Clinton ran own computer system for her official emails(news.yahoo.com)
news.yahoo.com
Clinton ran own computer system for her official emails
http://news.yahoo.com/clinton-ran-own-computer-system-121721814.html
99 comments
Was a record keeping law broken or not? Real question; I don't know.
Obviously there are political motivations. But any time a law is broken by a candidate or official, it's hard to argue that it's not honest news. May be blown out of proportion, etc., but still legitimate news.
If a law wasn't broken, it might look like she's hiding something, but I agree that it's probably going to be quickly forgotten.
Also, the political motivations might not be partisan. Partisans would choose timing carefully for maximum effect, and this doesn't seem like bad timing for Democrats. If the story blows up huge, they can nominate someone else; and if not, they nominate Clinton and this is forgotten by the time of the general election.
Obviously there are political motivations. But any time a law is broken by a candidate or official, it's hard to argue that it's not honest news. May be blown out of proportion, etc., but still legitimate news.
If a law wasn't broken, it might look like she's hiding something, but I agree that it's probably going to be quickly forgotten.
Also, the political motivations might not be partisan. Partisans would choose timing carefully for maximum effect, and this doesn't seem like bad timing for Democrats. If the story blows up huge, they can nominate someone else; and if not, they nominate Clinton and this is forgotten by the time of the general election.
A political hit job? I'm sorry, but any high level federal employee with a high security clearance sending all official email communications from their personal email server should be investigated. The government is going to have a system in place far better than most can provide.
The only two reasons I can think of why she would choose private over government issued is ease of use and control over access. If it is too bothersome for her to use a government account, then she shouldn't be in the position. If she's afraid she'll leave incriminating evidence, we don't need her.
The only two reasons I can think of why she would choose private over government issued is ease of use and control over access. If it is too bothersome for her to use a government account, then she shouldn't be in the position. If she's afraid she'll leave incriminating evidence, we don't need her.
Could she have been dodging the NSA?
It is unethical if she used it to hide government business that should be available to the public.
> So, anyone with a brain realizes this is a political hit job leading up to the 2016 presidential election.
This. Recall that only a few weeks ago, the leading republican candidate was falling all over himself announce that he was publishing all his emails from his time in office. In the seemingly desperate rush to make a spectacle of it, he didn't even redact the emails [1], and released a big pile of private data as a result.
Also, given the state of the State Department's computer network [2], who can blame her? But the most telling part is that she wasn't even the first Secretary of State to do this, she was the last.
I don't say this because I'm a supporter, it just seems like obvious political theater being run by the rival camp and merits being called out. Personally I'm disappointed that both the Clinton and Bush campaigns aren't being laughed off the stage. Political aristocracy is repugnant and has no place in this country.
[1] http://www.theverge.com/2015/2/10/8013531/jeb-bush-florida-e...
[2] http://gizmodo.com/state-department-computer-systems-hit-by-...
This. Recall that only a few weeks ago, the leading republican candidate was falling all over himself announce that he was publishing all his emails from his time in office. In the seemingly desperate rush to make a spectacle of it, he didn't even redact the emails [1], and released a big pile of private data as a result.
Also, given the state of the State Department's computer network [2], who can blame her? But the most telling part is that she wasn't even the first Secretary of State to do this, she was the last.
I don't say this because I'm a supporter, it just seems like obvious political theater being run by the rival camp and merits being called out. Personally I'm disappointed that both the Clinton and Bush campaigns aren't being laughed off the stage. Political aristocracy is repugnant and has no place in this country.
[1] http://www.theverge.com/2015/2/10/8013531/jeb-bush-florida-e...
[2] http://gizmodo.com/state-department-computer-systems-hit-by-...
This is reporting. Fox News is the only media outlet that has any significant share of the audience in America that would even remotely consider expending an ounce of resources trying to keep a liberal democrat out of office.
If you don't believe that, then you are probably a liberal democrat.
So, to call this news story about a politician acting in a premeditated, unscrupulous/unethical manner a "hit job" shows your deep political bias.
To turn it around, would you feel it was a "hit job" if a politician whose ideas and agendas you disagree with, set up an outside email server for the express purpose of discussing official government business so that it wouldn't/couldn't be easily tracked? I don't think you would.
If you don't believe that, then you are probably a liberal democrat.
