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False flag operations in cyberspace

Can Cozy Bear and Fancy Bear be codewords for false flag operation using Vault 7 tools?

News Vault 7 scandal Recommended Links DNC and Podesta emails leak and  subsequent false flag operation to  blame Vladimir Putin FBI and CIA contractor Crowdstrike and DNC leak saga Cyberwarfare "Seventeen agencies" memo about Russian influence on elections
Was Guccifer 2.0 a false flag operation? Seth Rich murder False flag operations as an important part of demonization of the enemy strategy Nunes FISA Memo scandal Brennan elections machinations Strzok-gate Steele dossier
"Seventeen agencies" memo about Russian influence on elections Is national security state in the USA gone rogue ? James "We are not weasels" Comey role in depriving Sanders of a chance to lead the Democratic ticket Audacious Oligarchy and "Democracy for Winners" The Iron Law of Oligarchy Amorality and criminality of neoliberal elite FBI Mayberry Machiavellians
Nation under attack meme Predator state Andrew McCabe Clapper role in putsch FBI contractor Fusion GPS Wiretaps of Trump and his associates during Presidential elections  
Edward Snowden as Symbol of resistance to National Security State Corporatism Media-Military-Industrial Complex Corporate Media: Journalism In the Service of the Powerful Few The Real War on Reality History of American False Flag Operations Humor

Introduction: Cyberspace an ideal medium for False Flag operations

Cyberspace present an ideal medium for false flag operations. British intelligence have probably the world most sophisticated specialists in false flag operations. And history of false flag operations is going back to emperor Nero (A Fake False Flag Hoover Institution)

The burning of Rome by Nero, which he blamed on the Christians; the forging of the Zinoviev Letter in 1924 by elements connected to MI5 in order to discredit the Labour party during the 1924 British general election; the Mukden Incident in which Japanese saboteurs created a pretext for the invasion of China in 1931, and the Gleiwitz incident in which the SS faked an attack on Germany by Poland in September 1939. Unlike the World’s Fair, all these were genuine False Flag incidents.

It is clear the  CIA uses hacks for false flag operations and has tools that do just that -- imitate malware from a particular state or some hacker group, while performing the hack themselves. Then blaming the target of this false flag operation. False flag operation in cyberspace are much easier then with material object as there are more possibilities to hide the trace.  And  use accomplices for the "investigation" if the hack occurred on the USA or allies territory.

And it is clear that  this can be very powerful tool by which CIA and other agencies have a veto power of any politician:

On the other hand, combine “Umbrage” with the seemingly invincible false narrative that President Donald Trump is a tool of Russian interests, and plenty of Americans would be willing to believe Trump really does have substantial ties to the Kremlin, something that has not been proven. Even now there is still no publicly available evidence the Trump campaign somehow colluded with the Russian government last year. Sources in newspaper articles are never identified. All that exists is the alleged say-so of faceless CIA spooks and people like former CIA employee and would-be presidential spoiler Evan McMullin whose motives are questionable.

In other words any politician who is considered to be a threat to intelligence agencies can be easily blackmailed and possibly politically destroyed using well crafted falsifications of their connection with suitable for the particular case foreign power with the ample evidence planted via false flag operations.

For example, what if Crowdstrike planted worms, or other signs of Russian intrusion to hide the fact that this hack was actually a leak (download of tenails to a UCB drive by an insider, possible Seth Rich), and then attributed their falsified, planted findings to "evil Russian hackers" in an attempt to to create a smoke screen that district form content of the emails which reveals that Hillary stooges in DNC (and  DNC in general what completely was under control Hillary operatives)  to derail Sanders and ensure Hillary victory in Democratic primaries.

A fake attack from Russia could also have been easily organized to solidify the evidence as foreign intelligence agencies consider Russian hacking "community" as one of the most lucrative sources of information, email leaks,  and blackmail of Russian officials (see Shaltai Boltai hacking group story below.)  And if Russians are for some reason are not available there are always Estonians, Latvian and Ukrainians or Georgians who would happily lend a helping hand pretending to be Russians and operating from Russian IP space. I sometimes wonder, if what is called "black web" represents the playground for intelligence agencies to a larger extent than for criminal hackers.  Perfect for demonization of a "strategic competitor" -- you can attribute to the "bad guys" of anything your want. Hacking Presidential election in favor of Trump  -- yes of cause. Attempt to hack voting machines (which are not connected to Internet) more difficult but also possible.

In other words to organize false flag operation in cyberspace is a "no-brainer." And to trace it and distinguish flag flag operation from a real attack is very difficult as at the time you get to the computers and able to analyze them the horse already left the barn (and to add insult to injury eliminated or planted false trances of the attack).  And even if you monitoring services pick up some suspicious activities in real time how to tell if this is a real of false flag if, for example botnets can be used for sophisticated set of redirections which even NSA might not be able to trace (especially if the guys who do it are from NSA ;-)

Add to this tremendous capabilities of intelligence services to subvert and exploit security tools installed (such as Kaspersky, or MacAfee, of Microsoft Security Services) and the situation looks completly hopeless.  Cyberspace is and will remain a paradise for false flag operations.

 Cyberspace is and will remain a paradise for false flag operations. Perfect for demonization of a "strategic competitor" -- you can attribute to the "bad guys" of anything your want. Hacking Presidential election in favor of Trump  -- yes of cause. Attempt to hack voting machines (which are not connected to Internet) -- more difficult, but also possible ;-).

In cyberspace all signs of the attack such as IP address, language and codepages used during compilation of binaries, timestamps can be forged. False identities can be constructed to "validate" planted narrative (Guccifer 2.0 might be one such example ) and used for nefarious purposes.

Mysterious Shaltai Boltai Russian hacking group
which specialized is stealing documents and emails from Russian officials as well as forgeries

It you want a really dirty twisted tech/IT environment you can join one of hacker groups. Who manipulates whom in such groups is not clear at all but  intelligence agencies are not passive observers of the hacking scheme. They are active participants.

There was a mysterious hacking group in Russia active in 2014-2016 which was known under nickname of Shaltai Boltai (Russian name for Humpty-Dumpty -- a character in Alice's Adventures in Wonderland and Through the Looking Glass ). There were some indication that the group might have been controlled by foreign  intelligence services via a mole in Russian FSB. Three persons including him were charged by Russian authorities with treason  (Russian Lawyer Says FSB Officers, Kaspersky Manager Charged With Treason )

There has been no public detail as to the nature of the treason charges against Mikhailov, Dokuchayev, and Stoyanov. The Interfax news agency on January 31 quoted "sources familiar with the situation" as saying that Mikhailov and Dokuchayev were suspected of relaying confidential information to the U.S. Central Intelligence Agency (CIA).

Pavlov told RFE/RL the individuals were suspected of passing on classified information to U.S. intelligence, but not necessarily the CIA.

"We have no information about the CIA" in the matter, he said.

Most members were arrested in a period from October 2016 (Vladimit Anikeev) to January 2017 (Shaltai-Boltai's leader arrested by the FSB Crime RusLetter). So the group was operational all the  period of US elections.

Later the head of the group got two year prison sentence.

After a two-day trial conducted behind closed doors, the Moscow City Court on Thursday sentenced Vladimir Anikeyev, the head of a hacking group that the authorities cracked down on last winter, to two years in a penal colony.

The state prosecutor had asked for a sentence of two and a half years.

Mr. Anikeyev, a former journalist who led a collective known as Shaltai Boltai — Humpty Dumpty — until his arrest last November, admitted his guilt in illegally gaining access to the private data of a number of targets, including high-ranking officials, businessmen and journalists, according to Russian news reports.

His cooperation with law enforcement made a swift trial possible, but the involvement of classified information meant it was closed to the public.

Among those whose email inboxes and mobile phones are said to have been penetrated are Natalya Timakova, the spokeswoman for Dmitri A. Medvedev, the prime minister and former president; Arkady Dvorkovich, a deputy prime minister; Andrei Belousov, an adviser to President Vladimir V. Putin and a former minister of economic development; and Dmitri Kiselyev, the Russian government’s chief propagandist.

Some of the information obtained by Shaltai Boltai was auctioned online. Emails stolen from Mrs. Timakova, for instance, netted Mr. Anikeyev’s team 150 bitcoins. Other information was used to blackmail officials, who had to pay Shaltai Boltai to keep it confidential.

As Guardian noted (Russian hacking group's 'last member at liberty' comes out of the shadows World news The Guardian):

Shaltai-Boltai, or Humpty Dumpty, terrorised Russian officials for three years, combining hacking, leaking and extortion

Not much know about their activities (Wikipedia) or the personalities of People who were charged with treason (three members of this group).  Ther central figure among those three was Sergei Mikhailov, who was the deputy director of FSB's Center for Information Security  

Mr. Mikhailov’s possible ties to Shaltai Boltai emerged in Russian news reports. Other Russian news outlets reported a competing theory for the intelligence officer’s arrest: that he had passed to the F.B.I. secrets about Russia’s government-backed hacking programs, helping in the investigation of Russian meddling in the presidential election.

Along with regular hacking groups activities (Surkov leaks Thousands of hacked emails allegedly from high-ranking Kremlin official published online t) hey also specialized on forgery of official documents in such a way as to inflict  maximum damage to the Russian  state.  One of the goal of the group was " working for foreign intelligence agencies to promote the myth of Russian cyber crime." :

Anonymous International is a hacking group known for leaking Russian government information and personal documents of government officials. They target high-ranking members of the government, large corporations, and media, and sell the stolen data. These actions are publicized on their blog, Shaltai Boltai, (Шалтай-Болтай, Russian for "Humpty Dumpty"), the name by which the group is also known.[1][2] Over a period of 15 months the group published information about Russian politicians on 75 separate occasions.

In October 2016, Vladimir Anikeev (Владимир Аникеев), known under the handle of "Lewis," considered the group's leader, was arrested and charged with unlawful access to computer information. In addition to Anikeev, five more people were detained, among them one of the leaders of the FSB's Information Security Center, Sergei Mikhailov, and his deputy Dmitry Dokuchaev, as well as Ruslan Stoyanov, the former head of Kaspersky Lab's Computer Incident Investigation Department.

