A former GCHQ intern who was jailed for taking top secret data home from the agency’s Cheltenham site has lost his bid to challenge the length of his sentence at the Court of Appeal.
What Happened
Hasaan Arshad, from Rochdale, was refused permission to appeal on Thursday by Lady Justice Cockerill, who said there were no arguable grounds that the sentencing judge had been wrong. The judge had given careful consideration to Arshad’s age, immaturity and neurodivergence, and had rightly taken account of the serious harm to national security that could have been caused.
The Appeal Argument
Arshad’s barrister, Rupert Bowers KC, argued that the sentence was too high for a first-time offender. He said Arshad had “noble if misguided” intentions and no corrupt motive, and described the case as exceptional because of those motivations. Bowers accepted that a serious offence had been committed by someone who was reckless, but said it had not been committed intentionally to harm national security.
Background
On 24 August 2022, Arshad, then a Manchester University computer science student, used his mobile phone to remove material from a GCHQ computer system and transfer it to his private computer. He was coming to the end of an industry-year placement with a technical development team at the GCHQ site in Cheltenham, Gloucestershire. He had completed GCHQ’s induction and had been required to sign the Official Secrets Act.
Prosecutor Duncan Atkinson KC told the Old Bailey that the material was top secret, that there was no reason to take it home, and that it referred to colleagues by name and codename. He said the breach risked exposing the identities of 17 GCHQ colleagues and created a significant risk of damage to national security.
In June 2025, Mrs Justice McGowan jailed Arshad for seven and a half years after he pleaded guilty to a Computer Misuse Act offence. He also admitted two charges of making an indecent photograph of a child. The investigation was led by the Metropolitan Police’s Counter Terrorism Command, and part of the sentencing hearing was held in private for national security reasons. Arshad told police he had removed the data “out of curiosity” and said he had no intention of passing it to anyone else.
GCHQ is the UK’s intelligence agency. It works alongside MI5 and MI6 to protect the country from security threats.
What Happens Next
Refusing permission means the challenge to the sentence cannot proceed on the grounds put forward at this hearing, so the seven-and-a-half-year term stands. No further hearings had been reported at the time of writing.
This is a developing story. We will update this article if further details emerge.