So, to call this news story about a politician acting in a premeditated, unscrupulous/unethical manner a "hit job" shows your deep political bias.
To turn it around, would you feel it was a "hit job" if a politician whose ideas and agendas you disagree with, set up an outside email server for the express purpose of discussing official government business so that it wouldn't/couldn't be easily tracked? I don't think you would.
I find your response a bit insulting and presumptuous.
I'm sufficiently well developed to separate my feelings about a politician from their political party, and in turn from my own feelings about an abstract ethical scenario. And none of this is to say anything about my political beliefs, which are personal and none of anyones beeswax.
This isn't abstract either, as some other poster mentioned, this is widespread, bipartisan behavior. I think that if there is evidence of malfeasance, then they should be required to produce their email (privately served or not) via subpoena. I can see the loophole about having people policing their own email archiving, but I honestly do not know if that is illegal, hence why I asked if any experts here knew if this violated any laws or policies.
EDIT: also, you assume this is sourced from a conservative or Republican group? Primaries happen before generals.
I'm sufficiently well developed to separate my feelings about a politician from their political party, and in turn from my own feelings about an abstract ethical scenario. And none of this is to say anything about my political beliefs, which are personal and none of anyones beeswax.
This isn't abstract either, as some other poster mentioned, this is widespread, bipartisan behavior. I think that if there is evidence of malfeasance, then they should be required to produce their email (privately served or not) via subpoena. I can see the loophole about having people policing their own email archiving, but I honestly do not know if that is illegal, hence why I asked if any experts here knew if this violated any laws or policies.
EDIT: also, you assume this is sourced from a conservative or Republican group? Primaries happen before generals.
As someone who does have a deep leftist bias, I honestly would not care if a Republican was doing this, unless the law was actually broken.
Didn't Cheney have a man-sized safe in his office or something? I don't remember anyone on the left screaming about that.
Didn't Cheney have a man-sized safe in his office or something? I don't remember anyone on the left screaming about that.
hehe someone has been watching house of cards a bit too earnestly.
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Surely, this must have been common knowledge at the State Dept. Wouldn't they have noticed that her emails came from a domain that wasn't dos.gov? And if she was communicating with other State Department officials, wouldn't the emails they received from her at their dos.gov email be part of the public record anyway, defeating the purpose of running your own server?
I just read at tech dirt that she gave staffers email from her domain. So there's that.
https://www.techdirt.com/articles/20150303/17404530204/what-...
Her emails may have looked like they did come from dos.gov. It's trivial to spoof a From header.
Does not appear to be the case, "Guccifer" was the first to bring this to light after he broke into Sidney Blumenthal's AOL account, they came from "[email protected]".
Hah! Try spoofing an email to a recipient in the State Dept and tell me how it works out :)
Find me someone in the State Department willing to be the recipient and I will happily conduct this experiment. Why do you think it would be any harder to spoof an email to the State Dept than anywhere else?
[deleted]
http://mxtoolbox.com/SuperTool.aspx?action=spf%3astate.gov&r....
"No SPF records found"
Looks pretty spoofable.
"No SPF records found"
Looks pretty spoofable.
SPF only validates the envelope, not the From header. To do that you need DKIM, and I'd be surprised if Dept of State has implemented that.
I'm okay if she ran Postfix. If she ran Sendmail, I have issues.
Was the server actually at her house or was the domain name just registered with that as an address? Neither option seems even slightly damning.
I think the bigger issue is that she's skirting rules that the rest of gov't has to follow.
Similar to the trend of government setting rules for everyone that they conveniently exempt themselves from.
Similar to the trend of government setting rules for everyone that they conveniently exempt themselves from.
Not necessarily. A much more important issue to me is the fact that top-ranking government officials are using e-mail for official business at all. If there's any reason to be concerned that Clinton was using an insecure account for official e-mails, that implies that other government officials use e-mail to communicate sensitive information. Since e-mail is inherently insecure (unless you're using GPG or PGP or some other kind of message level encryption, which they're probably not), this is the real problem here.
Having worked with / for the US government, encryption and signing email is actually fairly common.
For the most part people use a 2+ factor authentication and their smart cards have private keys. EX: http://www.cac.mil/common-access-card/
After it's set up Outlook then let's people encrypt with a simple click. The recipient then needs their card + PIN to decrypt.