=== from Mikhailov case - Wikipedia =====================================================================================

In December 2016, officers of the CIS FSB Sergey Mikhailov, Dmitry Dokuchaev, head of the cybercrime investigation department of Kaspersky Lab Ruslan Stoyanov, and Georgy Fomchenkov were arrested for treason. After that, the largest international media published information according to which the case of Aeroflot was again in the news, because based on the new data, the real reason for the prosecution of Vrublevsky was his investigation materials against Mikhailov and the rest of those arrested as long back as in 2010 on the basis of which he privately accused the a group of individuals working for foreign intelligence agencies to promote the myth of Russian cyber crime. Ultimately, this group of people was able to successfully fabricate the case against Vrublevsky himself. In this case, in 2016 was shed light on the early investigation of Vrublevsky and Mikhailov's group was arrested by the Self Security Unit of the FSB of Russia.[28][29][30]

In January 2017, it became known that the head of the site "Humpty Dumpty", journalist Vladimir Anikeev, also known as the "Anonymous International", who hacked the mail of Russian businessmen and high-ranking officials, was detained shortly before the arrest of FSB officers. In January, Rosbalt told about the circumstances of the capture of Anikeev: the FSB detained him in October 2016, and later, according to his testimony, high-ranking FSB officers Dmitry Dokuchayev and his boss Sergey Mikhailov were arrested. They were accused of state treason and cooperation with the CIA.

In February 2017, Reuters reported that the case of a state treason in the FSB was due to Vrublevsky's testimony from 2010.[31]

In March 2017, the US Department of Justice announces the involvement of Sergei Mikhailov and Dmitry Dokuchaev in the hacking of 500 million Yahoo mail accounts.[32]

In the same month, information is published that the accusation in the state treason is directly related to the transfer of data on the activities of Pavel Vrublevsky to foreign special services back in 2010. In response to the arrests of the US, they accused a number of the same FSB officers (Dokuchaev) of cybercrime and announced them on the international wanted list, posting their photos on the FBI website, which resulted in a complete rupture of cooperation between the United States and Russia on cybercrime.

On June 12, 2017, a significant part of the documents on the Mikhailov case was sealed with a "secret" stamp, Rosbalt reported, citing an informed source.[33]

Rafia Shaikh in her Jan 26, 2017 article (Wccftech) notes that "the accusation of Mikhailov tipping US officials is huge, which, if true, would mean that the US had employed spies right in the Kremlin’s cybersecurity center."

Regardless of Fomenko’s connection with Russian security agencies or election hackers, the accusation of Mikhailov tipping US officials is huge, which, if true, would mean that the US had employed spies right in the Kremlin’s cybersecurity center.

In a separate report, it was also suggested that Mikhailov could be a member of the hacker collective “Anonymous International” known in Russia as “Shaltai Boltai”. Anonymous International has on various occasions leaked private emails and other data to embarrass public Russian figures, but none of these leaks have ever resulted in any arrests since the content of these revelations is more “embarrassing than criminal,” Moscow Times added.

Reportedly the second-most senior figure in the Center for Information Security at the FSB, Mikhailov is also responsible for operating Cozy Bear, another APT (Advanced Persistent Threat) group. His arrest is being called as the highest-profile case within the Russian security agency since the breakup of the Soviet Union.

What the Arrest of the Russian Intel top Cyber-Crime Expert Has to Do With American elections — The Bell

Sergei Mikhailov  was arrested one year ago, on Dec. 5, 2016. Officers of the agency’s internal security division seized him at his office and led him away with a sack over his head. Mikhailov is a black belt in karate and the officers feared that he might resist, explained one of the colonel’s acquaintances.

Prior to his arrest, Mikhailov was head of the 2nd Directorate of the FSB’s Information Security Center (TsIB) and within Russian intelligence circles he was considered the main authority on cybercrime.

Now he and three other men —  Dmitry Dokuchayev, an FSB major and former criminal hacker, accused in the U.S. of hacking 500 million Yahoo! accounts in 2014;  Ruslan Stoyanov, a former Kaspersky Lab employee; and  Georgy Fomchenkov, a little-known internet entrepreneur — are suspected of state treason. The four are being held in Moscow’s high-security Lefortovo Prison

Was Shaltai Boltai gang controlled by foreign intelligence  services which used it to frame Russia?

Members of Shaltai-Boltai hacking gang have admitted to forging some parts of the correspondence that they hacked. The putative aim was to boost the profile of their group.

Reading between the lines of this, we can hypothesize that Shaltay-Boltay were indeed not hackers in a conventional sense. They were traders in an illicit information economy, including fabricating that information with possible input or at the request of foreign intelligence agencies (of course, for solid remuneration).

This most prominent adherent  of this hypothesis is Scott Humor (A Brief History of the "Kremlin Trolls",   thesaker.is, Oct 15, 2017)

Saint Petersburg, Savushkina, 55 is the most famous office building in the world, thanks to the relentless promotion of the United States government, the CIA, FBI, and by the powers of the entire Western media, financed by Western governments. VOA, NPR, and Svoboda, by the government of the US; the BBC by the government of the UK; CNN by the governments of Saudi Arabia; the DW, by the government of Germany; and so on and so forth. You name it, they all punched time to promote this office building.

To be specific, it's not even a building, but several adjoined buildings that cover an entire city block, an urban development plan common for Saint Pete's. That's why every business here has the address of Savushkina, 55 followed by a building number. You can take a virtual tour around it, to see for yourself. The buildings are shared by several dozens of private businesses, by the local Police department, and by the newsrooms of half a dozen Russia Media sources like the FAN (Federal News Agency), the Neva News (Nevskie Novosti), Political Russia, Kharkov News Agency, publishing Ukrainian news, and others. They all are privately owned and operated and generate over 55 million unique visitors per month. Overall, several thousand people come to this building to work every morning. But you wouldn't know this by account of Western media. For over two years now, these people are being harassed and collectively branded as "THE KREMLIN TROLLS."

The building is very popular because it's located in a quiet historical neighborhood and is in walking distance from a suburban train station. It's newly renovated offices offer open floor plans with Scandinavian fleur so very appreciated by the news people. In addition, the rent for this building is less than in center city. Which is why Evgeny Zubarev, a former top editor for the RIA NEWS, choose it for his media startup. He took several offices allowing him to manage his growing media giant without wasting time to commute. Now, the FAN newsroom alone employs about 300 journalists.

This wasn't always the case.

At the beginning of 2014, the building was still under construction and renovation, when an anti-Russian government group of hackers called first "The Anonymous International" and latter "Shaltay-B0ltay" fingered it as the "Kremlin trolls' layer."

Their wordpress blog is still here. It was last updated on November 2016. Its title states: "Anonymous International. Shaltay Boltay/Press Secretary of the group. Creating reality and giving meaning to words."

November 7, 2014, Khodorkovsky, who acted as an integral part of the CIA "Kremlin trolls" Project, tweeted the picture of one of the entrances to one of the buildings saying: "Savuchkina 55. New home for bots. ID check system. Not a sign there. I won't say who took the photo."

... ... ...

The phone number on the picture 324-56-06 belongs to the commercial real estate company Praktis Consulting & Brokerage that managed the rent of offices.

Midsummer 2014, Evgeny Zubarev with his start up and several hundred journalists moved in, along with the Police department, and a slew of other businesses people. Little did they know what was to come.

The best way to get information is to make it up.

Everything what we know now about the so-called "Kremlin trolls from the Internet Research Agency paid by Putin's favorite chef," came from one source, a group of CIA spies that used the mascot of Shaltay-Boltay, or Humpty-Dumpty, for their collective online persona.

They were arrested in November 2016 and revealed as the FSB and former FSB officers . One of them even managed a security department for the Kaspersky Lab. They all were people highly skilled and educated in manipulating and creating large online databases, in any online research imagined, and the knowledge of hacking and altering databases, including those that were run by the Russian government. They weren't poor people. They weren't there for the money. They were ideologically driven. Their hatred towards Russia and its people was the motive for their actions.

At some point, Gazeta.ru, an online Russophobic publication, suggested that " Shaltai-Boltai was just a distraction meant to confuse everybody." They themselves were more concise by stating that they were working to change the reality.

Russian authorities, the courts, and the lawyers, refused to call these men hackers. There was a reason for this. They weren't so much hackers in a classic sense, as in when someone gains access to real information and copies it. This group wasn't necessarily hacking existing information, but planting information. They were creating files about fake nonexistent companies and employees, files with blurry fake paystubs, memos, emails, phone messages and so on. The fakes looked convincing, but they still were forgeries that could be easy disproved for someone who had access to the real information.

That's when the hacking took place, when the FSB agents went into government databases and created records of people and companies that didn't exist.

I think that part of the reasons why some of them got the mild sentences of three years in general security prison, and some were left free, wasn't just the fact that they agreed to collaborate with the Russian government, but also the fact that they didn't actually steal information from government officials like Medvedev and his press secretary, Nataliya Timakova, or the owner of the largest in Europe catering business, Evgeny Prigozhin. They made information up and claimed that it was real.

These guys gave a bad name to all hackers, whistleblowers, leakers and spies. Now, journalists presented with some "hacked" and leaked secrets has to think it over, less they end up with an egg on their face like journos from the Fontanka, Vedomosti and Novaya Gazeta in case of the "Kremlin's trolls."

If we accept that the Shaltay-Boltay group was working to create and distribute documents they forged, claiming that those files were "hacked," we would also understand a mysterious statement made by them to BuzzFeed.

"In email correspondence with BuzzFeed , a representative of the group claimed they were "not hackers in the classical sense."

"We are trying to change reality. Reality has indeed begun to change as a result of the appearance of our information in public ," wrote the representative, whose email account is named Shaltai Boltai, which is the Russian for tragic nursery rhyme hero Humpty Dumpty."

Bazzfeed also said back in 2014, that " The leak from the Internet Research Agency is the first time specific comments under news articles can be directly traced to a Russian campaign." Now, this is a very important grave mark.

Just think about this working scheme: Shaltay-Boltay with a group of anti-government "activists" created the "Internet Research Agency," they and some "activists" created 470 FaceBook accounts used to post comments that looked unmistakably "trollish."

After that other, CIA affiliated entities, like the entire Western Media, claimed the "Russian interference in the US election." Finally, the ODNI published a report lacking any evidence in it.

The link to their report is here, but I don't recommend you to read it. You will gain as much information by reading this report as you would by chewing on some wet newspaper. Ask my dog for details.

Assessing Russian Activities and Intentions in Recent US Elections

https://www.dni.gov/files/documents/ICA_2017_01.pdf

Only three paragraphs is interesting on the page 4:

"Russia used trolls as well as RT as part of its influence efforts to denigrate Secretary Clinton. This effort amplified stories on scandals about Secretary Clinton and the role of WikiLeaks in the election campaign.

