By Katie Bo Lillis and Zachary Cohen

(CNN) — The CIA has sent the White House an unclassified email listing all new hires that have been with the agency for two years or less in an effort to comply with an executive order to downsize the federal workforce, according to three sources familiar with the matter – a deeply unorthodox move that could potentially expose the identities of those officers to foreign government hackers.

The list – which includes everything from new analysts to trainees preparing to operate under cover – only provides first names and last initials, officials said. The sources described that decision as the “least bad option” that career officials determined to comply with President Donald Trump’s order while still attempting to safeguard the identities of officers.

But some of the employees have “uncommon” first names, one of the sources noted, meaning that if a foreign intelligence service were to gain access to it, some of the officials could be easily matched with publicly available data and possibly identified.

Although new hires are unlikely to have yet been deployed undercover overseas, as a practical matter, the CIA may now consider it too risky to send them to dangerous postings for fear they will be identified before they even start. In other words, it’s possible that the move may have ended some young officers’ careers before they even started, according to two sources familiar with the situation.

“We are complying with the Executive Orders, and are providing requested information through the appropriate channels,” a CIA spokesperson told CNN in a statement.

The New York Times first reported the email.

Top Democrats assailed the move on Wednesday, calling it a risk to national security.

“Those details are secret for a reason — because protecting the identities of CIA employees is critical to their safety and mission, a mission that helps keep Americans safe every day,” House Intelligence Committee ranking member Jim Himes of Connecticut said. “I am also deeply concerned by the backdrop of this request, which appears to be an interest in firing provisional employees en masse.”

In another effort to shrink the federal workforce, the CIA earlier this week became the first major national security agency to offer so-called buyouts to its workforce. The agency said the move was “part of a holistic strategy to infuse the Agency with renewed energy.”

The-CNN-Wire
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