PS: This is one of those cases where the US Government seems to be significantly ahead of the private sector in terms of actual adoption and use.
For the most part people use a 2+ factor authentication and their smart cards have private keys. EX: http://www.cac.mil/common-access-card/
After it's set up Outlook then let's people encrypt with a simple click. The recipient then needs their card + PIN to decrypt.
PS: This is one of those cases where the US Government seems to be significantly ahead of the private sector in terms of actual adoption and use.
Thanks for the info.
But I'm a bit confused. If government officials have the ability to easily encrypt their messages asymmetrically, AND they're supposed to store all of their messages in some kind of database, that sort of defeats the purpose of the encryption in the first place. Also, having a central store of all that information seems really risky and inherently less secure than a message encrypted asymmetrically.
And, for that matter, if they are supposed to encrypt messages with a private key, that means they're not using asymmetric encryption for private communication. I'm not a security expert, but that seems like a bad move.
But I'm a bit confused. If government officials have the ability to easily encrypt their messages asymmetrically, AND they're supposed to store all of their messages in some kind of database, that sort of defeats the purpose of the encryption in the first place. Also, having a central store of all that information seems really risky and inherently less secure than a message encrypted asymmetrically.
And, for that matter, if they are supposed to encrypt messages with a private key, that means they're not using asymmetric encryption for private communication. I'm not a security expert, but that seems like a bad move.
It's not just about encription it's also a question of varification that the email came from the person that it seems to. That's where the senders smart card comes into play they sign the email and need it to get the recepents public key.
Also, the government wants a back door. So, they keep a copy of the private key's and assign them to an employee. The goal is to prevent interception and or data breeches on a lost laptop, not to hide the information from everyone.
The same backdoor exits with full disk encryption so internal IT can help users who forgot their password etc.
Also, the government wants a back door. So, they keep a copy of the private key's and assign them to an employee. The goal is to prevent interception and or data breeches on a lost laptop, not to hide the information from everyone.
The same backdoor exits with full disk encryption so internal IT can help users who forgot their password etc.
What would you have them use? Carrier pigeons?
E-Mail is universal in both business and government. Using TLS, it is sufficiently secure for most communications. For the rest, I'm sure the CIA and NSA know how to use PGP.
E-Mail is universal in both business and government. Using TLS, it is sufficiently secure for most communications. For the rest, I'm sure the CIA and NSA know how to use PGP.
Why the sarcasm?
And yes, TLS will securely transmit your message securely from your client (whether it's Outlook or a web browser) to your e-mail server. But you don't have any guarantee that the various relays which transport your message will use TLS.
And yes, TLS will securely transmit your message securely from your client (whether it's Outlook or a web browser) to your e-mail server. But you don't have any guarantee that the various relays which transport your message will use TLS.
You do if the email is only going to be on the local network. Most email is sent within the organization. It might not even need to leave the email server. My point is that TLS is good enough for most scenarios.
It is possible that all .gov-to-.gov emails go over a VPN linking all their mail servers together. Having government business conducted on a mail server not on this hypothetical VPN would be a security risk.
From my understanding in the Politico article[1], it appears the server was at the Clinton residence:
"And since the Secret Service was guarding Clinton’s home, an email server there would have been well protected from theft or a physical hacking."
[1] http://www.politico.com/story/2015/03/hillary-clinton-email-...
"And since the Secret Service was guarding Clinton’s home, an email server there would have been well protected from theft or a physical hacking."
[1] http://www.politico.com/story/2015/03/hillary-clinton-email-...
That's a slap up based on the same thin information as all the rest of the reporting.
more: The press comments about the location of the server sure do sound a lot more like misunderstanding than they do careful research.
more: The press comments about the location of the server sure do sound a lot more like misunderstanding than they do careful research.
You might be right. The other thing that doesn't sound right is how the server runs MX Logic, which is an email service/server run by McAfee. So there is a total misunderstanding by the press of how domains/dns/servers/email services work.
This guy is studying the issue:
http://thedailybanter.com/2015/03/aps-bombshell-hillary-clin...
The initial AP article wasn't specific about the server location, but various media outlets omitted that sentence.
Later updates to the AP article do state that a business record related to the server has been traced to her home, but the various republished editions of the AP story swamp search, so it is difficult to find any actual analysis of the technical details.