The likely financier of the so-called Internet Research Agency of professional trolls located in Saint Petersburg is a close Putin ally with ties to Russian intelligence.

A journalist who is a leading expert on the Internet Research Agency claimed that some social media accounts that appear to be tied to Russia's professional trolls -- because they previously were devoted to supporting Russian actions in Ukraine -- started to advocate for President-elect Trump as early as December 2015."

In other words, in its report with a subtitle: "Background to "Assessing Russian Activities and Intentions in Recent US Elections": The Analytic Process and Cyber Incident Attribution" the Office of the Director of National Intelligence ODNI, is quoting the Shaltay-Boltay, a group that had been proved to work for the CIA by "creating reality."

The only reason why they don't provide us with evidence, with at least one lousy IP address with the Russian trace roots that would convincingly point at the company named the Internet Research Agency, is because this company never existed, it never had any IP addresses assigned to it that would be verifiable via third parties like RIPE network coordination and via online domain tools.

We understand that having hundreds of people working ten to twelve hours a day, as they claimed, posting hundreds messages hourly, would use huge amount of bandwidth. They would need a very fast internet connection with unlimited bandwidth that only a business can get. Inevitably, this internet connection would come with the assigned IP addresses. No internet provider would let this kind of bandwidth hog to create this kind traffic without being forced to separate them from other customers.

One example, a woman with the last name Malcheva filed a lawsuit in court against the companies "Internet Research, LLC" and "TEKA, LLC," claiming unpaid wages.

The court asked her to produce evidence of her work, and then denied her claim after she produced a photo of a computer with an IP address on its screen as evidence of her employment.

An IP address that was assigned to a luxury hotel in Saint-Petersburg. A hotel that was awarded multiple international awards for excellence. An immensely popular hotel among discriminating travelers. A very expensive hotel located in the center of a historic city. The woman claimed that she was an "online troll' working from this location ten hours a day with hundreds of other virtual trolls. The judge didn't believe her. Would you?

People from the Shaltay-Boltay group weren't hackers in the proper terms because they worked with and for the CIA. Middle-of the-road and run-of-the-mill intelligence agencies would collect and analyze information for their governments. The CIA invents information, then goes on to manufacture and forge documents in support of their invented information; they then recruit people inside other countries and other governments to claim that they "obtained" this explosive evidence. Being the dirty cops that they are, the CIA doesn't obtain and secure evidence, but instead they plant fake evidence on their victims.

By this act alone they change our current and past reality, and they change our future. They change our history by forging never existing "proof" of invented myths. They hire and train groups of military men to act as "protesters" around government buildings, while other military men from other countries shoot at unsuspected bystanders whose death allows Washington to claim the sovereign governments' wrongdoing.

CIA-operated groups arrest and kill government officials or force them to flee, like in Ukraine. They take over a couple of government buildings and declare their victory over a huge country, just like it happened in Russia in 1991 and 1993 and in Ukraine in 2005 and 2014. For some reason, they claim that governments are those people who take over a couple of buildings in one city. When in fact, our countries' governments are those people whose names we wrote on ballots, regardless of where these people are located. We don't run around like chickens with our heads cut off electing a new president every time our current president leaves the country.

Going back to the CIA's Humpty-Dumpty project that came online sometime in 2013. Why would anyone name their enterprise after such predictable failure, you might ask. Because, in the Russian alliteration, Shalti-Boltai means "shake up and brag about it" and not as in its original Carroll's version of "humping and dumping."

I went ballistic after someone retweeted me this CNN clip titled "Russia used Pokemon Go to interfere with the US elections."

I actually listened to the clip itself, in which they brought up the Internet Research Agency" from SP. Knowing full well that the hackers who "leaked" the information about this "Agency" were arrested and successfully charged for treason because they worked for the CIA should prevent the CIA to run fake news about the entities and people they themselves made up. You would think that the matter of the "Kremlin trolls from Saint Petersburg" should be dead and buried after the arrest. The CIA and other 16 intelligence agencies should know better than to use information that is being known now as "discovered' with their "help."

Because it's all fake and we know it.

We also know everything that the CIA touches is fake. Speaking in layman's term, it's as if all those middle aged bald guys would start licking their balls while claiming to be in fulfilling relations. If it's just you, guys, there is no relations. It's just you. Deal with it!

The American intelligence community cannot claim an existence of threats against America if all fingers in those "threats" are pointing back at the American intelligence community.

By stating that someone interfered with the US election using the Internet Research Agency in SP, is plainly to state that it's CIA that interfered in the American elections.

 

What Nunes memo tells us about  cyberspace false flag operations and the use by intelligence agencies of US neoliberal MSM to create an arbitrary witch hunt

Everybody understood that the system is pretty well rigged on federal level and there two levels of justice -- one for neoliberal "masters of the universe" who are by-and-large above the law, and another for shmucks.  That's not a news.  The news is the level of sophistication is escaping the changes and use of the accusation of hacking  falsified via false flag operation as a new smokescreen to pass the blame to selected scapegoat.

Here we see very successful efforts to unleash Neo-McCarthyism campaign and put all the blame for Hillary defeat on Russians, which later was extended into the color revolution against Trump of falsified changed of Russia collision. Few people understand the US MSM is just a propaganda department of the US intelligence agencies and do their bidding. The fact that at some point CIA controlled major journalists was known from Church commission hearings. And there was some backlash. But now the situation reversed and due to the regime to total surveillance their capability to dictate the agenda far exceed the level that was in the past.

moreover, now CIA cyberwarriors can cook any accusation using their "technical capabilities" and spread is using subservant MSM in a matter of days creating the wave of hate which  far exceed what was described in famous dystopian novel 1984 by George Orwell.  Refuting those "cooked" intrusions (which are a new and very nasty form of false flag operations) is difficult what when (and if) it is done, typically it is too late. As Hermann Goering said (Hermann Goering War Games):

“Of course the people don’t want war. But after all, it’s the leaders of the country who determine the policy, and it’s always a simple matter to drag the people along whether it’s a democracy, a fascist dictatorship, or a parliament, or a communist dictatorship. Voice or no voice, the people can always be brought to the bidding of the leaders. That is easy. All you have to do is tell them they are being attacked, and denounce the pacifists for lack of patriotism, and exposing the country to greater danger.”

— Herman Goering at the Nuremberg trials

... ... ...

His comments were made privately to Gustave Gilbert, a German-speaking American intelligence officer and psychologist who was granted free access by the Allies to all the prisoners held in the Nuremberg jail. Gilbert kept a journal of his observations of the proceedings and his conversations with the prisoners, which he later published in the book Nuremberg Diary. The quote offered above was part of a conversation Gilbert held with a dejected Hermann Goering in his cell on the evening of 18 April 1946, as the trials were halted for a three-day Easter recess.

Paradoxically while the value of cyberspace for offensive operations against adversaries is unclear, it is clear that it has tremendous potential for conducting false flag operations serving as a pretext for real wars, or some "Show trials" of dissidents in best Stalin traditions. and witch hunt against Trump is a just form of Show Trials in a court of public opinion.

Everything can be forged in cyberspace -- source of attack, attack methods. Fake personalities like Guccifer 2.0 can be created to support the accusations.  Sky is the limit for false flag operations in cyberspace.  Steele dossier in this sense is old school falsification. It is "DNC hack" that is the harbinger of things to come.

Sky is the limit for false flag operations in cyberspace.  Steele dossier in this sense is old school falsification. It is "DNC hack" that is the harbinger of things to come.

We may feel uneasy by the idea that people now could be so easily manipulated into sacrificing themselves in wars at the whims of the neoliberal elite, but perhaps we can be more concerned (and maybe even scared) at the thought that the capabilities to deceive us are now greater not less that it was before. Much greater. They now really can create "artificial reality" using MSM.

In any case capabilities of intelligence agencies to hatch and then inject into MSM "DNC hack style disinformation" to blackmail a major political figure using a "cyberspace" false flag operation are now enormous. Even POTUS can be the target of such blackmail.  In this sense the current Russiagate hysteria makes Joseph McCartney like a pretty uninventive, even somewhat dull guy with very limited capabilities to frame his victims ;-) Recently even Nunes was accused (with impunity) to be a Russian agent.   This is "communists under each bed" type of witch hunt on a new level.

Now we know that Russiagate was initially the criminal plot to exonerate Hillary and derail Sanders campaign hatched by intelligence community in cooperation with connected members of Clinton campaign like John Podesta (who as a former WH chief of staff has deep connections to "intelligence community".)  Intelligence agencies and journalists connected with intelligence services were recruited and the well planned obfuscation campaign started. which later morphed into color regulation against Trump (typical for color revolution charges of rigged election were replaced by accusation of "collision" with foreign power.)  All this  was done with full cooperation and eager participation of NYT, WaPo, CNN. MSNBC and other neoliberal outlets. As the result in May 2016 a Special Prosecutor was appointed to take care of Trump removal. 

Sanders did not have the courage to switch to alternative Open Convention to get a nomination from Democratic Party. He was so aftraid (or was threatened, the meaning of his visit with Obama is not known) that he chose to betray his voters and support Hillary. So with the help of neoliberal MSM a brazen plot to exonerate Hillary Clinton from a clear violation of the law (with regard to the way she handled classified information with her private email server; absolutely a crime, absolutely a felony) did succeed.  In this  sense Russiagate is in reality FBI-gate. 

It is an established fact that Comey and the senior DOJ officials conducted a fake criminal investigation of Hillary Clinton. Following none of the regular rules, gave her every break in the book, immunized all kinds of people, allowed the destruction of evidence, no grand jury, no subpoenas, no search warrant. That was not an investigation, that was a Potemkin village. It was a farce.

DOJ should convene grand jury to indict the major players (whose in high positions in DOJ and FBI should be fired). If like torturers in Bush II era  will not be  brought to justice this is just another sign that the USA is neither a republic not a democracy.

Unfortunately Trump while a good tactician, is not strategic thinker on any level. He might have some courage which allowed him to fire Comey, and then tell that truth to American people that this firing is about "Russiagate".  But you need more that courage to take on "deep state". You need to have a plan.  You need to have a coalition.  And we do not  know if Trump was threatened or not (see Chuck Schumer remark above.) He should address the nation from Oval Office and tell that FBI story can only be believed by people with IQ below 70.  And that DOJ should immediately appoint a Special Prosecutor investigating  this matter. But this will most probably just a fantasy.

