, Epstein pushed Barak to “spend real time” with Peter Thiel, co-founder of Palantir, one of the most powerful surveillance companies in the world. Palantir designs software for intelligence agencies to analyze massive amounts of data on civilians and populations.
Barak couldn’t make that first meeting, but Epstein insisted on setting up dinner. Barak later wrote to another associate that he’d have a “first date” with Thiel to talk geopolitics. He didn’t mention Epstein’s role in arranging it.
In 2016, Epstein pitched Carbyne to Valar Ventures, another fund co-founded by Thiel. They passed, saying it was too early. Two years later, Thiel’s Founders Fund joined that $15 million funding round. Epstein’s name was never on the investor list - his money went in through Barak’s partnership, which lasted until 2019 - but the connections he’d built were paying off.
This wasn’t random networking. Epstein was systematically positioning himself at the intersection of money, power, and surveillance technology. The emails show he was also reaching out to Russian oligarchs and officials. He introduced Barak to Sergey Belyakov, a former Russian Deputy Minister of Economic Development. He suggested Barak send Belyakov a note saying Putin and his advisors “would benefit from spending some time with Jeffrey to discuss markets.”
He even tried pitching a Chinese personal protection company that Prince Andrew had mentioned to him. The emails reference “wealthy chines looking for to start personel protection co in beijing, kidnapping has begun.”
What you’re seeing here is someone building an international surveillance network while maintaining a social circle that included prime ministers, tech billionaires, and royalty. Someone who had already been convicted of sex crimes involving minors and was actively using those same connections to embed himself in the infrastructure of public safety and intelligence.
Barak’s emails also reveal something else. In January 2014, Barak wrote to Epstein about trying to avoid taking his security detail to Little Saint James, Epstein’s private island. “I’m still trying to arrange that the security guys will NOT come with us to the island,” Barak wrote. “Does this works for you?”
Epstein responded by arranging a helicopter pickup from St. Thomas. The emails don’t say whether the security team came or not. But Barak was clearly comfortable enough with Epstein to plan trips to an island where, according to multiple victim testimonies, trafficking was happening.
Barak has denied any wrongdoing. He said he never participated in “any party or event with women or anything like that.” In 2019, after Epstein’s arrest on federal sex trafficking charges, Barak said he’d ended their business relationship. One month later, Epstein was found dead in his jail cell.
But the emails show that in 2011, an assistant forwarded Barak news articles about Virginia Giuffre’s accusations against Epstein. That means the allegations landed in Barak’s inbox eight years before he said he’d had no idea. And he kept investing with Epstein anyway.
Here’s why this matters beyond the obvious. Women who were inside Epstein’s Manhattan mansion say it was wired with hidden cameras - bedrooms and bathrooms included. A 2014 court filing for Virginia Giuffre says Epstein made her describe her encounters with powerful men “so that he could potentially blackmail them.” Everything was documented.
That’s not casual blackmail. That’s systematic intelligence gathering. And when you see Epstein putting money into a surveillance startup after his conviction, when you see him connecting tech billionaires with foreign officials, when you see him embedding his investments into American emergency services, a pattern emerges.
Epstein wasn’t just collecting compromising material through sexual exploitation, the way his accusers describe. He was building the infrastructure to collect data at scale. He was connecting the people who build surveillance tools with the people who fund them and the governments who deploy them.
Carbyne captures emergency call data. Palantir analyzes intelligence data for governments and corporations. Both companies are tied to people Epstein cultivated relationships with. Both companies deal in information about people’s locations, behaviors, and vulnerabilities.
And Barak was the key to making those connections in Israel. Carbyne is headquartered in New York, with its research team in Tel Aviv. One of Carbyne’s co-founders, Pinchas Buchris, used to run Unit 8200, Israel’s signals intelligence unit. The emails show Barak setting up a meeting between Epstein and Buchris while they worked out the Reporty investment.
This is bigger than one sex offender networking with powerful people. This is about how surveillance infrastructure gets built. Who funds it. Who profits from it. And who has access to the data it collects.
The leaked emails also show Barak pitching Epstein on another company, Levitection, an electromagnetic imaging startup. The company says Barak never invested and Epstein’s name never came up there. It later won a share of a U.S.-Israeli homeland security research grant, then went out of business in 2022.
None of this happened by accident. Epstein was leveraging his wealth and connections to insert himself into an industry where information is currency. Where knowing someone’s location, their call history, their emergency contacts, their behavioral patterns has value.
And he was doing it after being convicted. After everyone knew what he was. After the world had decided he was a predator who should be isolated from power.
Instead, he used his relationship with a former prime minister to buy into a surveillance startup that now works with American 911 centers. He used his social network to connect Silicon Valley’s most powerful surveillance tech founder with Ehud Barak, Israel’s former prime minister and one-time military intelligence chief. He positioned himself as a broker between Russian officials and American markets.
The Barak emails are important because they document how this actually worked. Not speculation. Not conspiracy theories. Actual emails showing actual investments, actual meetings, actual business partnerships between a convicted sex offender and people at the highest levels of military intelligence and technology.
