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The Intercept: NSA report details Russian hacking effort days before 2016 US election

Cirion

Banned
She must be doomed, don't think the US is kind to leakers at all.

Considering "liberal" people in this forum argued that Chelsea Mannings lenghty, inhuman imprisonment was justified and cheered the possibility of Eward Snowden getting sent back to the US by Putin to possibly get executed, calling him a "traitor" many times: Yes.
 

Theonik

Member
I really want a timetable released on all of this. If they knew this was going on in months prior to the election, why weren't we informed about it then?
To avoid appearances that Obama was trying to influence the election that would have turned a very serious matter into a politicised issue. More so than it's already been.
 

geestack

Member
grain of salt:

that woman tweeting about "opsec" thinks bernie bros are russian bots:
6TzreOm.jpg


so yeah, massive grain of salt. she probably learned the word opsec today from all the tweets floating around about the arrest of the leaker.

and, considering the fact that the intercept and glenn greenwald were so paranoid about leaks and exposing snowden enough to put their phones in the refrigerator while they were talking, i don't think they burned a source. reading the justice department thing, it seems pretty easy to figure out who it was given that she used her work computer and they track which documents are seen
 

TAJ

Darkness cannot drive out darkness; only light can do that. Hate cannot drive out hate; only love can do that.
Putin 's reckless meddling will blow back on him. He has fermented (anti-Russian sentiment among Americans and the western world in a way there hasn't been for a long time.

Fomented.
But yeah.
 
that woman tweeting about "opsec" thinks bernie bros are russian bots:
6TzreOm.jpg


so yeah, massive grain of salt. she probably learned the word opsec today from all the tweets floating around about the arrest of the leaker.

and, considering the fact that the intercept and glenn greenwald were so paranoid about leaks and exposing snowden enough to put their phones in the refrigerator while they were talking, i don't think they burned a source. reading the justice department thing, it seems pretty easy to figure out who it was given that she used her work computer and they track which documents are seen

Of course they screwed up, Snowden was the one who told them how to behave securely. They probably forgot or never really knew.

The intercept is regarded by a bunch of people as Putin influenced. It might be simpler to say they are useful idiots.

The same people who say the intercept was russian influenced also say this report was exactly what Putin wants to happen. Because everything Putin influenced people do is supposed to be perfectly aligned with his game plan but it is more likely they wanted to break a story and they screwed up. And given Trumps focus on Leaks the FBI and DOJ could score an easy take down of a young contractor who didn't realise how to do things right.

It doesn't really matter - except for her and her family - the report is real and the aim of the attackers to specifically target election counting related firms, the way they specifically targeted the DNC etc, is the news.
 

TAJ

Darkness cannot drive out darkness; only light can do that. Hate cannot drive out hate; only love can do that.
I doubt though we'll ever get an investigation on this because I think government officials do not want to taint the actual totals and results. If the Russians did indeed successfully penetrate into the voting election system we won't find out about for many years later once Trump is long out of office.

That's like washing your hands before handling fish that's been left unrefrigerated for a couple weeks.
 
that woman tweeting about "opsec" thinks bernie bros are russian bots:
6TzreOm.jpg


so yeah, massive grain of salt. she probably learned the word opsec today from all the tweets floating around about the arrest of the leaker.

and, considering the fact that the intercept and glenn greenwald were so paranoid about leaks and exposing snowden enough to put their phones in the refrigerator while they were talking, i don't think they burned a source. reading the justice department thing, it seems pretty easy to figure out who it was given that she used her work computer and they track which documents are seen

Actually, the paranoia was all Snowden's. If you read the book on it, all that stuff delayed the leaks by a good amount of time. Can't recall if it was weeks or months, but basically, Snowden came outta nowhere saying "hey, if you jump through all these hoops, I'll talk to you," and Greenwald said "pffft, nah," until Snowden finally convinced him.

So it's hard to say where the ball was dropped, but when someone is emailing news orgs from their work pc...
 

Cirion

Banned
The same people who say the intercept was russian influenced also say this report was exactly what Putin wants to happen. Because everything Putin influenced people do is supposed to be perfectly aligned with his game plan but it is more likely they wanted to break a story and they screwed up. And given Trumps focus on Leaks the FBI and DOJ could score an easy take down of a young contractor who didn't realise how to do things right.

So, Putin hired a 25-year old contractor to leak this document to the Intercept who then presents his Russian bias by publishing a heavy-hitting story about Russian hacking attempts connected to the election? Man this guy certainly plays 564646th dimensional chess.

Get real. Stop with this absolutely ridiculous theories about Bond villain mastermind Putin controlling everything just for justifying your personal, unsubstantiated (as explained multiple times in this thread already) bias against the Intercept. I mean, are you for real? You are trying to use an anti-Russian story from the Intercept as proof for a Pro-Russian bias? That's some Spicer level spinning.