Summarizing we can say that "FISA memo" is a testimony of tremendous personal courage of Nunes (note that one neoliberal MSM jerk already accused him being a Russian spy).  He did tremendous job driven by noble motives of restoring justice. And his memo undermined the  Color revolution against Trump by making Mueller position more vulnerable as he is clearly a member of the gang of FBI Mayberry Machiavellians. It also put Rosenstein into defensive position.  But this is an uphill battle and he might lose at the end of the date. The neoliberal swamp is way too powerful and can consume even such courageous people as Nunes. 

From Snowden revelations to Vault 7

One year ago, most people on either side of Atlantic had scant or no knowledge of the NSA and its activities. Edward Snowden’s revelations changed all that and rocked one of the pillars of transatlantic relations.  It proved that the USA (as well as its ally Israel, which probably enjoys high level of cooperation) has sophisticated program of weaponizing worms and other malware.  this is very similar to the way biological weapns are produced. You kate something from "natural habitats" and modifies it for specific purposes to be more dealy, less detctable and such. like is the case with biological weapons such an activity should be prohibited, but currently it is not.

But NSA was not the only player in development weapons for cyberspace. CIA, which is rumored to be highly envious of NSA elected status brought by universal Internet connectivity and importance of electronic communication,  has an independent program to produce similar weapons as well. Which is easy as both agencies are effectivly out of control of civil government and can spend allocated funds "as they wish".

the net result of this activity eventually was leaks and parts of this leak were published WikiLeaks as so called "Vault 7". Vault 7 is a series of documents that WikiLeaks started publishing on 7 March 2017. 

The most important among those revelations was that CIA cultivated capabilities for false flag operations in cyberspace. Actually cyberspace is an ideal space for false flag operation and using such unscrupulous middleman as Crowdstrike you can both the plant the worm or other traces and later "discover" it.  So two competing rivals were developing a set of sophisticated cyber weapons (and Stuxnet was really a new generation of malware opening  new turn in the this cyberweapns race0 , but CIA collection has a twist  -- its focus of attribution of cyber attack to other party (CIA Capable of Cyber 'False Flag' to Blame Russia):

As Wikileaks notes, the UMBRAGE group and its related projects allow the CIA to misdirect the attribution of cyber attacks by “leaving behind the ‘fingerprints’ of the very groups that the attack techniques were stolen from.”

In other words, the CIA’s sophisticated hacking tools all have a “signature” marking them as originating from the agency. In order to avoid arousing suspicion as to the true extent of its covert cyber operations, the CIA has employed UMBRAGE’s techniques in order to create signatures that allow multiple attacks to be attributed to various entities – instead of the real point of origin at the CIA – while also increasing its total number of attack types.

Other parts of the release similarly focus on avoiding the attribution of cyberattacks or malware infestations to the CIA during forensic reviews of such attacks. In a document titled “Development Tradecraft DOs and DON’Ts,” hackers and code writers are warned “DO NOT leave data in a binary file that demonstrates CIA, U.S. [government] or its witting partner companies’ involvement in the creation or use of the binary/tool.” It then states that “attribution of binary/tool/etc. by an adversary can cause irreversible impacts to past, present and future U.S. [government] operations and equities.”

While a major motivating factor in the CIA’s use of UMBRAGE is to cover it tracks, events over the past few months suggest that UMBRAGE may have been used for other, more nefarious purposes. After the outcome of the 2016 U.S. presidential election shocked many within the U.S. political establishment and corporate-owned media, the CIA emerged claiming that Russia mounted a “covert intelligence operation” to help Donald Trump edge out his rival Hillary Clinton.

Prior to the election, Clinton’s campaign had also accused Russia of being behind the leak of John Podesta’s emails, as well as the emails of employees of the Democratic National Committee (DNC).

Last December, Director of National Intelligence James Clapper – a man known for lying under oath about NSA surveillance – briefed senators in a closed-door meeting where he described findings on Russian government “hacks and other interference” in the election.

Following the meeting, Rep. Adam Schiff (D-CA), a ranking member of the House Intelligence Committee, remarked: “After many briefings by our intelligence community, it is clear to me that the Russians hacked our democratic institutions and sought to interfere in our elections and sow discord.”

Incidentally, the U.S. intelligence community’s assertions that Russia used cyber-attacks to interfere with the election overshadowed reports that the U.S. government had actually been responsible for several hacking attempts that targeted state election systems. For instance, the state of Georgia reported numerous hacking attempts on its election agencies’ networks, nearly all of which were traced back to the U.S. Department of Homeland Security.

Now that the CIA has been shown to not only have the capability but also the express intention of replacing the “fingerprint” of cyber-attacks it conducts with those of another state actor, the CIA’s alleged evidence that Russia hacked the U.S. election – or anything else for that matter – is immediately suspect. There is no longer any way to determine if the CIA’s proof of Russian hacks on U.S. infrastructure is legitimate, as it could very well be a “false flag” attack.

Given that accusations of Russian government cyber-attacks also coincide with a historic low in diplomatic relations between Russia and the U.S., the CIA’s long history of using covert means to justify hostile actions against foreign powers – typically in the name of national security – once again seems to be in play.

We can now talk about global cyber war unleashed by the USA after year 2000. It already has three stages:

  1. Stuxnet discovery (2010) and Flame revelations (2012). Those worms were pretty complex creation which were clearly stated by state actors. They are typically attributed to the NSA (although Israel may also participated in the development in some role). At this point (2010) the technologies used in Stuxnet and Flame became public knowledge and  the trust toward the US producer of hardware  was undermined.
  2. Edward Snowden revelations (2013) signify the  round two this Global Cyberwar. As the  result the confidence in Google, Microsoft, Yahoo, Amazon, etc was undermined (many companies prohibited employees to use Facebook) and in government sector completely disappeared. That also changed behaviour of both US friends and "adversaries" (which are few states which does not want to accept the USA dictat).  The level of damage Snowden did to the USA "intelligence complex" should be underestimated. There was a huge fallout. For example Obama personally and his administration did lost moral high ground. From this point Obama generally looks more like an employee of a three letter agency (specifically as Brennan subordinate)  rather then the President of the country.  Public was really alarmed and became somewhat paranoid. As one commenter stated: "it's easy to poke fun at the Snowden affair from many angles, but I, for one, do not like the idea of any Agency anywhere, governmental or private, reading my e-mails and monitoring my calls. "

    There was angry voices:

    Peter Schaar, Germany's freedom of information commissioner, told Reuters he wanted "clarity" from the United States "regarding these monstrous allegations of total monitoring of various telecommunications and Internet services." Another German official has called for a boycott of the companies. German Chancellor Angela Merkel, who is running for reelection, has said she will raise the issue with Obama this week either at Lough Erne or in Berlin.

    "The most upset party in all of this, I think, is the Germans," said Michael J. Geary, an assistant professor at Maastricht University in the Netherlands and an expert on Europe. "The Germans were the most snooped-upon country, apparently, in March. In a country where memories of the former East German Stasi are still quite fresh, the response has been quite critical." Geary described Europeans as "peeved" and "quite annoyed" at the U.S. actions and said they have the potential to set back sensitive trade negotiations and do damage to transatlantic relations. "It's a major PR disaster for the administration," he said. "Now, they have really lost the moral high ground."

  3. Wikileaks Vault 7 release (2017). It was not the initial release, just the most publicized case. At this point the cat was already out of the bag for a long time.  Now with  CIA tools available on  the Internet we can talk about the third phase of this global Cyberwar.  One of the most  damaging  revelations ws that CIA has tools to create cyber attacks under the false flag. It also became clea that CIA’s secret hacking division had produced malware and other means of hacking iPhones, Android phones, Samsung Smart TVs. As well as some popular encrypted apps like WhatsApp, Signal, and Telegram. All of them were also targeted. At some point CIA lost control of their whole arsenal of highly advanced hacking tools and malware and it became its travel first of "dark Internet" and  then on "grey. ".  at this point cat was out of the  bag and other government start paying serious attention both to cyber-defense and cyber offence. This is not only a gross, malignant incompetence.

In other word the USA unleashed three stages of global cyberwar and which now endanger its own infrastructure. So by by virtue of its own actions the USA became much less secure and now  it is tremendously more difficult to protect the infrastructure from intrusions, which became more sophisticated. To the  great joy of all those snake oil security solutions salesmen like Crowdstrike. 

So a lot of "security parasites" got access to serious money, imitating previous ISS "achievements" on the new level (with the same dream of being bought by somebody big before some spectacular failure of their products).

One  of first signs of this damages are talks that DNC was hacked specifically to conceal Seth Rich or somebody else leak and then this hack was malignantly attributed to Russians using  greedy and  biased Crowdstrike cyber warriors  which performed the attribution (while details are secret, Crowdstrike attribution of DNC hack to Russians (which FBI took at face value; a very usual step). BTW the level of hype over Crowstrike products does reminds me days of ISS glory ;-). Probably they are the same type of greedy and unscrupulous security parasites ready for money to do anything. Both  can sell for money their own mother. 

More about Vault 7

CIA surveillance and hacking tools not eroded transatlantic trust but also reveals internal political struggle within intelligence CIA, with some forces consider CIA too dangerous and out of control and ready to risk their life to cut CIA influence.  As was with Snowden revelations this is another game changer:

When the Guardian started reporting on the largest disclosure of secret NSA files in the history of the agency in June, it was only a question of time before the information spill reached America's allies overseas. That's because the NSA's prime duty is to monitor and collect global signals intelligence. The agency is by law prohibited from conducting electronic surveillance on Americans except under special circumstances.

In the Guardian's first story on how the NSA was collecting the metadata of phone calls from Verizon, a major US carrier, it was clear that data of European citizens would be involved, since the NSA's secret court order included all calls made from and to the US.

But it was the second scoop on the NSA's PRISM program that really blew the story wide open. It revealed that the agency was siphoning off personal data like email, chats and photos from the world's biggest Internet companies including Google, Microsoft, Apple and Yahoo.

This also reveals the real danger of modern smartphones and PC.  Smartphones now are pretty powerful computer in  their own right and the fact the vulnerabilities are literally planted into popular operating system and applications caused public outrage. It also might speed up balkanization of Internet, started after Snowden revelations, as foreign countries now clearly want to control information flows from and to thier country. so far only China totally control those flows. 

How it will affect US manufactures of hardware, especially PC and smartphone we can only guess.

