Bradley Manning aka Chelsea released
I one final act of ultimate hypocrisy Obama commutes the sentence for this traitor who leaked secret military documents to Wikileaks. The same organization that the he and all the Dems have railed against these last few months. Become a traitor to your country while you are an active member of the military, and the government will commute your sentence, and pay for your sex change operation. Disgraceful!
Denis I agree, what a farce, he/she tried to commit suicide twice last year, whose next Bo Bergdahl, that wouldn't surprise me either.
kb2755 I was thinking Jillian Assange
https://www.justice.gov/pardon/obama-pardons
here is the list
skippy 
PREDATOR Uh you cannot actually pardon someone not convicted of a crime PREDATOR. So that last one would be really hard.
Agust Let's see if he pardons Trump for releasing American documents to Russia.
Trump luvs Commies Sunlight isn't dangerous (unless you're a vampire) and is extremely important to the people of any society.
I say good for Manning. Next up Snowden.
justintime @justintime I suspect you don't feel the same way about sunshine when it comes to Hillary, Podesta, and Wasserman Schultz.
Why would you think that denis? Truth, no matter how uncomfortable or inconvenient, is preferable to false beliefs.
If you believe the leaks of the DNC e-mails was a good thing, then I stand corrected and made a false assumption.
I do, yes, but also wish that the shenanigans of the R's was also made visible. There's too much bs floating around and it was nice to see some sunshine for a change.
I find that many people fully support the free release of information.
Unless, of course, it's personal and intimate information about themselves and/or people they care about. Then, suddenly, those same folks are screaming, "Why doesn't the government DO something?!"
JerseyWolf Let's see, Wikileaks was a GOOD thing when it was about Bush's war against WMDs, but BAD when it was about Benghazi and Hillary's emails. Just more hypocrisy.
I LIKE Wikileaks, if it shows the truth. The truth shall set us free. It'll suck really bad at first tho. Ditto Edward Snowden.
Bergdahl IS a traitor. His fellow soldiers confirmed it. IDK know the story of Manning enough to comment.
JeffersonRepub 
jd2 (from the Trump thread before I realized Brad, I mean Chelsey, had her own thread.)
First, Obama has prosecuted more leak cases that all other Presidents combined.
Second, in our entire history, most "leakers" get 3 years or less, she has served 7. 35 years is unprecedented and a new US prison time record for such a crime.
Commutation is not a pardon for the crime, it's just adjusting the time which, in this case, was certainly unusual, historically speaking, and therefore many believed cruel as well.
I think a new 7-year standard for whistle-blowing US secrets is probably deterrent enough for our citizens. Especially when the leak, like this one, has aspects of a public service announcement.
Here's an interesting view: https://www.bloomberg.com/view/articles/2017-01-18/obama-trolls-trump-with-clemency-for-manning
Meanwhile Trump signaled that he might rescind the commutation because it was an act of political correctness. Does this idiot even understand the process?
And will Assange come out of hiding like he said he would? And will he bring Trump's Russian connection with him. Ah, the Tlot Phickens.
And.... let's make a deal with Snowden to get him out of Russia, come home, admit guilt, do some Club Fed time (seems like 35 years with possible parole at 7 is the going rate), and move on.
strangerdanger I personally do not agree that the army should provide sex rezoning on an incarcerated individual who didn't have an identity issue when signing up. No doubt a go fund me page will be set up for the remorseful victim, with a book and movie deal in the works. Maybe Caitlyn Jenner will jumpstart the whole thing.
Denise First off the title of this thread is wrong. She was not released, her sentence was commuted, she will be released in May.
2nd, she released 750,000 documents to wikileaks. Among these were videos of the US army killing civilians that the army obviously did not want public.
3rd, Obama ran for office on a lot of platforms of government transparency. Early Obama would have praised Manning. Older Obama I think just wants a dig at Trump and has reasonable belief that the 35 year sentence - the longest ever for a crime like this, is unreasonable.
It's very different than Hillary and the rest of the DNC, don't even try to compare those.
