Person
David Burkett
Also known as David Alan Burkett, Burkett
- Cybersecurity researcher, Corelight Labs; author of Lies Above (2026)
David Burkett is a cybersecurity researcher at Corelight Labs who works on anomaly detection. He describes himself as a lifelong sceptic who changed his mind after studying the record, and in 2026 published Lies Above: How the Pentagon Misled Congress and Cost America Its Skies, which links its sources by QR code.
In his November 2026 interview on NewsNation's Reality Check he argued that the Condon Committee was the clearest example of a cover-up, and disputed the explanation of the 1967 Malmstrom shutdown as a secret EMP test. He also discussed the drone incursions over military bases and the missing Nimitz sensor data. He is on file as an analyst: what he says is drawn from others' accounts and from his reading of the record, apart from what he says he has seen of the retaliation against a source.
Sources: NewsNation Reality Check interview, November 2026, and its description
Facts and claims
- claimed On NewsNation's Reality Check (November 2026) he called the 1967 Malmstrom EMP-test explanation, reported by the Wall Street Journal in 2025 with Sean Kirkpatrick as one of its main sources in his view, impossible to square with the record: such a test needed concrete, towers and days of building, Strategic Air Command would have known, and the request for proposals for the system named went out four years later. — David Burkett Source: Whistleblowers 'fear being murdered': Ross Coulthart with David Burkett, author of Lies Above (NewsNation Reality Check, 2026) at 14:35
- claimed He says Robert Salas tracked down the 341st wing's historian, who said the line ruling out UFO rumours was the only change he was told to make apart from editorial and morale matters. — David Burkett Source: Whistleblowers 'fear being murdered': Ross Coulthart with David Burkett, author of Lies Above (NewsNation Reality Check, 2026) at 14:05
- claimed He says someone entered the house of one of his sources unnoticed and cut the power cable of the internet modem, which the source took as a threat. — David Burkett Source: Whistleblowers 'fear being murdered': Ross Coulthart with David Burkett, author of Lies Above (NewsNation Reality Check, 2026) at 32:01
Connected files
Books
Claims
- The U.S. government has deliberately spread false or misleading information about UFOs (asserts)
- A UFO shut down nuclear missiles at Malmstrom Air Force Base in March 1967 (asserts)
Incidents
- Malmstrom AFB missile shutdown (statement about)