The hacktivist who obtained the USA’s huge no-fly list of 1.5 million people including terror suspects has told how it is “scary” to go up against the CIA.

The transgender hacker and computer scientist – known as “Maia Arson Crimew”, also spelt “maia arson crimew”, and previously known as Tillie Kottmann, 23 – surfaced on the security service’s radar after leaking the list on 20th January.

The 23-year-old Swiss national found the top-secret list on a publicly accessible server run by CommuteAir in a text file titled ‘NoFly.csv’ and passed it on to the US tech magazine the Daily Dot.

The list contains the names, known aliases and associates of hundreds of thousands of people, including terrorists or suspected terrorists banned from entering the US.

The hacker told Swiss newspaper 20 Minuten: “I shouldn’t answer questions about the CIA. But yes, it’s scary that I’m dealing with such a powerful opponent who has every conceivable means at his disposal.

“But in order to continue my life as normally as possible, I have to try not to think about it. Paranoia doesn’t help at all, it’s exactly what they want.”

The hacker had previously made international headlines when she cracked access to more than 150,000 prison and hospital cameras as part of the ‘Advanced Persistent Threat 69420’ hacker collective in March 2021.

The computer scientist and her team reportedly penetrated security systems at more than 100 prisons, hospitals, schools, and even electric car company Tesla.

crimew – from Lucerne – was indicted by a US grand jury in 2021 for the camera hack and faces up to 20 years behind bars if she sets foot in America.

crimew’s latest hack to the no-fly list is now being investigated by America’s Transportation Security Administration as a “potential cybersecurity incident”.

The US Congress is also reportedly investigating the incident.

crimew said: “I feel like this is just a very perverse outgrowth of the surveillance state. And not just in the US, this is a global trend.”