Hillary's emails were turned over during an investigation. Podesta's and others were hacked by a foreign enemy, at minimum to disrupt our election, at maximum to mortally wound a canidate and to put a puppet in the top spot of our government. Manning leaked documents to a once reasonable neutral 3rd party, that she believed should have been exposed, much like Snowden did. They have key differences - Snowden ran and hide, Manning admitted guilt, confessed and went through the judicial process. Snowden was more responsible with the documents, releasing them to journalists who decided when and how they would be made public, Manning dumps close to a million documents online with much less regard for who had access to them or how they were used. Arguable, no harm has come to us from either of this disclosures.
While Snowden did do wrong, I believe what he did should be considered a great public service and Obama should pardon him - if nothing else, to enforce that the government works for the people and that people will help keep it in check.
In cyber security, there's protocols of "Responsible disclosure". For instance, if I found a bug in Hackettstownlife.com, there's protocol of how I would notify the site owner, disclose the bug, how I came across it, how it could be used, etc, and give them a reasonable amount of time (often up to a year) to fix it before I announce the bug to the world. Whistleblowers and leakers should have some standard to what they do, and so should sites like Wikileaks that enable it.
Information is good, transparency is better, but in the absence of the government providing them, Wikileaks and others should take the high ground and not just dump information, but comb through it and decide what can be leaked, what can't be (They've been known to leak tons of personal information that could ruin lives and has no value) and what should be sent to journalists, security researchers, etc.
I don't believe the army should ever pay for a sex change for anyone. Nor do I believe we should have to bend over backwards for those special snowflakes.
alpha1beta One a related note, it is the duty of all people to stand up for injustice wherever it may be. That could be refusing an order to kill civilians in the armed services, or letting a fellow employee know they are being grossly underpaid for the work that they do or are not given adequate safety equipment for their job.
A great many problems exist because people have no moral character and refuse to do what's right.
You're computer had a virus? Some unethical person wrote that, either themselves or for someone else who paid them too.
You've likely been scammed out of hundreds or thousands of dollars by companies who skirt ethics and add fees and charges -
Hotels charge a room safe fee. You can ask them to remove it if you don't use the safe but they sneak it on for everyone.
Comcast charges a broadcast TV fee - a fee they invented after they bribed congress to let them encrypt all channels they push out over their pipes (Which also means you pay more because every TV has to have a cable or DTA box)
Been tricked into paying more than you expected by a website? We call those dark patterns - http://darkpatterns.org/ - and that's a lot of ways, unscrupulous people trick people into handing over their money - because someone, someone did not stand up and say "That's wrong" or refuse to do it.
There's billions of examples of unethical people, instructions uncaring and immoral people to do harm to others, and there's enough corrupt people that evil will always win.
Whistleblowing and leaking fall into the same category, refusing to stand idly by while evil is perpetrated.
Clarify for me. I thought the left hated WikiLeaks because they cost Hillary the election. But you have no problem commuting the sentence of a traitor who leaked classified information to WikiLeaks. I guess Putin has now taken over the commuting privilege of the commander in chief. Friday at noon can't come soon enough.
Ollie It should have been equal time for the RNC, but that didn't fit someone's agenda..... Da!
RAS Ollie, if Wikileaks had exposed wrong equally without an agenda no one would have objected. When they selectively expose one side its wrong. When they showed Bush's flaws to help Obama it was problematic, when they exposed or made up things about Hillary without bothering to show what they knew of Trump, it was just as wrong.
Folks who are afraid of Trump, are not necessarily left leaning liberals. Some of us are moderate libertarians who fear a lunatic with one thumb typing on twitter and the other resting on the nuclear launch codes.
JeffersonRepub - appreciated!
Hi Ollie, I have a love-hate relationship with Wikileaks. I'm very Pro Open Government and Government Transparency (If they are acting in the best interest of their citizens, they should have very little to hide - a notable exception being some miltary spending, employee salary and personal info, etc). I think giving people a way to disclose information and blow the whistle on illegal acts by governments is a great thing, and think we all know we need it.