Here are direct quotes from WikiLeaks describing Vault 7 (Heavy.com)

By the end of 2016, the CIA’s hacking division, which formally falls under the agency’s Center for Cyber Intelligence (CCI), had over 5,000 registered users and had produced more than a thousand hacking systems, trojans, viruses, and other “weaponized” malware. Such is the scale of the CIA’s undertaking that by 2016, its hackers had utilized more code than that used to run Facebook. The CIA had created, in effect, its ‘own NSA’ with even less accountability and without publicly answering the question as to whether such a massive budgetary spend on duplicating the capacities of a rival agency could be justified. In a statement to WikiLeaks the source details policy questions that they say urgently need to be debated in public, including whether the CIA’s hacking capabilities exceed its mandated powers and the problem of public oversight of the agency. The source wishes to initiate a public debate about the security, creation, use, proliferation and democratic control of cyberweapons.”

These techniques permit the CIA to bypass the encryption of WhatsApp, Signal, Telegram, Wiebo, Confide and Cloackman by hacking the ‘smart’ phones that they run on and collecting audio and message traffic before encryption is applied.”

WikiLeaks continued.

The U.S. government’s commitment to the Vulnerabilities Equities Process came after significant lobbying by US technology companies, who risk losing their share of the global market over real and perceived hidden vulnerabilities. The government stated that it would disclose all pervasive vulnerabilities discovered after 2010 on an ongoing basis. ‘Year Zero’ documents show that the CIA breached the Obama administration’s commitments. Many of the vulnerabilities used in the CIA’s cyber arsenal are pervasive and some may already have been found by rival intelligence agencies or cyber criminals.”

WikiLeaks redacted and anonimized some of the information before releasing it, including CIA targets throughout the U.S. and the world. Here are just some highlights about how the hacks worked, according to WikiLeaks:

Because the CIA kept the vulnerabilities hidden, even after they were exposed, WikiLeaks said this put the population at large at risk, including members of the U.S. government, Congress, top CEOs, and engineers. Without letting Apple and Google know about their vulnerabilities, the companies had no means to fix the hacks after they leaked.

According to WikiLeaks, an archive with the malware and other exploits was being circulated for at least a year and only fraction of it was given to WikiLeaks by an unnamed source..

Antivirus Hack Details

So what are some of the takeways from this? There are many. But essentially, because the CIA was targeting Android devices, iOS devices, Smart TVs, and even Microsoft and Mac OSX and Linus systems, it seems that almost anything is vulnerable — especially any device that has microphone and is camera-equipped and connects to the Internet. These seem to be the biggest targets.

And antivirus systems really won’t stop them. According to WikiLeaks, “CIA hackers developed successful attacks against most well known anti-virus programs. These are documented in AV defeats, Personal Security Products, Detecting and defeating PSPs and PSP/Debugger/RE Avoidance.” Some of the antivirus and security programs that they may have found defeats or workaround for included (Note: It’s unclear if these were all bypassed, because some files were redacted by WikiLeaks):

They even discussed how the NSA got some things wrong and how they could do it better.

There are other aspects to Vault 7 that are still being deciphered. For example, some are concerned that the CIA was infiltrating online games, because of one page’s reference to League of Legends, Hearthstone, and Heroes of the Storm.

Clinton’s Missing Emails or the FBI’s Vault on Clinton

Some believed this was about a seventh “vault” of FBI emails, since the FBI had released six sets of Clinton emails and information at the time that the tweets were published. But this was less than likely, since the FBI just released Part 7 of its Clinton vault here. Others believed that it was related to Clinton’s missing 33,000 emails. This theory gained new traction after a federal court hearing about Anthony Weiner and Huma Abedin’s laptop emails, scheduled for Tuesday March 7, was postponed on March 6. However, it’s unclear at this time if the postponement happened before or after WikiLeak’s announcement. Read the press release from Judicial Watch, where they mention the hearing was postponed, here.

Obama Wiretapping

Because of President Donald Trump’s recent tweets claiming President Barack Obama “wiretapped” him, some believe that Vault 7 is about this. However, the wiretapping suspicion so far is unsubstantiated.

‘Pizzagate’

Others theorized this was somehow related to a longstanding conspiracy theory about “pizzagate,” which involves the idea that high-ranking politicians are involved in a pedophile ring to keep them from deviating from the "Deep state" party line. So far no conclusive evidence has been found to support this theory. The rumors gained traction after WikiLeaks released John Podesta’s emails.


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[May 28, 2021] More Hacks, More Baseless Accusations Against Russia

May 11, 2021 | www.moonofalabama.org

More Hacks, More Baseless Accusations Against Russia

In January police in various countries took down the Emotet bot-network that was at that time the basic platform for some 25% of all cybercrimes.

Based on hearsay Wikipedia and other had falsely attributed Emotet to Russian actors. The real people behind it were actually Ukrainians :

The operating center of Emotet was found in the Ukraine. Today the Ukrainian national police took control of it during a raid (video). The police found dozens of computers, some hundred hard drives, about 50 kilogram of gold bars (current price ~$60,000/kg) and large amounts of money in multiple currencies.

bigger

Emotet had nothing to do with Russia.

Now the U.S. is accusing Russia of somehow having part in another cybercrime :

President Joe Biden said Monday that a Russia-based group was behind the ransomware attack that forced the shutdown of the largest oil pipeline in the eastern United States.

The FBI identified the group behind the hack of Colonial Pipeline as DarkSide, a shadowy operation that surfaced last year and attempts to lock up corporate computer systems and force companies to pay to unfreeze them.

"So far there is no evidence ... from our intelligence people that Russia is involved, although there is evidence that actors, ransomware is in Russia," Biden told reporters.

"They have some responsibility to deal with this," he said.

Three days after being forced to halt operations, Colonial said Monday it was moving toward a partial reopening of its 5,500 miles (8,850 kilometers) of pipeline" the largest fuel network between Texas and New York.

Biden however is badly informed. There is no evidence that DarkSide has anything to do with Russia. It is, like Emotet, a commercial 'ransomware-as-a-service' criminal entity that wants to make money and does not care about geopolitics.

Yes, a version of the DarkNet software does exclude itself from running on system with specific language settings :

The DarkSide malware is even built to conduct language checks on targets and to shut down if it detects Russian, Ukrainian, Belarusian, Armenian, Georgian, Kazakh, Turkmen, Romanian, and other languages ...

That is a quite long list of east European languages and Russian is only one of it. Why the authors of DarkNet do not want their software to run on machines with those language settings is unknown. But why would a Russian actor protect machines with Ukrainian or Romanian language settings? Both countries are hostile towards Russia. To claim that this somehow points to Russian actors is therefore baseless.

Russia strongly rejected Biden's accusation:

The Kremlin has once again pointed out the importance of cooperation between Moscow and Washington in tackling cyberthreats amid a cyber-attack on Colonial Pipeline, a US company. "Russia has nothing to do with these hacker attacks, nor with the previous hacker attacks," Kremlin Spokesman Dmitry Preskov assured reporters on Tuesday.

"We categorically reject any accusation against us, and we can only regret that the US is refusing to cooperate with us in any way to counter cyber-threats. We believe that such cooperation - both international and bilateral - could indeed contribute to the common struggle against this scourge [known as] cyber-crime," Peskov said.

The U.S. seems notoriously bad at attributing computer hacks. It claims that the recent SolarWinds attack which intruded several government branches was also done by Russia. But that attack required deep insider knowledge and access to SolarWinds' computers and processes :

The recently discovered deep intrusion into U.S. companies and government networks used a manipulated version of the SolarWinds Orion network management software. The Washington borg immediately attributed the hack to Russia. Then President Trump attributed it to China. But none of those claims were backed up by facts or known evidence.

The hack was extremely complex, well managed and resourced, and likely required insider knowledge. To this IT professional it 'felt' neither Russian nor Chinese. It is far more likely, as Whitney Webb finds, that Israel was behind it .

Indeed - the programmers of an Israeli company, recently bought up by SolarWinds, had all the necessary access for such a hack. However the U.S. sanctioned Russia over the SolarWinds hack without providing any evidence of its involvement.

If the U.S. continues to blame Russia without any evidence for each and every hack there may come a time when Russia stops caring and really starts to hack into or destroy important U.S. systems. The U.S. should fear that day.

Posted by b on May 11, 2021 at 17:31 UTC | Permalink


David G Horsman , May 11 2021 17:48 utc | 1

Thanks b. I don't think Russia is going to escalate destructive attacks any time soon. There's no upside.
They might even be reluctant to reveal their capabilities in the Ukraine.
For the moment, mockery is the best remedy while they up their game.
psychohistorian , May 11 2021 17:56 utc | 2
@ b who ended with
"
If the U.S. continues to blame Russia without any evidence for each and every hack there may come a time when Russia stops caring and really starts to hack into or destroy important U.S. systems.
"

How can you write such assertions that vary from the approach that both Russia and China are taking?....strong defense but no offense.

Now if empire tried to hack into a Russian or Chinese system/network then appropriate takedowns of malicious systems/networks would seem logical....and I expect they know how...but will not do it on the basis of another avenue of empire lies and deceit.

anon48 , May 11 2021 18:20 utc | 3
You should have titled the post "Killing Two Birds With One Stone".
This pipeline is huge, running from Texas through the Southeast and all the way up to New England. It's condition is beyond awful with multiple leaks along the route some of which lose more than a million gallons per month and much more than can be determined since some of the gasoline / jet fuel went into the aquifers. These faults have been well known for decades and although some of the areas are heavily populated no remediation was done. The local outcry recently caught the attention of the press when kids reported a gasoline smell along the pipeline route to the police. The locals demanded the pipeline be closed for repairs and sought answers from state officials and Federal authorities as to why this situation was allowed. To blame the Russians for the closure of the pipeline which results in a surge in prices and limited availability of gas for the summer is an absolute stroke of genius.
https://www.wcnc.com/article/news/local/ncdeq-colonial-pipeline-spill-huntersville/275-70e16fb6-c945-4634-b933-3975d0573f2e
Ike , May 11 2021 18:27 utc | 4
Great article. Russia must be getting so pissed off with the idiots in Washington.The uninformed and easily manipulated Western people surely get the governments they deserve.
Paul Craig Roberts highlights this with another bit of truth telling from Tucker Carlson
https://www.paulcraigroberts.org/2021/05/11/the-proof-is-in-tony-fauci-is-responsible-for-the-creation-of-the-covid-19-virus/?utm_source=newsletter&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=the_proof_is_in_tony_fauci_is_responsible_for_the_creation_of_the_covid_19_virus&utm_term=2021-05-11
DG , May 11 2021 18:43 utc | 5
@all

I need to ask this: What do you think about the vaccination of children?