A discussion here on HN is the best I've found:
https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=9148730
The records for the mail server do point to an ip address from a provider in the area of her home. But there is no further evidence.
http://thedailybanter.com/2015/03/aps-bombshell-hillary-clin...
The initial AP article wasn't specific about the server location, but various media outlets omitted that sentence.
Later updates to the AP article do state that a business record related to the server has been traced to her home, but the various republished editions of the AP story swamp search, so it is difficult to find any actual analysis of the technical details.
A discussion here on HN is the best I've found:
https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=9148730
The records for the mail server do point to an ip address from a provider in the area of her home. But there is no further evidence.
Almost certainly the domain registration.
> Hoteham was listed as the customer at Clinton's $1.7 million home on Old House Lane in Chappaqua in records registering the Internet address for her email server since August 2010.
Does that sound like the information you get from running whois on an IP address or on a domain name?
> Clinton's private email server was reconfigured again to use a Denver-based commercial email provider, MX Logic
How the fuck would anybody know how her private server was reconfigured unless they're talking about mx records?
> Hoteham was listed as the customer at Clinton's $1.7 million home on Old House Lane in Chappaqua in records registering the Internet address for her email server since August 2010.
Does that sound like the information you get from running whois on an IP address or on a domain name?
> Clinton's private email server was reconfigured again to use a Denver-based commercial email provider, MX Logic
How the fuck would anybody know how her private server was reconfigured unless they're talking about mx records?
It's just poor reporting. I think they're misunderstanding their sources. I agree with you that the source is DNS, and they mean, "her email domain" was reconfigured, rather than her server.
> In November 2012, without explanation, Clinton's private email account was reconfigured to use Google's servers as a backup in case her own personal email server failed, according to Internet records.
I took "Internet Records" to mean MX record for her domain. I'm assuming there are people keeping track of DNS changes publicly that one can view somewhere. Someone will probably respond to this post with a link.
I took "Internet Records" to mean MX record for her domain. I'm assuming there are people keeping track of DNS changes publicly that one can view somewhere. Someone will probably respond to this post with a link.
I interpreted it as "she's using Google Apps on her own domain, which has a registered address of her house". But it's not exactly clear.
The damning part is that her emails weren't stored in State Department records.
Who Is Eric Hoteham? Clinton's private server was registered under his name. Is he real?
Is there an archive of domain mx records out there? That would seem to clear up exactly where her email was hosted.
Edit: the current mx records are below:
Edit: the current mx records are below:
;; ANSWER SECTION:
clintonemail.com. 5495 IN MX 10 clintonemail.com.inbound10.mxlogic.net.
clintonemail.com. 5495 IN MX 10 clintonemail.com.inbound10.mxlogicmx.net.Having her email rely on Mexico's DNS servers doesn't seem like a terribly good idea.
From what I have read so far there doesn't appear to be any evidence whatsoever that the server was hosted in her actual home. And that certainly would be a strange, strange thing to do. All it would take is an ice storm in Westchester to put her ability to read and send emails out of commission.
Ockham's razor tells me it's more likely the media is speculating based on a whois record or similar. Scanning the existing comments I don't see anything more definitive than that. Is there any actual reason to think the email server was physically in suburban NY?
Ockham's razor tells me it's more likely the media is speculating based on a whois record or similar. Scanning the existing comments I don't see anything more definitive than that. Is there any actual reason to think the email server was physically in suburban NY?
See my post below. The mx records point to mxlogic, which provides email filtering services, not hosting (as far as I can tell). It looks like she may have indeed run her own email server.
Right, I don't find it implausible at all that she ran her own email server, by some definition of that expression. I do, however, find it at least somewhat implausible that said server was in a residential home in Westchester NY.
More to the point I don't see any evidence at all that it was physically there besides speculation. If there is such evidence (like IP addresses or similar) floating around, that would be interesting.
More to the point I don't see any evidence at all that it was physically there besides speculation. If there is such evidence (like IP addresses or similar) floating around, that would be interesting.
Pretty interesting that it's being run from her own house. I guess if anyone has any idea about how the NSA operates, it would be her.
I really hate the fact that this is a technical discussion or its an attack on her or a smear campaign.
The underlying fact is, she broke the LAW. That means she should be dragged through the punishment of the law.
