Operation Mega is a 1997 FBI investigation into a senior U.S. government official believed to be passing highly sensitive information to Israel. Per John Kiriakou, the case opened after the NSA intercepted a secure communication between a senior Israeli intelligence officer in Washington and his superior in Tel Aviv referring to a source with the code name “Mega.”[1]
No indictment, no disclosure
Kiriakou contrasts the Mega case with other counterintelligence investigations into foreign spying, which have sometimes produced indictments or public fallout: in this case, there was nothing. The identity of the American official was never learned, and the information passed was never revealed.[2]
How CIA code names work
Asked about the origin of the name “Mega” itself, Kiriakou explains that CIA code names are generated by computer: every one begins with a two-letter digraph tied to a subject category, followed by a random word with no relation to its literal meaning — in this case, the computer simply generated the word “Mega,” unconnected to the case’s substance.[3]