Epstein wasn’t just some wealthy pervert. He was someone who had spent years building connections across intelligence communities, surveillance industries, and political networks. Someone who had demonstrated he could position himself at the nexus of money, power, and information.
He had credibility because he’d built infrastructure. He had access because he’d invested in the tools that create access. He had leverage because he’d positioned himself at the center of industries that run on leverage.
That’s what makes the Barak emails so significant. They show the mechanism. They show how money, intelligence, technology, and sexual exploitation were all part of the same operation. Not separate scandals. One systematic network.
And a lot of that network is still operating. Carbyne still has those government contracts. Palantir is still one of the most powerful surveillance companies in the world. The connections Epstein built didn’t disappear when he died. They’re embedded in the architecture of how data flows and who has access to it.
That’s the real scandal. Not just that a sex offender had powerful friends. But that he used those friendships to build surveillance infrastructure that’s still in use. Still collecting data. Still connecting intelligence agencies with tech companies with foreign governments.
The question isn’t just what Epstein knew. It’s what the systems he helped build now know. And who controls them.
#ratcclips
FACT CHECK
Ehud Barak Emails Leaked
More than 100,000 emails from Barak’s inbox (2007-2016), stolen by the hacker group Handala and leaked in 2024, were first reported on August 27th, 2025. Published by DDoSecrets. Reported by Reason, Straight Arrow News and other outlets.
Reporty Homeland Security / Carbyne Investment
Epstein and Barak invested in Reporty (now Carbyne) in 2015. Confirmed in leaked emails first reported by Reason magazine, August 27, 2025.
Peter Thiel Connections
May 2014: Epstein pushed Barak to meet with Thiel. Confirmed in leaked emails. 2018: Thiel’s Founders Fund joined Carbyne’s $15 million Series B round. Confirmed by multiple sources including Reason.
Barak Island Trip
January 2014 email from Barak to Epstein: “I’m still trying to arrange that the security guys will NOT come with us to the island.” Confirmed in leaked emails reported by Straight Arrow News and other outlets.
2011 Virginia Giuffre Articles Sent to Barak
Assistant forwarded Barak news articles about Giuffre’s accusations in 2011. First reported by Straight Arrow News, August 28th, 2025, and covered in Holly Aguirre’s Substack on September 2nd, 2025.
Epstein’s First Conviction
Pleaded guilty to soliciting prostitution from a minor in Florida in 2008. Served approximately 13 months in detention. Well-documented public record.
Russian Connections
Epstein introduced Barak to Sergey Belyakov, former Russian Deputy Minister of Economic Development. Email suggested Barak tell Belyakov that Putin and his advisors would benefit from time with Epstein. Confirmed in Reason reporting on leaked emails.
Carbyne U.S. Contracts
Carbyne has contracts with U.S. police departments and emergency services. Company headquartered in New York, with research in Tel Aviv. Confirmed by multiple tech industry sources.
Epstein’s Manhattan Mansion Surveillance
Women who were inside Epstein’s Manhattan mansion describe hidden cameras there, and police found hidden cameras in his Palm Beach house. Documented in court records and victim statements from criminal cases and civil lawsuits.
Unit 8200 Connections
Multiple people involved in Israeli surveillance startups have ties to Unit 8200 (Israeli signals intelligence). Widely reported in tech and intelligence industry coverage.
SOURCES
https://reason.com/2025/08/27/inside-jeffrey-epsteins-spy-industry-connections/
https://www.thenorthstar.com/p/hacked-emails-the-israeli-prime-minister
https://www.cf.org/news/ex-israeli-pms-hacked-emails-expose-ties-to-epstein/
https://www.jfeed.com/news-world/ehud-barak-epstein-emails
https://www.yahoo.com/news/articles/leaked-emails-reveal-jeffrey-epsteins-143052842.html
https://internewscast.com/news/us/exposed-emails-uncover-epsteins-connections-to-a-spying-network/
https://hollyaguirre.substack.com/p/jeffrey-epsteins-ties-to-israels
Correction, October 7th, 2026: This essay first said Levitection’s technology ended up in U.S. Homeland Security programs, funded through networks that included Epstein’s money - the company won a share of a U.S.-Israeli research grant, says Barak never invested, and closed in 2022. Those lines, and the line about Carbyne capturing “behavioral indicators,” came from a site in the Pravda network, a set of pro-Russian propaganda sites; that source has been removed along with the lines that followed it. The title first said the two men built a surveillance company - they invested in a startup others founded. It also said Handala leaked the emails the day before (they were stolen and leaked in 2024), that Founders Fund put in $15 million (it joined a $15 million round), that Carbyne is based in Tel Aviv (it’s headquartered in New York), that several people in these startups had Unit 8200 ties (one co-founder ran it), that Epstein connected Barak with that former Unit 8200 chief (Barak set up the meeting), and that Epstein suggested Barak tell Putin’s advisors about him (the note was to go to Belyakov). A line saying victims were coached to ask about jobs and secrets was cut.
Update, October 7th, 2026: A few lines now say who says so - the hidden cameras, the 2014 Giuffre filing and what the 2011 emails show - and Straight Arrow News’s original report is now in the sources.