Stop supporting her or making excuses. The society of today really stops caring so much about the rule of law, but rather what they have for an opinion. But I ask you if you if murder is against the law, do you support it?
We shouldn't be supporting this either way. It was plainly against the law and she broke that law. If you have a problem with it, then change the law. Stop sticking up for someone that blatantly broke the law.
The underlying fact is, she broke the LAW. That means she should be dragged through the punishment of the law.
Stop supporting her or making excuses. The society of today really stops caring so much about the rule of law, but rather what they have for an opinion. But I ask you if you if murder is against the law, do you support it?
We shouldn't be supporting this either way. It was plainly against the law and she broke that law. If you have a problem with it, then change the law. Stop sticking up for someone that blatantly broke the law.
What law did she break?
I don't say that as support, I just haven't seen any clear explanation of that yet.
I don't say that as support, I just haven't seen any clear explanation of that yet.
Your link says Former U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton may have violated federal records laws by using a personal email account for all of her work messages, the New York Times reported on... and goes on to quote some speculation from unnamed experts.
You said It was plainly against the law and she broke that law.
I was hoping you could explain more than the press articles have been, because you made it sound like you could.
You said It was plainly against the law and she broke that law.
I was hoping you could explain more than the press articles have been, because you made it sound like you could.
I tried sending an email to that domain to see if it would bounce back, but it didn't. I was hoping to get the server's IP address.
Looks like bouncebacks were working yesterday, but have been disabled: http://www.zerohedge.com/news/2015-03-03/hdr22clintonemailco...
Edit:
I tried to telnet to the server:
Looks like bouncebacks were working yesterday, but have been disabled: http://www.zerohedge.com/news/2015-03-03/hdr22clintonemailco...
Edit:
I tried to telnet to the server:
telnet clintonemail.com 25
Trying 208.91.197.27...
telnet: Unable to connect to remote host: Connection timed out
I'll probably get down voted for this, so be it. I worked in the Clinton whitehouse in the mid-90s. Every time you sent an email, which was on a cluster of VAX servers, you got a full screen notification about the presidential records act, and you had to agree affirmatively if something was, or was not an official record. If you said no, it still got archived, it just got flagged so a FoIA might not be valid against your email. We simply backed everything up to tape, and sent it to NARA. My first week there we got subpeoneDed. I remember being asked to volunteer to go up to greenbelt Maryland to help restore tapes for records requests.
There is absolutely no way she or anyone else that worked woth here didnt know your needed to archive emails. Subpoenas happened regularly, and everyone knew Emails = record. Years later after I left I landed a contract with a government contractor to recover thse tapes, against federal lawsuits, emails are records and the courts want them. Par for the course. I'd argue the Clinton whitehouse was the first administration to truly face electronic records retention effects with the courts. Nixon maybe being the first with audio tapes, the clintons got email Subpeonas.
So when I hear she was running her own email server and staying outside federal records retention requirements, I both nodded knowingly that I would expect nothing less from the wife of a man that learned first hand: keep no records, and then shook my head ruefully knowingly why she did it:
Keep no records.
When public leaders avoid record keeping requirements, this prevents public scrutiny, and that means they no longer work for you because they aren't accountable to you. Maybe you agree with her, but you'll never know what she did in your name. Hillary knew what she was doing. I have no doubt of this, as I said I would expect nothing less. I would be shocked if she didn't do this. Stunned really. I'm still paranoid about what I put in written form (text, email, etc.) to this day.
This was calculated, to keep her unaccountable and off the record.
There is absolutely no way she or anyone else that worked woth here didnt know your needed to archive emails. Subpoenas happened regularly, and everyone knew Emails = record. Years later after I left I landed a contract with a government contractor to recover thse tapes, against federal lawsuits, emails are records and the courts want them. Par for the course. I'd argue the Clinton whitehouse was the first administration to truly face electronic records retention effects with the courts. Nixon maybe being the first with audio tapes, the clintons got email Subpeonas.
So when I hear she was running her own email server and staying outside federal records retention requirements, I both nodded knowingly that I would expect nothing less from the wife of a man that learned first hand: keep no records, and then shook my head ruefully knowingly why she did it:
Keep no records.
