In November 2009, an external attacker breached a University of East Anglia server used by its Climatic Research Unit and copied about 160 MB of material, including more than 1,000 emails, roughly 2,000 documents, and climate-research source code. The material was distributed online weeks before the Copenhagen climate summit, then amplified by climate-sceptic blogs and media. Critics, including U.S. Senator Jim Inhofe and former Alaska Governor Sarah Palin, portrayed phrases such as “hide the decline” and “Mike’s Nature trick” as evidence that scientists manipulated temperature records. The researchers said the emails had been selectively quoted and taken out of context.
The controversy produced investigations in the United Kingdom and United States, including the UEA’s Independent Climate Change Email Review, published on 7 July 2010, and the Oxburgh Science Assessment Panel report of 14 April 2010. Across eight inquiries, reviewers found no evidence of fraud or scientific misconduct and concluded that the disputed statistical methods were legitimate and that the scientific evidence for human-caused warming was unaffected. Norfolk Police closed its criminal investigation on 18 July 2012, citing no realistic prospect of identifying or prosecuting the attacker; police also found no evidence that anyone associated with UEA committed the breach. The episode nevertheless damaged researchers’ reputations and led to death threats and demands for stronger data-security and Freedom of Information practices.