...

Josh , May 11 2021 18:44 utc | 6
It is odd that certain elements of the us intelligence community, along with negative factions within the us political establishment, continue to absolutely refuse to enter into verifiable and mutually binding international agreements on cyber security with exactly the nation states that they accuse (without evidence) of malicious activity in the same sphere, while at the same time operating in this field in an openly declared hostile manner under the secrecy deemed necessary for 'national security'.

[May 28, 2021] Was the Colonial Pipeline Co. ransomware attack a false flag operation ?

Probably it was not a false flag. First of all the state of IT security at Colonial Pipeline was so dismal that it was strange that this did not happened before. And there might be some truth that they try to exploit this hack to thier advantage as maintenance of the pipeline is also is dismal shape.
Notable quotes:
"... "As for the money-nobody really knows where it really went." If you are right about the perpetrators, my guess would be that it went into the black-ops fund, two birds one stone. ..."
"... I have become so used to false flags, I am going to be shocked when a real intrusion happens! ..."
"... an in depth article researching solarwinds hack - looks like it was Israel, not a great leap to see that colonial was a false flag https://unlimitedhangout.com/2021/01/investigative-reports/another-mega-group-spy-scandal-samanage-sabotage-and-the-solarwinds-hack/ ..."
"... Regarding the ownership of Colonial Pipeline: 'IFM Investors, which is owned by 27 Australian union- and employer-backed industry superannuation funds, owns a 16 per cent stake in Colonial Pipeline, which the infrastructure manager bought in 2007 for $US651 million.' ..."
"... 'The privately held Colonial Pipeline is valued at about $US8 billion, based upon the most recent sale of a 10 per cent stake to a unit of Royal Dutch Shell in 2019.' ..."
May 19, 2021 | www.moonofalabama.org

Blackhat , May 19 2021 18:51 utc | 6

The Colonial Pipeline Co.,ransomware attack was a false flag. They wanted to blame Russian hackers so they could derail Nordstream II

It is common knowledge that the only real hackers that are able of such sabotage is CIA and Israeli. It's the same attack types they do to Iranian infrastructure on a regular basis.

The Russians are not that stupid to do something they know will be blamed on them and is of no political use to them. And could derail Nordstream2.

As for the money-nobody really knows where it really went. CEO is ultra corrupt. They never ever invested in their infrastructure so when it went down they came up with a profitable excuse. Just look at their financials/balance sheet over the years. No real investment in updating and maintaining infrastructure. Great false flag. Corruption and profiteering.


MarkU , May 19 2021 19:04 utc | 7

@ Blackhat | May 19 2021 18:51 utc | 6

"As for the money-nobody really knows where it really went." If you are right about the perpetrators, my guess would be that it went into the black-ops fund, two birds one stone.

james , May 19 2021 19:08 utc | 9

@ 6 blackhat..

I have become so used to false flags, I am going to be shocked when a real intrusion happens!

abee , May 19 2021 19:21 utc | 10

@ blackhat 6

an in depth article researching solarwinds hack - looks like it was Israel, not a great leap to see that colonial was a false flag https://unlimitedhangout.com/2021/01/investigative-reports/another-mega-group-spy-scandal-samanage-sabotage-and-the-solarwinds-hack/

vinnieoh , May 19 2021 20:05 utc | 15

Blackhat | May 19 2021 18:51 utc | 6

I'm not familiar with your handle - hello. IMO, it would be counterproductive for Russia to initiate such a hack. What really affects and debilitates US oil and gas interests is low prices, both at the pump and on the stock exchange. The hack helped jack up prices (which were already being jacked-up despite demand still lagging behind supply) which only HELPS those energy interests. It has long been known, the math isn't complicated, what level crude must trade at for US domestic oil & gas operations to be profitable. Remember that just as the pandemic was emerging Russia and Saudi Arabia once again sent the global crude market into the depths of despair.

I do agree the hack can be interpreted in light of the desperation of US energy interests to try to kill NS2. I have not yet read the recent articles discussing Biden's recent moves in that regard. If these moves are a recognition that US LNG to Europe (and elsewhere) are diametrically opposed to climate responsibility, I'd welcome those moves. As is usually the case though, environmental responsibility is probably the least likely reason.

vk , May 19 2021 22:31 utc | 35

Colonial Pipeline CEO confirms paying $4.4 million ransom to hackers, says he did it for America

This is USSR-of-the-1980s level of propaganda. Either way, give that man a statue in D.C.!

P.S.: this is the quotation of what the CEO really said, so you don't accusing me of just reading the headline:

"[it was very hard, difficult to me etc. etc.] But it was the right thing to do for the country," Blount, who leads the company since 2017, added.

--//--

No shit, Sherlock:

Russian Sputnik V Covid-19 vaccine hasn't been approved by EU due to political pressure from top officials – Moscow's spy chief

Paul , May 19 2021 23:42 utc | 42

Posted By Oldhippy @28

Thanks for your comment.

Regarding the ownership of Colonial Pipeline: 'IFM Investors, which is owned by 27 Australian union- and employer-backed industry superannuation funds, owns a 16 per cent stake in Colonial Pipeline, which the infrastructure manager bought in 2007 for $US651 million.'

also

'The privately held Colonial Pipeline is valued at about $US8 billion, based upon the most recent sale of a 10 per cent stake to a unit of Royal Dutch Shell in 2019.'

see Australian Financial Review 6 days ago.

Koch may well own another multi million $ stake.

[Jan 28, 2021] Ukraine is become a Wild West for spies and mercenaries. Perhaps that was whole intent of coup

Jan 28, 2021 | www.moonofalabama.org

oldhippie , Jan 27 2021 16:04 utc | 3

Ukraine is become a Wild West for spies and mercenaries .Perhaps that was whole intent of coup

Bemildred , Jan 27 2021 16:07 utc | 4

I have been dumbfounded for some time by supporters of the Izzies apparent lack of concern about the eventual consequences of this sort of behavior. But I suppose, as with Uncle Sugar, the notion of ones own exceptional nature prevents a sensible assessment.
gm , Jan 27 2021 16:17 utc | 7

Israeli intel spinoffs/cutouts, US FBI/CIA and the NSA surveillance/blackmail collection agencies and their agents; they are facets of the same worldwide "NWO" criminal Blob-Mob, imo.

It should be obvious by now they have the power to set up one US President, and depose him through a ham-handed domestic election fraud coup, and install an eaaily controlled neurodegenerating corrupt puppet, and completely control and pervert the US Judicial system, so as to essentially get away and continue with their criminal culture and crimes against humanity unchecked.

With such a history, of course they have the means to frame Russia, as well as to destroy any others who stand in their way to more power and autocratic control of the planet.

[Jan 27, 2021] typical

Jan 27, 2021 | www.extremetech.com

PICNIC .

i've also been in various IT roles and it's funny how people ghettoize themselves...web design/"full stack" guys were always the worst but i had a lot of server/NAS guys who had ZERO clue about security and would use idiot passwords like that (and torrent episodes of "the wire" and watch sports on youtube and etc etc).

as for the israelis, the cellebrite guys and probably these jackasses are good examples of what happens when you get to sit around on stolen land and live off free money from the US. which is funny because a lot of skilled "1337hax0rz" also come from poor-ass areas of russia and the other former soviet areas.

Posted by: the pair | Jan 27 2021 16:45 utc | 13 @Posted by: Bemildred | Jan 27 2021 16:35 utc | 11

I saw that headline too.

I didn't (bother) to read it, but wondered why the MSM
would do everyone a favor and warn about this guy.

His usefulness had ended? So eke out that last drop of value from him
by sowing distrust within Proud Boys and other alternate organizations.
Or (heaven's forbid!) that guy is being set up for assassination
by the Deep State as a false-flag. (Outrageous, simply outrageous,
but imagine if they did a Navalny/Skripal on him - whoa!)

Posted by: librul | Jan 27 2021 16:46 utc | 14 Posted by: librul | Jan 27 2021 16:46 utc | 14

We do seem to have some disagreements among our ruling "elites" these days, and I think that may have something to do with it, but I really don't know and that is a good question. "Why are they telling me this" is always a good question.

Nevertheless, I think it is a good idea to warn the young these days, so I thought I'd post it.

Posted by: Bemildred | Jan 27 2021 16:53 utc | 15 @Posted by: Bemildred | Jan 27 2021 16:53 utc | 15

For sure, that is the rub.
When to self-censor, when to post.
Better to post and then discuss
then simply censor.

Posted by: librul | Jan 27 2021 17:00 utc | 16 @Bemildred | Jan 27 2021 16:35 utc | 11

Yep. FBI is following the time-tested "proactive" standard playbook of synthetic terror/crime creation to support the Borg's agenda.

Some congressman a few years back got a hold of, and publically released official docs showing that FBI was budgeting a yearly payroll for nsome >15,000 paid confidential informants/agent provacatuers circa 2014(?).

This FBI practice goes all the way back to the 1960's and probably much earlier.

In the last 60+ years, there have been oo many FBI-created/supported domestic 'crime/terror' groups/leaderships to list in one post here.

Likely the leadership of both BLM and US antifa is also controlled by FBI (Euro antifa=>likely CIA). [CIA Operation Ajax/Kermit Roosevelt)was running paid *rent-a-mobs* all the way back in the 1953 overthrowal of Iran's Mossadegh govt].

Posted by: gm | Jan 27 2021 17:00 utc | 17


Wikipedia falsely claimed ...


Recently I've been unable to find anything on Wikipedia that has not been corrupted to some degree or other by lies.

What a disappointment of a once grand ideal.

Posted by: Arch Bungle | Jan 27 2021 17:21 utc | 18

I know it is OT, but, I was wondering what is happening with the Huawei Princess in Canada since the regime change in the USA?

Posted by: Young | Jan 27 2021 17:52 utc | 19 Good report. The Wikileaks Vault 7 release clearly shows the USA has tools to create false flag cyber warfare. To say one knows where a hack originates says more about the accuser than the accused. Ms. Webb's reporting on the Epstein case was profound, and her follow-up reporting on various threads has been stellar. There is no reason to doubt her reporting here. It is no accident that most of Webb's threads lead back to Israel. When one considers the USA's blind fealty to Israel, often alone in its support, one must consider that mass blackmailing of political leaders going back decades is a real possibility to explain the USA's Israel-centric foreign and domestic policy.