When public leaders avoid record keeping requirements, this prevents public scrutiny, and that means they no longer work for you because they aren't accountable to you. Maybe you agree with her, but you'll never know what she did in your name. Hillary knew what she was doing. I have no doubt of this, as I said I would expect nothing less. I would be shocked if she didn't do this. Stunned really. I'm still paranoid about what I put in written form (text, email, etc.) to this day.
This was calculated, to keep her unaccountable and off the record.
Without government resources, it's hard to imagine this server could be secured, copying the data to two private companies creates much more exposure.
The rule of security is to make the attack more expensive than it's worth to your adversary. How much are the U.S. Secretary of State's emails worth? Certainly they are worth billions, and I'd guess even trillions of dollars; the information could make existential differences, for example to security of entire nations. In addition, the money you could make with foreknowledge of U.S. policies, for example in oil markets, seems astronomical.
I expect that foriegn intelligence services, with billions in reources and highly skilled personnel, had access to her mail. I expect some private interests also did.
The rule of security is to make the attack more expensive than it's worth to your adversary. How much are the U.S. Secretary of State's emails worth? Certainly they are worth billions, and I'd guess even trillions of dollars; the information could make existential differences, for example to security of entire nations. In addition, the money you could make with foreknowledge of U.S. policies, for example in oil markets, seems astronomical.
I expect that foriegn intelligence services, with billions in reources and highly skilled personnel, had access to her mail. I expect some private interests also did.
It seems the objection to this practice is that government email is supposed to be insecure by design in that anyone should be able to access it by making a FOIA request. To me, that seems kind of silly. I can imagine there a lot of legitimate reasons the Secretary of State would not want their email to be publicly accessible.
> It seems the objection to this practice is that government email is supposed to be insecure by design in that anyone should be able to access it by making a FOIA request. To me, that seems kind of silly. I can imagine there a lot of legitimate reasons the Secretary of State would not want their email to be publicly accessible.
Security doesn't mean everything is inaccessible, it means you control who, when, and where the data can be utilized. Obviously not all of the Secretary of State's email should be publicly accessible, but 1) the law as implemented by the government, and not a private individual, should control access, 2) someone needs to ensure control is maintained and prevent unauthorized access, and a private individual probably doesn't have the resources to do it.
Security doesn't mean everything is inaccessible, it means you control who, when, and where the data can be utilized. Obviously not all of the Secretary of State's email should be publicly accessible, but 1) the law as implemented by the government, and not a private individual, should control access, 2) someone needs to ensure control is maintained and prevent unauthorized access, and a private individual probably doesn't have the resources to do it.
I was interviewed by NewsRadio 106.7 about this about an hour ago. The podcast will be online here in a couple hours:
http://michaelgraham.com
If Clinton can run her own email server, why are so many people allergic to running their own servers? (PS, hope she had a business internet connection so she wasn't violating ToS)
Clinton employs a large staff of people, some of whom are apparently email experts. I think that probably helps to reduce the allergy symptoms.
No, because it's a violation of the law. The federal government is supposed to keep records of everything they do, for several reasons :
1) they are accountable to the people. Granted this is a principle. At some point in the future, everything the federal government did will become open knowledge.
2) It must be possible to get them in front of the justice system. This is a basic principle of a separation-of-powers democracy. The justice system is, by law, entitled to access any and all documents, emails, everything any agency has (just so we're clear : not talking about the judge down the street, although they have some access, but the supreme court has full, unquestionable, access)
3) FOIA (freedom of information act). Citizens and others can petition the justice system to make government documents public. Unless the justice system and the federal government agree something can not be made public, it is made public.
This is extremely prominently mentioned on every computer system anywhere near the federal government. Record keeping requirements this, email archival that.
Ms. Hillary Clinton did not miss these requirements. She knowingly violated the law and conducted official government business in an illegal manner. Ms. Clinton knowingly, and with the aid of dozens of people working for her on the public's dime violated the law. In theory the minimum punishment for this is to become unelectable for 5 years, but "somehow" I doubt that will happen. Also there seems little doubt that the emails she will make public will be a filtered version of the original.
This is comparable to fraud (though technically not fraud) : if you did this as a CEO of a publicly traded company, it would be considered fraud, and you could very well go to jail for that.
1) they are accountable to the people. Granted this is a principle. At some point in the future, everything the federal government did will become open knowledge.