I don't have an issue with them hold a grudge for "costing Hillary the election". She was a weak candidate. The DNC rigged the primaries and favored her and Bernie was not given a fair shot.
I have an issue with them disclosing information irresponsible in general. I have an issue with Russia for trying to influence our election, regardless of the effect.
Did you know they leaked Turkish databases with names, addresses and personal information on almost every citizen - including a database of all adult women? (Among many other blunders)
That's irresponsible disclosure. I wish they would take a better approach to leaking any information - reach out to journalists and experts, verify the information and decide if it has value to the public. The vast majority of HRC's email had nothing of value. A database of women's personal information puts more people at risk - both of digital threats like identity theft or being hacked as well as physical thread of rape, kidnapping, stalking, etc.
RAS: Supposedly Russia tried to hack the RNC but were unable to gain access. Now, that could be because they had better security, or because they did not try very hard.
"Folks who are afraid of Trump, are not necessarily left leaning liberals. Some of us are moderate libertarians who fear a lunatic with one thumb typing on twitter and the other resting on the nuclear launch codes."
And folks who were afraid of Obama are not necessarily right leaning conservatives. Some of us are libertarians who fear a socialist lunatic who wants to turn America into the EU, further limit constitutional rights (altho only selectively, of course- and boy howdy did he try!), and thru refusing to acknowledge Islamic terrorism for what it is, further spreading it onto our shores (which happened).
Ditto Hillary- she would have been Obama 2.0, and admitted such. I'm still not convinced she isn't seriously ill... I guess we'll find out if she either passes away or disappears from public life soon.
I guess they knew nothing of Trump because he didn't have a private server in his basement. And the fact that the RNC wasn't hacked. Only the DNC. I hope he continues to use it twitter account. It must be working because it bothers the heck out of a lot of people. And by passing the MSM has really got their underwear in a bunch. 2 more days until we make America great again!!
Hi Ollie, you have some major facts wrong.
1) HRC's private email server was not hacked. Emails were turned over to State department, which made them public. Please go check this - Wikileaks even says that.
2) John Podesta's emails were hacked and released. However, that's a pretty easy task. I can explain how it could have been done, and honestly, I could probably do it to you or almost anyone, it does not take great effort.
3) The RNC had was hacked - or at least attempted. We don't know if information was collected and no released, or if they were unable to get into the RNC, or did not try very hard to get into the RNC
4) The DNC hacks (and the Clinton Foundation - again, separate incidents and NOT the mail server) would have been more sophisticated and separate than Podesta's email except for the likelihood that it is the same attacker(s).
I really resent when people who clearly don't know much, form incorrect opinions and state those opinions as fact.
So far, I have never spoken to one person who can correctly and fully explain the hacks and leaks, on either side of the isle.
Is there anyone here who (without googling) can explain what a mail server is, or could name one? I operate my own (not my primary email).
Can anyone actually tell me what was so wrong with HRC operating an email server?
Can anyone (again, without googling) explain what is meant when the media reports HRC "Bleached" her deleted emails, and what is wrong, or right, about doing it?
"Can anyone actually tell me what was so wrong with HRC operating an email server?"
From what I have gathered, there was nothing wrong with HRC operating an email server. There WAS something wrong with her putting classified information on it.
that being said, I'm with you on the hacks thing: NO ONE, including law enforcement, can or is saying DEFINITIVELY if these various accounts were hacked, if anything got out, or if it had anything to do with the election. In the end, much ado about nothing, because there's no proof anywhere. HOWEVER- if it was, in fact, a felony for HRC to have classified information on a private server, then she should be prosecuted, just like anyone else would be.
And she should CERTAINLY be prosecuted for purgery. Just like everyone else would be. However, I understand the Trump administration's "letting bygones be bygones" in an attempt to get on with the business of running the country, and i the hopes of greater unity between the left and the right (which will not happen, whether he chose to prosecute her or not.)
But as we all know, laws DON'T APPLY to those in power... one of our major problems in the country.
bleaching - overwriting the deleted data with 0's so they cant be recovered.
putting class on non class systems without the appropriate controls is illegal because it has no governance and controls in place.
