John Greenewald Jr. | |
|---|---|
 Greenewald on the Max Moszkowicz show. | |
| Born | (1981-04-17)April 17, 1981 (age 44) |
| Citizenship |
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| Known for | The Black Vault,FOIA activist,classified information releases. |
| Website | www |
John Greenewald Jr. (born April 17, 1981) is an American researcher andufologist,[1][2][3] best known as the founder ofThe Black Vault, a digital archive containing millions of pages ofUnited States government documents obtained through theFreedom of Information Act.[4][5] His work has been described byThe Washington Post as a "civilian repository" of such records, and he has published material ranging fromMKUltra papers to declassifiedPentagon UFO videos. Greenewald has written several books ongovernment secrecy and has appeared in media including theUFO documentary series.
Greenwald grew up in theSan Fernando Valley inCalifornia as a child and lived inNorthridge, California.[6][7] His father was aUnited States Marine and his grandfather served in theUnited States Navy.[6] Greenewald attendedAlemany High School inMission Hills, Los Angeles.[7] He was 15 years old in 1996 when began the Black Vault project.[8] Greenewald later filed FOIA reports to obtain information on his ancestors who served in government.[6] Greenewald's parents were supportive of his research.[7]
Greenewald operates the document archive siteThe Black Vault, a website which retrieves and archives documents obtained using theFreedom of Information Act.[5] TheThe Independent described The Black Vault as "a US government transparency site."[9] TheWashington Post identified Greenewalds works as a "massive civilian repository of government documents mostly obtained by Freedom of Information Act requests."[10] By 2015, Greenewald had filed over 5,000 FOIA requests.[8]
He credits his interests in FOIA and UFOs to early experiences onAmerica Online (AOL).[6] While online in the earlyInternet, he found theComputer UFO Network (CUFON) and read about a reported UFO incident involvingIran in 1976.[6] Greenewald filed a FOIA for the same documents he read online over AOL, and to his surprise received the exact same document two weeks later from theDefense Intelligence Agency (DIA).[6] As a result, Greenewald began filing more FOIA requests, and began building a collection of his findings.[6] One of Greenewald's first FOIA requests as a child was forMKUltra documents.[5] In his early days, Greenewald due to technical limitations was forced to hand-type all his retrieved documents onto Internet pages.[6] In 1999, Greenewald told theLos Angeles Daily News that he'd yet to personally see anything "unusual" in the sky, and that it's "fun to think the CIA is working for me."
Greenewald was credited byABC News andVice magazine with uploading 130,000 declassified documents fromProject Blue Book, which was the code name for the systematic study ofunidentified flying objects (UFOs) by theUnited States Air Force from March 1952 to its termination on December 17, 1969.[8][3] His research has been described by Greenwald as apolitical, focusing only on government transparency.[6] Greenewald reported toVice that his website's visits increased after his release of the Project Blue Book materials from approximately 5,000 per day to "hundreds of thousands".[8]
Following the release of thePentagon UFO videos, The Black Vault made aFreedom of Information request of the Government for the release of more video footage, filed to theUS Navy in April 2020. Some two years later, the government confirmed it had morefootage, but refused to release it, citing concerns fornational security.[11][9]
In 2024, Greenewald, via The Black Vault, published documents related to biting incidents involvingCommander, a German shepherd kept by Joe Biden at the White House. The documents were released due to a Freedom of Information Act request by Greenewald.[12]
For his Black Vault work, Greenewald has worked with and relied on assistance from the public and Internet users, such as when he engaged in a years-long FOIA struggle with theCentral Intelligence Agency; his work there included support fromReddit users.[5] Greenewald developed his own customized search enginedatabase, and then supplemental custom databases, to support his research.[8]
Greenewald does not consider himself a journalist.[6]Vice reported that Greenewald does not receive a journalism or public-interest waiver for his U.S. government FOIA requests, and has to pay money for them.[5] Greenewald in the past has relied onGoFundMe programs to help support his research due to the costs.[5] Greenewald reported he makes nearly no profit from The Black Vault.[6]
In terms ofufology theories, Greenewald in 2015 expressed support toVice for theextraterrestrial UFO hypothesis and that he did "not yet" support theinterdimensional UFO hypothesis.[8]
Greenewald has worked as a bartender, as well as a documentary and television producer and writer.[6] His primary business was reported byColumbia Journalism Review to be not his website, but instead importing and selling audio-visual equipment to schools and businesses.[6]
Featured in a 1999NBC program that discussed his research, hostRobert Davi referred to Greenewald as a "folk hero" and "nuisance to theUnited States government." The show's popularity caused his site to crash.[6] TheLos Angeles Daily News reported in 1999 that Greenewald appeared on television after a story about him was published in a newspaper fromBaltimore.[7]
TheDayton Daily News quoted Greenewald in 2015 on matters of government secrecy. He said, "I've been fascinated with government documents what they don't want us to know. I just people to see history."[13] In 2017, Greenewald was reported byVox to have been investigating reports about alleged "alien mummies" fromPeru.[1] In 2021, Greenewald appeared in the documentary seriesUFO produced byJJ Abrams.[14]The Jerusalem Post spoke with Greenewald in 2024 after an alleged UFO sighting over theUnited States Capitol building.[2]
Greenewald hosts a podcast to discuss his documents and findings, described by Shaun Raviv in theColumbia Journalism Review as "popular".[6]
TheUnited States Department of Justice has identified Greenewald as part of a "FOIA posse", along with journalistJason Leopold.[6]
The cofounder ofMuckRock,Michael Morisy, has called Greenewald's work "groundbreaking".[6]
According to Greenewald, the "best feeling in the world" is obtaining a FOIA declassified document that no one in the public had seen before him.[5] In the past, Greenewald has expressed support for theories the U.S. government shot downUnited Airlines Flight 93.[6]
...the popular UFOlogist John Greenewald...
While speculation ran rampant, skeptics and experts have been quick to offer alternative explanations. John Greenewald Jr., a ufologist and researcher, took to X (formerly Twitter) to address the controversy surrounding the lights captured in Diggins's photo. Greenewald explained that the lights at the U.S. Capitol building have been causing "UFO sightings" in camera lenses for decades, attributing the lights in Diggins's photo to a common optical phenomenon.
John Greenewald, a UFO enthusiast, spent nearly 20 years filing Freedom of Information Act requests for the government files on UFOs and related phenomena.
The US Navy has said it will not release more unseen, classified videos of unidentified flying objects (UFOs) publicly, adding that doing so would 'harm national security'. A US Navy spokesperson said so last week in response to a Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) request filed by the Black Vault, a US government transparency site. 'The release of this information will harm national security as it may provide adversaries valuable information regarding Department of Defense/Navy operations, vulnerabilities, and/or capabilities,' the Navy spokesperson wrote.
'The Navy designates the objects contained in these videos as unidentified aerial phenomena,' Joseph Gradisher, spokesman for the deputy chief ofnaval operations for information warfare, toldthe Black Vault blog, a massive civilian repository of government documents mostly obtained by Freedom of Information Act requests.
The documents were released in response to a Freedom of Information Act request by John Greenewald, a longtime California-based researcher who specializes in unearthing government secrets on everything from U.F.O.s to C.I.A. and military activities, and posted on his website, called The Black Vault. The Secret Service confirmed the documents were authentic.