2) It must be possible to get them in front of the justice system. This is a basic principle of a separation-of-powers democracy. The justice system is, by law, entitled to access any and all documents, emails, everything any agency has (just so we're clear : not talking about the judge down the street, although they have some access, but the supreme court has full, unquestionable, access)
3) FOIA (freedom of information act). Citizens and others can petition the justice system to make government documents public. Unless the justice system and the federal government agree something can not be made public, it is made public.
This is extremely prominently mentioned on every computer system anywhere near the federal government. Record keeping requirements this, email archival that.
Ms. Hillary Clinton did not miss these requirements. She knowingly violated the law and conducted official government business in an illegal manner. Ms. Clinton knowingly, and with the aid of dozens of people working for her on the public's dime violated the law. In theory the minimum punishment for this is to become unelectable for 5 years, but "somehow" I doubt that will happen. Also there seems little doubt that the emails she will make public will be a filtered version of the original.
This is comparable to fraud (though technically not fraud) : if you did this as a CEO of a publicly traded company, it would be considered fraud, and you could very well go to jail for that.
Just because you can run one doesn't mean that you're doing it safely and securely. Also, I'm willing to bet that the Clintons have a bit more resources and services at their disposal than the "so many people" you refer to.
However, I do think it would be cool if people had a turn-key solution to host their own email solutions on a cloud provider or something. :)
However, I do think it would be cool if people had a turn-key solution to host their own email solutions on a cloud provider or something. :)
First of all, I think you're assuming a level of technical incompetency that's completely incongruent with much of what is known about Mrs. Clinton.
Secondly, I think your last sentence answers the question. Running one's own email server isn't "normal" these days; email-as-a-service is such an over-solved problem for the average (security-unconscious) user, that going to the hassle and risk of running one's own is generally the purview of people who have something to prove, something to protect, or something to hide.
Secondly, I think your last sentence answers the question. Running one's own email server isn't "normal" these days; email-as-a-service is such an over-solved problem for the average (security-unconscious) user, that going to the hassle and risk of running one's own is generally the purview of people who have something to prove, something to protect, or something to hide.
There is a difference between registering your own domain and running your own server, though it appears Yahoo News is unaware of this.
Because it's a huge pain in the butt. As you note, most residential ISPs prohibit it.
You also need to take steps to ensure that your email will get to where it is going. That means configuring authentication protocols like SPF, and taking steps like using a fresh IP address for your mail server, and warming it up so remote ISPs begin to trust it. For most email providers, the default status of new sending IPs is "suspect." You can't just stand up an email server and expect your emails to hit everyone's inbox.
This does not even get into the security aspects that apply to running any server on the Internet.
Legal protections are one of the only reasons to bother that I can think of. When your email is hosted by Google, Google can provide it to legal authorities without telling you. When it lives in your home or business, you will know if someone is asking for it.
You also need to take steps to ensure that your email will get to where it is going. That means configuring authentication protocols like SPF, and taking steps like using a fresh IP address for your mail server, and warming it up so remote ISPs begin to trust it. For most email providers, the default status of new sending IPs is "suspect." You can't just stand up an email server and expect your emails to hit everyone's inbox.
This does not even get into the security aspects that apply to running any server on the Internet.
Legal protections are one of the only reasons to bother that I can think of. When your email is hosted by Google, Google can provide it to legal authorities without telling you. When it lives in your home or business, you will know if someone is asking for it.
>> For most email providers, the default status of new sending IPs is "suspect."
We moved servers to a new block of IP addresses, and after a couple hours we found ourselves on Microsoft's spam list. Took about 20 phone calls and almost 48 hours to get off of that thing. The other big lists didn't make a peep.
We moved servers to a new block of IP addresses, and after a couple hours we found ourselves on Microsoft's spam list. Took about 20 phone calls and almost 48 hours to get off of that thing. The other big lists didn't make a peep.
I want to be mad that a high-profile public servant created and used an email capability that allowed her to skirt record laws if ever challenged.
But... it's a really good idea. Hell, I used to run my own back in the day before my ISP started prohibiting it (around 2003ish?)
So I'm conflicted.
But... it's a really good idea. Hell, I used to run my own back in the day before my ISP started prohibiting it (around 2003ish?)
So I'm conflicted.
I left a personal email and webserver running in my parents shed for a few years on an old debian box. It was useful, I keep meaning to set up another one.