Hi JeffersonRepub,
You're right on the classified information. The email server itself was likely an attempt to violate the Freedom of information act (FOIA) which is the law in which the State Department released her emails that ended up in Wikileaks. Fun Fact - Bill Clinton signed the eFOIA which mandated how long and which electronic records have to be kept. There may not be any legislation saying strictly no private servers, but it is surely implied. Also there's a federal records act that specifically mentions emails outside of federal systems must be stored for recording keeping and FOIA.
The amount of classified information was minimal - this is evident by the fact that the state department RELEASED almost all of her emails to the general public. You can request them yourself under the FOIA. You can do that for any elected official and all kinds of public records. You can request your own FBI file too.
Only 12 documents too classified to be released (After she "bleached" her email). Any punishment would have been very minimal, charges like mishandling classified information would have applies, rather than charges like Manning or Snowden face or charges under the espionage act, aiding the enemy, or other intentional abuse of classified materials. After all, she can't control who can SEND classified email to her private server (but those folks could potentially face charges as well!)
She probably should have been charged with obstruction of justice and various crimes related to deleting potential evidence. That would have been the most surefire way to find someone guilty - but it could be hard to nail it on her, and her IT guy get immunity. She's probably smart enough to have plausible deniability.
Hi Skippy, Bleaching isn't a real term used by any professionals. Neither is acid washed. Bleachbit is an open source program that does what you describe - overrides deleted data and free space on storage devices with zeros, multiple times. There are numerous government and DOD standards for overwriting data. If you are going to delete classified or sensitive information, she did it the right way - but for the wrong reasons. The correct thing for her to do would have been to turn over all the emails and then ask that her personal emails, emails unrelated to government work, etc, be excluded from the FOIA.
When you boil it down, it comes down to bad judgement. (Let's note Colin Powell and others influenced her decision to run a private email server).
If you guys are really concerned about classified data becoming public, you shouldn't be a Trump supporter.
His twitter account is a bigger threat to national security than HRC is and while HRC has bad judgement, let's not forget you can push the president elect into a full on tantrum by mocking him on SNL and he has a history of criminal activity, that would have landed any middle class person in prison for years.
- Let's not forget the president-elect bragged about committing sexual assault. He's also been accused of rape, several times
- He won't release his tax forms so you and I can't find out about who he may owe money too, or if he has paid any taxes (for a legit reason, or not).
- He ran a fake university taking thousands from vulnerable people
- He refused to pay hardworking contractors repeatedly, abusing bankruptcy laws and using his wealth to threaten them and force them to choose getting paid anything or going broke while fighting him in court for years and years.
- Various "self dealing" violations with his "charity"
- paying undocumented workers far below minimum wage (which also could be tax fraud)
- Among a list of criminal and suspected criminal acts, dealings, scams, longer than the collective resumes of the entire congress.
He'll probably tweet out classified information by the end of the year.
4catmom a1b,
I'm just looking for EQUAL scrutiny and justice on BOTH sides. Hillary didn't get it. Why should Trump, or anyone else? That's my whole point: ALL this crap - on BOTH sides- are just smoking guns, the stuff on which our well-planned-out, severely-corrupt, 2-party system designed.... collusion, obfuscation, plausible deniability, cronyism, it's a very high level game of good cop bad cop. I suggest just about everyone on both sides has done something immoral, illegal, and probably things the rest of us would be prosecuted for.
JeffersonRepub - there you are dead on! I doubt there is one elected official on a federal level that hasn't done something illegal, and certainly not one in NJ!
I don't think HRC committed a major crime in the emails, and its not having the server itself, or deleting the emails - but the failure to provide them in accordance with federal record keeping that is the real crime (if she had provided them, she could delete anything she wanted afterwards).
I honestly don't think you'd find an unbiased jury that would convict her. She's old, not exactly computer literate, and would be portrayed as just trying to get the job done by any means. Even if she was convicted, I doubt she would have gotten a full year, even with a fair trial. What she should have gotten is a trip to Cybersecurity 101.