What happened to the woman is horrible. It's entirely reasonable to assume that such reports would maybe never see the light of day in a Trump-controlled environment. There are enough Trump shills around, even in the IC. By making this public, she throws another direct wrench in the lies and deflections of Trump and the GOP. She did nothing wrong. The amount of possible prison time is, as usual for US standards, infuriating and laughable.
 
https://twitter.com/max_read/status/871853843906265092

This was linked through a few reporters' twitters. Seems like a reasonable conclusion. The gist is that the DOJ would've found her immediately regardless of the crease and that they're playing up the crease to discourage leaking.

We're too quick to give random people on Twitter, like this lady, credit and run with their theories just because they shoot out a long tweet.
 
I do it because A) he's is in for name awareness only and I'm not giving him that and B) because that IS the position he has and people really need to remember that this is not some normal tantrum child running amok. This is a position in which only a few dozen people have held power, and that means any damage done by him will be significant, long-term, and probably permanent in some ways.

You can roll your eyes all you want, but he IS the 45th President Of The United States of America. It is the office that Americans elected him to, and it is where he does his damage to Putin's America. Calling him by his old life just makes it seem as he isn't elected to the worst possible position he could have.

Also I'm tired of seeing his name and honestly just want it gone at this point. So 45 it is. I expect to switch to 46 soonish though.

You took what I said entirely the wrong way. I'm not saying what I'm saying to somehow deny Trump is President. I'm saying it because just calling him 45 is dumb. If you can't stomach calling him President, just call him Trump lol. Everyone knows he's President, you don't have to go through mental gymnastics to justify it. If you can't stand that call him Don the Con or something. This ain't damn The Prisoner.
 
The gist is that the DOJ would've found her immediately regardless of the crease and that they're playing up the crease to discourage leaking.

thats a silly way to discourage leaking. If they want to scare contractors say that every print out is encoded with small changes that survive photographs and so on and ties it back to the secure facility, user id and time if was printed. If you want to redesign the NSA to scare leakers you make its systems always produce (whether screen or printer) subtly unique versions of everything stored that contains digital watermarks.
 
that woman tweeting about "opsec" thinks bernie bros are russian bots:
6TzreOm.jpg


so yeah, massive grain of salt. she probably learned the word opsec today from all the tweets floating around about the arrest of the leaker.

and, considering the fact that the intercept and glenn greenwald were so paranoid about leaks and exposing snowden enough to put their phones in the refrigerator while they were talking, i don't think they burned a source. reading the justice department thing, it seems pretty easy to figure out who it was given that she used her work computer and they track which documents are seen

There is plenty of evidence that there were Russian bots working against Clinton in the primaries. That doesn't mean that Sanders was, in any way, working with the Russians. Only that they were working to help him defeat Clinton.

Clinton Watts touched on this in his testimony before congress. Because these bot networks have to work in the open, they can be pretty easily tracked. It would be even easier to track their work if Twitter or Facebook assisted, but neither is enthusiastic to publicize how much of their traffic is bot related.
 
Even before your edit, Glenn Greenwald won a pulitzer for the work he did at the Guardian as a precursor to The Intercept, so I dunno where your post even starts to make sense at all.

They're not a conspiracy site.

Also, The Intercept's verification process informed the NSA of the leak, and the leaker got themselves arrested pretty much immediately.

That so many people are skeptical of The Intercept is pretty surprising to me, though it really shouldn't be in 2017.

I referenced arguments and reporting done by Greenwald at a prestigious graduate school. My professors considered him a legitimate source. That was years ago before the craziness of Snowden, Assange, and Trump though so maybe it would be different now.
 

nomster

Member
We're too quick to give random people on Twitter, like this lady, credit and run with their theories just because they shoot out a long tweet.
I dont know - this is just someone pointing out something pretty obvious then inferring something for discussion, not breaking news. Their only point is this person would've been arrested regardless, which is true, the NSA would certainly have checked to see if the doc had been printed.
 
I saw "Bernie bros" on Twitter who magically switched to Trump out of outrage when he was out.

They were definitely playing both sides.
 

CazTGG

Member
But guys, Putin said Russia didn't do this. He wouldn't lie to us, right?

Right?

Sarcasm, obviously. He's going to try something similar during Canada's election, no doubt.
 

PantherLotus

Professional Schmuck
CALLED IT.

The *one* thing I couldn't get over this entire time is how we're supposed to believe Russia went to all these lengths with disinformation and bots and fake news and turning actual members of campaigns ... but didn't get fucky with polling machines? We're supposed to believe that??

oprah.gif
 

-x.Red.x-

Member
What if... Hear me out. Bernie was working with the Russians? Now that is a twist I do not expect and love to see what would fucking happen next.
 
I dont know - this is just someone pointing out something pretty obvious then inferring something for discussion, not breaking news. Their only point is this person would've been arrested regardless, which is true, the NSA would certainly have checked to see if the doc had been printed.

Correct! the Obama DOJ would do exactly the same thing.

It is true that leaks make the IC look a bit inept (which helps Putin) but it is also true that public confirmation that Russia was aiming at a voting contractor is not helpful to his lies and is likely to accelerate pressure to tighten up the election system and investigate collusion and increase sanctions (which hurts Putin).

While he may have a chuckle at all the internal finger pointing, it doesn't make sense that he would want to orchestrate this, and if he did want to, it says something about how few bombs he has left to throw.
 