Personally I think that it is great that a high profile public servant went and ran their own personal server from their house.
It suggests a level of competency and it encourages other people to try and set up their own servers from home.
Personally I think that it is great that a high profile public servant went and ran their own personal server from their house.
It suggests a level of competency and it encourages other people to try and set up their own servers from home.
Are you a public official conducting the public's business through your own mail server? If not, you've got nothing to feel guilty about.
(At least not in this regard. You may or may not have other unrelated things to feel guilty about.)
(At least not in this regard. You may or may not have other unrelated things to feel guilty about.)
Not excusing the behavior, but it's not new: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bush_White_House_email_controve...
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*Hillary
Whoever is the most relevant gets the shorter name, in a kind of Huffman-like coding. If you say "Bush" now, people think you mean the 43rd president, even though earlier they would have thought of the 41st president.
But the headline should differentiate because there are more than one Clinton in the public sphere. "H. Clinton" would have been enough.
"her" wasn't a sufficient clue?
I don't think Her was in the headline at the time. I think it was just something a la "Clinton ran email server from home" or something.
I think you're right. Here's the old one http://hosted.ap.org/dynamic/stories/U/US_DEM_2016_CLINTON_E... and the newer one http://hosted.ap.org/dynamic/stories/U/US_DEM_2016_CLINTON_E...
damn impermanence.
I thought it was Bill now too because somehow the headline "sounded" like it was about something older.
If I see 'Bush' now I actually think Jeb, who wants to be #45.
Are we supposed to pretend the NSA doesn't exist and Hillary Clinton has a bunch of emails the government doesn't know about?
Governmental -- i.e., public -- communications are supposed to be available for review. Certainly, the Secretary of State can legitimately claim national security issues, but using an external system just gives the appearance that Clinton would like to be able to obfuscate even-legitimate internal requests for her communication. For instance, the paper trail about Bengazi is already damning enough. I'm quite sure she'd like to avoid showing her office's internal -- and her personal -- correspondence on this issue. Unless you're suggesting that the NSA would present that communication (which I agree they have access to) in court, I think this is a non-sequitor.
The problem is not that the government doesn't know about them, it's that the PEOPLE don't know about them.
But if the emails were sent from the government's servers the people still wouldn't know about them.
Yes they would. They would be handed over to the National Archives as a matter of course (except the classified ones, etc.)
It's still possible that they could be handed over from her personal account, but this bypasses the various controls that are supposed to be in place to ensure the fullest possible disclosure.
It's still possible that they could be handed over from her personal account, but this bypasses the various controls that are supposed to be in place to ensure the fullest possible disclosure.
For all intents and purposes, yes, the people wouldn't know about it, but there's supposed to be some form of oversight into the actions of political officials, and this circumvents it.
If she had her own mail server, it's probably fair to assume she could have set it up as her outbound mail server and to use TLS of some sort when connecting to it.
But you could (in theory), request them under a FIOA
I don't see a reason that you would be detered from submitting the same FIOA request for these emails. I expect the likelihood of getting a response and a set of documents sent to you would be the same as it would be if her emails were hosted through the Department of State's mail server.
Because it's on a private server, not a government operated one. Gives her legal coverage.
The NSA doesn't seem to share much with other agencies. So most of "the government" might not know about it.
Did you read about parallel construction?
https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2013/08/dea-and-nsa-team-intel...
https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2013/08/dea-and-nsa-team-intel...
At this point I think everybody has read about parallel construction.
Define "The Government", it's not a single uniform body, various branches and factions work with and against each other.
It's not the NSA we're worried about. It's that Secretary Of State Hillary Clinton was receiving, storing, and transmitting official secrets illegally on a secret personal email server, subject to extreme risk of antagonistic foreign powers snooping that server and acquiring those secrets. One may wonder why she would arrange such a system in her own home. One may wonder if she wanted such covert foreign access to such documents, the security risks being so obvious.
But I am genuinely curious about this. It doesn't seem like wrongdoing per se, or even anything unethical. But I don't like the trend of losing documents from the historical record. And I think that (while her email security is probably better than State Dept. as a whole) it probably would have been better as the leader to hold herself to the same standards as everyone in the organization as a general principle.
Curious to hear if anyone here has .gov experience and can give useful insight into the story.