Posted by: gottlieb | Jan 27 2021 17:52 utc | 20

Ukraine used to be closer than Canada to the US; after CIA/State manipulation it became a Mexico or El Salvador.

IF Ukrainian criminals are going to be labeled Russian than label Salvadorian criminals as Americans.

Posted by: Antonym | Jan 28 2021 2:37 utc | 48

[Jan 27, 2021] Was there a better way for Trump to telegraph (or tweet, whatever) to the public that the establishment had no idea who was behind the hack?

Jan 27, 2021 | www.moonofalabama.org

William Gruff , Jan 27 2021 16:27 utc | 9

"The Washington borg immediately attributed the hack to Russia. Then President Trump attributed it to China."

Was there a better way for Trump to telegraph (or tweet, whatever) to the public that the establishment had no idea who was behind the hack?

If Trump said that he didn't believe Russia did it that would just give the establishment mass media ammunition to say he was Putin's puppet. After dozens of mass media products echo the narrative off each other to amplify a weak and vague suggestion and build it into something that the public perceives as truth, Trump crushed it all by just accusing someone else. Rather than laboriously dismantling the accusation aimed at Russia he just cut it off at the knees.

Unfortunately that is something only a President can do, and the current figurehead in that position absolutely will not be doing anything that might undermine the establishment narrative du jour. I miss Trump already for that alone.

[Jan 27, 2021] I have no direct knowledge of SolarWinds specifically, but if Boeing hired HCL (formerly Hindu Computer Limited) to develop software for its 737 max, I'll make a wild guess and assume that SolarWinds too probably hired a bunch of Indian kids worth $10/hour each, who come and go every few months.

Jan 27, 2021 | www.moonofalabama.org

Mao Cheng Ji , Jan 27 2021 16:14 utc | 6

I have no direct knowledge of SolarWinds specifically, but if Boeing hired HCL (formerly Hindu Computer Limited) to develop software for its 737 max, I'll make a wild guess and assume that SolarWinds too probably hired a bunch of Indian kids worth $10/hour each, who come and go every few months.

And if that's indeed the case, then anything's possible.

[Jan 27, 2021] Solar Winds was an Israeli penetration- Not Russia- - Sic Semper Tyrannis

Jan 27, 2021 | turcopolier.typepad.com

Solar Winds was an Israeli penetration? Not Russia?


"As Russiagate played out, it became apparent that there was collusion between the Trump campaign and a foreign power, but the nation was Israel , not Russia . Indeed, many of the reports that came out of Russiagate revealed collusion with Israel , yet those instances received little coverage and generated little media outrage. This has led some to suggest that Russiagate may have been a cover for what was in fact Israelgate.

Similarly, in the case of the SolarWinds hack, there is the odd case and timing of SolarWinds' acquisition of a company called Samanage in 2019. As this report will explore, Samanage's deep ties to Israeli intelligence, venture-capital firms connected to both intelligence and Isabel Maxwell, as well as Samange's integration with the Orion software at the time of the back door's insertion warrant investigation every bit as much as SolarWinds' Czech-based contractor. " unlimitedhangout

----------------

Pilgrims! I am suggesting or at least raising the possibility that Israel has massively broken into American government IT systems. Hmmm. Does that mean that I am a Rooshan asset?

The sadly funny thing in this is how deaf, dumb and blind the main stream media are with regard to any, any, any possibility that Israel does not think its interests are identical with those of the US.

Natanyahu is quite open about his intention to bully Biden into continuing Israeli policy aimed at a Morgenthau model for Iran.

People openly say on the TeeVee that not only must Iran give up its nuclear ambitions but it must also accept Israeli hegemony in the region. Joltin' Jack Keane is one of the foremost proponents of such a vision of the future Middle East. For him the Syrian military are merely "Iranian surrogate forces." Perhaps someone should look carefully at the funding for the Institute for the Study of War. Keane is the chairman thereof. pl

https://unlimitedhangout.com/2021/01/investigative-reports/another-mega-group-spy-scandal-samanage-sabotage-and-the-solarwinds-hack/


Ed Lindgren , 26 January 2021 at 11:30 AM

When friends and acquaintances question my apparent antipathy towards the State of Israel, I suggest that they familiarize themselves with the circumstances regarding the attack on the USS Liberty and the Pollard spy scandal.

I have been slogging through Jerome Slater's book 'Mythologies Without End: The US, Israel, and the Arab-Israeli Conflict 1917 - 2020.' Frankly, after getting 3/4 of the way through this book, I gave up because Slater's narrative was so depressingly repetitive. Slater documents Israel's repeated intransigence and refusal to make any meaningful concessions towards a just and lasting arrangement for peace with the Palestinians.

Probably the only event that will cause a serious reassessment of the US relationship with Israel will be the day when we can no longer find a buyer for our debt and we are forced to live within our means. But when that day arrives, the US/Israeli relationship will probably be the least of our problems.

Deap , 26 January 2021 at 11:47 AM

......." Parallels are obvious when one considers that SolarWinds quickly brought on the discredited firm CrowdStrike to aid them in securing their networks and investigating the hack. CrowdStrike had also been brought on by the DNC after the 2016 WikiLeaks publication, and subsequently it was central in developing the false declarations regarding the involvement of "Russian hackers" in that event......."

CrowdStrike ...CrowdStrike ......CrowdStrike.

Still think Trump's mention of CrowdStrike in his Ukraine phone call, that led to his bogus impeachment ,was the real reason Democrats went apoplectic.

The echo chamber media treatment of the CrowdStrike element of the phone call as a "long discredited conspiracy theory", without ever mentioning CrowdStrike by name, was the first clue.

Is Israel First any worse than America First, or China First?

Certainly Netanyahu was eager to congratulate "President Elect Biden" before the Trump body was even cold demonstrated Trump's history of special treatment and good will towards Israel counted for nothing in their own version of their nation's real-politik.

Which is to also include our own self-serving interests, treating Israel in the same fashion. I think we should all be prickly against each other. Real-politik. Give only what one can afford to lose.

Fred , 26 January 2021 at 12:20 PM

So Isabel Maxwell is sister to Ghislaine Maxwell of Jeffrey Epstein fame. The connecting dots point to an ever shrinking world of espionage against the US in order to get at more local targets. I wonder what they have on John Roberts.

irf520 , 26 January 2021 at 12:59 PM

I thought at the time how ironic it was that Netenyahu couldn't wait to throw Trump under the bus even though Trump spent so much time kissing up to Israel.

Alex , 26 January 2021 at 01:04 PM

I thought it was obvious to most Americans that Israel does not have the same interests that the U.S.has.The source of Israel's influence in the U.S. is the evangelical vote which is Protestant in nature going back to Plymouth Rock and naming their kids after OT heroes and guilt from WW2. Nationalist Americans still fall in the trap of supporting Israel thinking we are all in this together with them. Think about it, all senators and congressmen vote uniformly for anything Israel wants and yet can't get a proper stimulus package thru. By the way Israel first is worse than America first.

turcopolier , 26 January 2021 at 01:12 PM

Alex

As someone who has dealt with the issue of American illusions about Israel for many decades, I assure you that most Americans think Israel is the 51st state. I was the principal liaison between US and Israeli military intelligence for seven long years.

scott s. , 26 January 2021 at 02:25 PM

Alex,
I'm not sure I can agree with your source of Israel influence going back to Plymouth Rock. The Pilgrims were strongly reformed and promoted Covenant Theology, while current American evangelicals largely accept Dispensationalism and pre-tribulation as developed by Darby in the early 1800s and popularized by Schofield in the early 1900s.

sbin , 26 January 2021 at 02:30 PM

Used tools such as Solar Winds extensively as engineer in wireless telcom industry.
There are much better tools.
Have read many accounts of this security breach and Israel being involved is much more probable and likely explanation.
Also available evidence points that way.
Russia Russia Russia and China China China are easy talking points for those that are lazy

Walrus , 26 January 2021 at 03:00 PM

For we are a stiff necked people...

_dex_ , 26 January 2021 at 04:09 PM

NSA has Israel under surveillance for decades afaik.

turcopolier , 26 January 2021 at 04:56 PM

dex

Thank God. I see you are in Slovenia. What is your point? If you think they don't get far more from us than we get from them, you are misinformed.

turcopolier , 26 January 2021 at 05:05 PM

All

The lazy, ignorant Spanish trolls who apparently never heard of wikipedia claim to not know what I meant by a "Morgenthau model." https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Morgenthau_Plan

Seward , 26 January 2021 at 06:32 PM

In 1989, as an IBM contractor, I spent a month at a VQ2 det in the Med, helping install a computer system, and instructing key personnel in its use. I became friends with the Chiefs, male and female, that ran the place, walking around in their starched kakis with clipboards, instructing the pilots and recon officers, slouching in their flight suits, their assignments for the day. (Which of course came down from VQ2 itself, likely compiled by Chiefs there. As Zhukov said when asked who ran the Russian Army: "The Sergeants and myself.") We both knew several of the Liberty survivors: I from my previous Government employment; they from the Navy. They all assured me privately that the Navy was determined never to let anything like that happen again. There's undoubtedly been a complete turn over or two of personnel since then, but I suspect the same determination prevails today: Once bitten, twice shy.

The Twisted Genius , 26 January 2021 at 09:01 PM

Given the publicly available evidence and information, there is no reason to rule out Israel. They have the skill and motivation to pull this off. The same can be said for China as well as Russia. North Korea and Iran are also strong contenders. Those two are surprisingly capable. However, from our viewpoint any attribution is based on circumstantial evidence only. True attribution needs more than that such as that laid out in the GRU 12 indictment for the DNC hack or the Dutch AIVD witnessing of the APT29 (SVR) hack of the Pentagon in 2015. We need to see the adversary's traffic and infrastructure. Without that, we're guessing.

Our inability to see Israel as an adversary is exasperating. As Ed Lindgren mentioned, the USS Liberty and the Pollard spy ring should be reason enough to cause permanent suspicion. The author brought up the case of Trump campaign collusion with Israel and Saudi Arabia. The evidence for this was actually stronger than any Trump-Russia collusion. Yet that went unnoticed outside a small group of researchers. Our blindspot towards Israel may prove fatal some day.

jim ticehurst , 26 January 2021 at 09:44 PM

Who contracted Solarwinds..? It was associated with "GITHUB"which was making enemys in the Middle East..and was Involved with Jared Kushner as a Backer...according to the Wiki Write up on "GitHub" Thats a Backdoor I would look at..