TAJ

Darkness cannot drive out darkness; only light can do that. Hate cannot drive out hate; only love can do that.
After hearing time and again that polling machines would have to be tampered with individually on-site I'm shocked-not-shocked that it can be done just before they're deployed.

What if... Hear me out. Bernie was working with the Russians? Now that is a twist I do not expect and love to see what would fucking happen next.

Bernie is just a useful idiot. Jill Stein, though...
 
Reality Winner is a hero, with a perfect hero name to boot! I know she was arrested, but I hope she isn't charged.

She will be considered a hero for the next four years. In 2020, she will get pardoned and will get a book deal for millions. I would make the same trade. lol.
 

Tzmhero

Member
I can't wait for Trump to weirdly double down on this.

'YES THE RUSSIANS HACKED THE ELECTIONS. BEST HACKERS. AMAZING HACKERS. I KNOW THESE HACKERS. But the whole Russian thing is fake news and they are going to fund the wall and this is all because Hillary didn't go to jail and-'

Then he just explodes.
 
Yeah, I'm confused about this, too.
Not sure how it works anywhere else, but original ballots at my voting location were scanned and then shredded. So the recount still looked at the electronic data, and if it was compromised, then recounts are worth the same as the shit data it is recounting...
 

watershed

Banned
Not at all surprising. The Obama administration really should have stepped in and said something sooner but if reports are to believed they felt a Hillary victory was assured, didn't want to politicize Russian interference, and wanted to give President Clinton the space to respond to Russia on her own terms. All 3 assumptions were mistaken.
 

sazzy

Member
Why did The Intercept provide the leaked document AS IS to the NSA for comment/verification?

What a dumb move.
 
It's too late to know what sort of damage this hacking done to the elections. But it's more evidence of the collision between Trump's administration and the Russians.
 

Mully

Member
Obama didn't want to. Plus if this came out would have helped Trump with the whole Rigged statements.

I somewhat wonder whether the rigged statements were part of the plan. If Russia knew of an Obama announcement on the hacking, they could have preempted it with a major disinformation campaign that then Trump could have picked up on.
 

Mully

Member
Voter registrations were tampered with in Arizona. I know someone who has lived and voted there for years but in the past election their ballot was made provisional. I absolutely believe this was done.

There were also some issues in Connecticut database the night of the election. The CT Secretary of State's vote database was switching votes for candidates up and down the ballot once totals were sent in from local precincts. Bridgeport's system was also down for hours.
 

antonz

Member
I somewhat wonder whether the rigged statements were part of the plan. If Russia knew of an Obama announcement on the hacking, they could have preempted it with a major disinformation campaign that then Trump could have picked up on.

The Russians worked things masterfully with the help of the fact the very type of people to support Trump are the people to buy into conspiracies about Obama etc. It would have been Emperor Obumbo trying to steal the election etc etc.

Its frustrating because I managed to talk my Republican family out of voting for Trump in the election and they still dislike Trump but still think the Russian stuff even if True is only cared about so Obama can try and get back into office. Got into a shouting match with them today over the fact that every single conspiracy they have bought into about Obama has never happened and never will happen yet they still hold onto them.
 

chekhonte

Member
I really wonder what the NSA is planning to do about this kind of shit in the future and if they're planning on countering it.

This kind of shit is nightmarish.
 

Tovarisc

Member
DOJ charges alleged media leaker under Espionage Act

The Trump administration on Monday brought its first case under the Espionage Act, charging an intelligence agency contractor with leaking a classified document to a news outlet.

The leaked document described in the charges appears to match a top-secret National Security Agency analysis published Monday afternoon by The Intercept, detailing Russian efforts to tamper with U.S. election systems.
http://www.politico.com/story/2017/06/05/media-leaks-cybersecurity-espionage-239162
 

antonz

Member
Lol the bots are at war with Assange now for supporting her.

The new narrative is there with the bots too. She leaked "Fake intel"
 

Balphon

Member
Charging a national security information leaker under the Espionage Act?

Of all the Obama administration policies to actually keep, they had to pick one of the worst?
 
Espionage Act of 1917 putting in work

This is what was constantly used for other whistleblowers who leaked to the press over the past 8 years. Funny how giving information to journalists always gets conflated with "espionage".
 
What if... Hear me out. Bernie was working with the Russians? Now that is a twist I do not expect and love to see what would fucking happen next.

Look this campaign is more like a M Night movie when it comes to twists. Bernie being the mastermind is WWE levels and 45's campaign is not at that level.
 
I dont know - this is just someone pointing out something pretty obvious then inferring something for discussion, not breaking news. Their only point is this person would've been arrested regardless, which is true, the NSA would certainly have checked to see if the doc had been printed.

I was referring to Leah McElrath's tweets. Not the Max Read one I quoted.

She's accusing an outlet of carelessly "burning" a whistleblower, leading to that whistleblower's arrest. That's a hugely serious accusation and also apparently not true. We shouldn't let the quickest person to make a wild claim on the tweet machine hijack the conversation the way we do.
 
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