Part of the problem is there's too much money to be made working the system, you have to remove money from politics. And that's part of why whistleblowers are important - someone has to keep everyone honest and make it clear corruption and illegal activities won't be tolerated.
"Part of the problem is there's too much money to be made working the system, you have to remove money from politics. And that's part of why whistleblowers are important - someone has to keep everyone honest and make it clear corruption and illegal activities won't be tolerated."
Completely agree- it's just unnerving when so many LOVE wikileaks when it's anti-Bush, but disregard it when it's anti-Hillary. The hypocrisy is what pisses me off. He's early releasing Manning, therefore Snowden should also get a pardon.
I agree that bleaching is not a term used in InfoSec however that's what is being referred too - great posts today.
You also have to remember while she can't control who sent her classified email - that was the mechanism that was in place to contact her - she accessed class data via an untrusted devices on hostile networks (foreign cellular networks) as a current TS holder I would be jailed for 35 years for that
alpha1beta - You've got a good deal of information in the string of your posts, but I think there's one thing you overlooked. You mention the FOI issues of the private server as a motivation as well as a possible crime. Do you recall one of the things the server did was auto-forward to the State Department any "business account" emails? The State Department server being on the inside has auto archive that satisfies the FOI requirements. When the FBI did the investigation, and even before the investigation HRC did not have to turn over any archives in order to satisfy any FOI requests. They were already there. Also remember when it all started the furor was started with FUD about there being 30,000 emails because the State Dept archive had about 10,000. (approx numbers) The State Department was aware of the server even though they had recommended against it. However, it would never have been approved if it was instantly clear they would have to go to HRC every time they had an FOI request. Not only that, as far as I know, solving the FOI requirements are essentially impossible on a private server which is exactly why they made it auto-forward to where it was already handled.
You are correct about the handling of confidentiality though. JR's initial statement about not allowing classified emails is incorrect. There are certainly loads of regulations as you mentioned, but the server had other re-write rules besides the auto-forward that handled that. Although it's not explicitly stated in the FBI report, it was implied the routing of the email on the outgoing side had to be different, as well as the archiving destination was also different. That all seems to have be handled correctly except for cases where the sender mishandled classified information. That's the source of the 12 bad cases. The re-write rules looked for the required notices in the email headers and title. If those were left out, the rule would not kick in. You can say that maybe that shouldn't have been left to the sender to handle but think about any email that accidentally tries to use "(c)" for "copyright".
As for the initial reasoning and what the private email server was all about, it seems to be something far more mundane. HRC was addicted to the Crackberry. Her primary reason for the server was so she didn't have to carry around two of them all the time. She would have had to constantly go back and forth between private and "business" phones. That's all. The real bad judgment was in placing the convenience ahead of the appearance of failure to comply. Even if she did comply.
The other parts you mentioned about Wikileaks I generally agree with. But also remember that as much as people should have ethics, they don't. Nice in practice that falls apart in the real world.
GC Here are the three most frequently cited laws that appear to have been violated by Clinton:
1. Mishandling Classified Information
Executive Order 13526 and 18 U.S.C Sec. 793(f) of the federal code make it unlawful to send or store classified information on personal email.
By using a private email system, Secretary Clinton violated the Federal Records Act and the State Department’s Foreign Affairs Manual regarding records management, and worse, could have left classified and top secret documents vulnerable to cyber attack,' Cause of Action Executive Director Dan Epstein said in an email to reporters.
'This is an egregious violation of the law, and if it were anyone else, they could be facing fines and criminal prosecution.'”
Multiple violations of this law have been enforced recently, including in 1999, when former CIA Director John M. Deutch's security clearance was suspended for using his personal email to send classified information.
Additionally, this past week, Gen. David Patraeus pleaded guilty for mishandling classified information by using a Gmail account instead of his official government email.
2. Violation of The 2009 Federal Records Act
Section 1236.22 of the 2009 National Archives and Records Administration (NARA) requirements states that:
“Agencies that allow employees to send and receive official electronic mail messages using a system not operated by the agency must ensure that Federal records sent or received on such systems are preserved in the appropriate agency record keeping system.”
According to the original story on Clinton's emails published in The New York Times:
"Federal regulations, since 2009, have required that all emails be preserved as part of an agency’s record-keeping system. In Mrs. Clinton’s case, her emails were kept on her personal account and her staff took no steps to have them preserved as part of State Department record.
In response to a State Department request, Mrs. Clinton’s advisers, late last year, reviewed her account and decided which emails to turn over to the State Department."
The fact that the State Department combs through the 55,000 pages of emails sent on Clinton's private email account seems to verify that at least some of the emails Clinton sent contained classified information.
3. Violation of the Freedom Of Information Act (FOIA)
Veterans for a Strong America has filed a lawsuit against the State Department over potential violations of FOIA. Joel Arends, chairman of the non-profit group, explained to the Washington Examiner that their FOIA request over the Benghazi affair specifically asked for any personal email accounts Secretary Clinton may have used:
“'At this point in time, I think we're the only ones that specifically asked for both her personal and government email and phone logs,' Arends said of his group's Benghazi-related request.”
MSNBC's Lawrence O'Donnell believes that the use of a personal emails server appears to be a preemptive move, specifically designed to circumvent FOIA:
“'Hillary Clinton’s system was designed to defy Freedom of Information Act requests, which is designed to defy the law.'”
What are your thoughts on commuting the sentence of the FALN terrorist? Not starting an argument just curious on your thoughts. Personally I find it disgusting.
HI GC, I only ever saw one source on auto-forwarding and did not have enough confidence to mention it. She did turn over emails, possible sent emails, or a backup archive? Would you mind posting a link to a reliable source if you know of a good one?
Potentially any auto forward could still allow her to bypass FOIA requests, either by keyword, sender, or custom email headers.
And you are right on the Crackberry part. I suspect the likely thing is the state department email sucks (all big corporate email sucks). She probably asked around, Colin Powell and others suggested using a private server. In all likelihood, she got permission from some low level IT guy who didn't know what to do, and she acted on it. My personal bet is she found out the additional benefits (FOIA avoidance, etc) somepoint after that.
It's also quite possible that some of her email clients don't support the confidential headers. I've used those headers, not all clients support them. Potentially her phone might say it's classified, but her desktop email client does not, or vice versa.
All in all, it became a crazy sensationalist story for some not very exciting emails and the lousy reporting by the media, and the illegal hacks (aren't all "hacks" illegal?) changed the course of history forever.
I'll throw this out there too - if you want to protect yourself from having almost any account hacked, the simplest thing you can do is turn on 2 Factor Auth. That would have likely protected John Podesta's emails and potentially could have been used to protect the DNC hacks and the Clinton Foundation hacks.
I use gmail with a custom domain as my primary email, with 2 factor auth setup by security key (hardware), software token and text code backup.
I also use https://protonmail.com/ which is awesome as it encrypts your mail as it is stored (I need a total of 3 passwords and a 2-factor auth code to access my protonmail account)
You can find out more on 2FA and services that have it here https://twofactorauth.org/
Ollie, I disagree with many of Obama's pardons and commutations but I have not had a chance to read up on the full list. I'll try to remember to respond once I'm caught up. I know there were many drug crimes, but most of what I have seen it not personal use and seemed like the scum would be better kept behind bars.
A1B I agree with you about systems for personal use but that does not compare to air gapped SCI systems and there's no governance and compliance there - HRC had what appears to be an exchange server
I don't think email servers can ever really be airgapped unless you're whole network is local, but yes, government systems have many more regulations to follow, but that doesn't protect from user stupidity (failing for phishing, setting a weak password, password reuse)
agreed - also there was nothing making that device NIST 800-45 compliant
http://csrc.nist.gov/publications/nistpubs/800-45-version2/SP800-45v2.pdf
it certainly was not 800-53 Rev 4 compliant.
http://nvlpubs.nist.gov/nistpubs/SpecialPublications/NIST.SP.800-53r4.pdf
even so - non cleared people had access to the data - show me where her contract admin completed an SF-86. management can be air gapped with a blow away VM
Commenting is no longer available.