Leith , 26 January 2021 at 11:55 PM

AIPAC and their friends on both sides of the aisle in Congress already has access to info from the various federal agencies that were hacked. Would they endanger that open gateway by a penetration of US government IT systems?

The Izzies are much more interested in hacking Iranians. Or those european signers of JCPOA that are trying to negotiate with Iran. They hacked computers in various European hotels that had Iranian guests. In the US Israeli hackers' target has been the BDS movement (Boycott, Divest & Sanction) movement, plus any association or group that promotes civil rights for Palestinians. I wouldn't doubt that they are also hacking congresswoman Rashida Talib, the Arab American Institute, the Council on American-Islamic Relations, various Arab-American lobbies, and the Palestinian diaspora in Detroit and other American cities.

However, there is suspicion that Israeli private individuals may at one time or another be involved with or helped provide expertise to Cozy Bear & other cyber APTs operated mainly out of Russia.

mcohen , 27 January 2021 at 03:46 AM

A new one for consideration

"A deed in hand is worth a burning bush for it is belief that lights the flame."

Funny how solarwinds pops up after the election,isn't it.the winds of change are blowing.

Yeah, Right , 27 January 2021 at 04:14 AM

I know you can't go into specifics, but as a general rule of thumb did Israeli military intelligence ever offer you any intel that you didn't already know?

Seamus Padraig , 27 January 2021 at 05:07 AM

@scott s. | 26 January 2021 at 02:25 PM

Theologically, you have a point. Except that historically, virtually all the low-church British protestants were very pro-Jewish anyway, regardless of theology. Remember: it was Oliver Cromwell who let the Jews back into England after nearly three centuries of absence. Why? I don't know. Maybe the Proddies thought the Jews would make good allies against Rome. There is also the fact that they tended towards biblical literalism in those days, looking to the Bible as though it were system of law--similar to the way the Jews did.

turcopolier , 27 January 2021 at 09:18 AM

Yeah, right.
No, it was a one way street. It amounted to a firehose stream going one way. There were a lot of meetings at which they gave us nothing of value, and that evidently was not enough because they planted people all over the government to feed them stuff we did not want to give them. Occasionally they got caught passing material and when that happened the politicians would forbid prosecution. That was true of both US parties. Pollard was recruited for the purpose of not having their significant assets put at risk. He was passed lists of specific documents by his Israeli handlers. The documents were listed by serial number so that he would not bring the wrong ones out of the US security envelope. He brought them to the team safe house where they were copied and then he returned them to the Navy's safes. On one occasion I decided to probe their willingness to actually cooperate with us. I told the liaison rep in Washington that we maintained encyclopedic files on all the armed forces of the world. this was a routine task. I told them that it was a waste of our time to collect basic data about the IDF. That being the case, I asked them to give us the TO&E of a type IDF infantry brigade so we would not waste analytic time. The request went to Tel Aviv and was refused.

turcopolier , 27 January 2021 at 09:43 AM

leith

Israel has a long history of stealing US information over and above that which they are given. They don't believe that we give them everything we have and so they steal what they think we may be keeping from them. Compartmentation makes it impossible for them to be sure. Remember Pollard? In Pollard's case the material he was directed to obtain for them often had nothing to do with the ME, but it was good trading material.

The Beaver , 27 January 2021 at 11:37 AM

@ Fred

To learn more about the Maxwell twins who moved to Silicon Valley:
https://www.thecut.com/2019/08/ghislaine-maxwell-family-twin-sisters.html
https://www.wired.com/1999/02/maxwell/

james , 27 January 2021 at 01:46 PM

at what point does the relationship with usa and israel get severed??

[Jan 27, 2021] More Cyber Crimes, Attributed To Russia, Are Shown To Have Come From Elsewhere

Jan 27, 2021 | www.moonofalabama.org

More Cyber Crimes, Attributed To Russia, Are Shown To Have Come From Elsewhere

Earlier today police in Europe took down the Emotet bot-network:

First discovered as a fairly run-of-the-mill banking trojan back in 2014, Emotet evolved over the years into one of the most professional and resilient cyber crime services in the world, and became a "go-to" solution for cyber criminals.

Its infrastructure acted as a mechanism to gain access to target systems, which was done via an automated spam email process that delivered Emotet malware to its victims via malicious attachments, often shipping notices, invoices and, since last spring, Covid-19 information or offers. If opened, victims would be promoted to enable macros that allowed malicious code to run and instal Emotet.

This done, Emotet's operators then sold access on to other cyber criminal groups as a means to infiltrate their victims, steal data, and drop malware and ransomware. The operators of TrickBot and Ryuk were among the many users of Emotet.

Up to a quarter of all recent run of the mill cyber-crime was done through the Emotet network. Closing it down is a great success.

Wikipedia falsely claimed that Emotet was based in Russia:

Emotet is a malware strain and a cybercrime operation based in Russia.[1] The malware, also known as Geodo and Mealybug, was first detected in 2014[2] and remains active, deemed one of the most prevalent threats of 2019.[3]

bigger

However the Hindu report linked as source to the Russia claim under [1] only says :

The malware is said to be operated from Russia, and its operator is nicknamed Ivan by cyber security researchers.

"Is said to be operated from Russia" is quite a weak formulation and should not be used as source for attribution claims. It is also definitely false.

The operating center of Emotet was found in the Ukraine. Today the Ukrainian national police took control of it during a raid (video). The police found dozens of computers, some hundred hard drives, about 50 kilogram of gold bars (current price ~$60,000/kg) and large amounts of money in multiple currencies.


bigger

Since the 2016 publishing of internal emails of the DNC and the Clinton campaign attribution of computer intrusions to Russia has become a standard propaganda feature. But in no case was there shown evidence which proved that Russia was responsible for a hack.

The recently discovered deep intrusion into U.S. companies and government networks used a manipulated version of the SolarWinds Orion network management software. The Washington borg immediately attributed the hack to Russia. Then President Trump attributed it to China. But none of those claims were backed up by facts or known evidence.

The hack was extremely complex, well managed and resourced, and likely required insider knowledge. To this IT professional it 'felt' neither Russian nor Chinese. It is far more likely, as Whitney Webb finds, that Israel was behind it :

The implanted code used to execute the hack was directly injected into the source code of SolarWinds Orion. Then, the modified and bugged version of the software was "compiled, signed and delivered through the existing software patch release management system," per reports . This has led US investigators and observers to conclude that the perpetrators had direct access to SolarWinds code as they had "a high degree of familiarity with the software." While the way the attackers gained access to Orion's code base has yet to be determined, one possibility being pursued by investigators is that the attackers were working with employee(s) of a SolarWinds contractor or subsidiary.
...
Though some contractors and subsidiaries of SolarWinds are now being investigated, one that has yet to be investigated, but should be, is Samanage. Samanage, acquired by SolarWinds in 2019, not only gained automatic access to Orion just as the malicious code was first inserted, but it has deep ties to Israeli intelligence and a web of venture-capital firms associated with numerous Israeli espionage scandals that have targeted the US government.
...
Samanage offers what it describes as "an IT Service Desk solution." It was acquired by SolarWinds so Samanage's products could be added to SolarWinds' IT Operations Management portfolio. Though US reporting and SolarWinds press releases state that Samanage is based in Cary, North Carolina, implying that it is an American company, Samanage is actually an Israeli firm . It was founded in 2007 by Doron Gordon, who previously worked for several years at MAMRAM , the Israeli military's central computing unit .
...
Several months after the acquisition was announced, in November 2019, Samanage, renamed SolarWinds Service Desk, became listed as a standard feature of SolarWinds Orion software, whereas the integration of Samanage and Orion had previously been optional since the acquisition's announcement in April of that year. This means that complete integration was likely made standard in either October or November. It has since been reported that the perpetrators of the recent hack gained access to the networks of US federal agencies and major corporations at around the same time. Samanage's automatic integration into Orion was a major modification made to the now-compromised software during that period.

The U.S. National Security Agency has ways and means to find out who was behind the SolarWinds hack. But if Israel is the real culprit no one will be allowed to say so publicly. Some high ranging U.-S. general or official will fly to Israel and read his counterpart the riot act. Israel will ignore it just as it has done every time when it was caught spying on the U.S. government.

With more then half of Washington's politicians in its pockets it has no reason to fear any consequences.

Posted by b on January 27, 2021 at 15:32 UTC | Permalink


Jackrabbit , Jan 27 2021 15:51 utc | 1

Whitney Webb's entire article is a must-read.

!!

Jackrabbit , Jan 27 2021 15:55 utc | 2
pat lang weighs in (also in the comments): Solar Winds was an Israeli penetration? Not Russia?

!!

oldhippie , Jan 27 2021 16:04 utc | 3
Ukraine is become a Wild West for spies and mercenaries .Perhaps that was whole intent of coup
Bemildred , Jan 27 2021 16:07 utc | 4
I have been dumbfounded for some time by supporters of the Izzies apparent lack of concern about the eventual consequences of this sort of behavior. But I suppose, as with Uncle Sugar, the notion of ones own exceptional nature prevents a sensible assessment.
dan of steele , Jan 27 2021 16:11 utc | 5
can someone explain why they had all that gold there? do people pay ransom in gold bars now?

this seems very odd to me.

Mao Cheng Ji , Jan 27 2021 16:14 utc | 6
I have no direct knowledge of SolarWinds specifically, but if Boeing hired HCL (formerly Hindu Computer Limited) to develop software for its 737 max, I'll make a wild guess and assume that SolarWinds too probably hired a bunch of Indian kids worth $10/hour each, who come and go every few months.

And if that's indeed the case, then anything's possible.

gm , Jan 27 2021 16:17 utc | 7
Israeli intel spinoffs/cutouts, US FBI/CIA and the NSA surveillance/blackmail collection agencies and their agents; they are facets of the same worldwide "NWO" criminal Blob-Mob, imo.

It should be obvious by now they have the power to set up one US President, and depose him through a ham-handed domestic election fraud coup, and install an eaaily controlled neurodegenerating corrupt puppet, and completely control and pervert the US Judicial system, so as to essentially get away and continue with their criminal culture and crimes against humanity unchecked.

With such a history, of course they have the means to frame Russia, as well as to destroy any others who stand in their way to more power and autocratic control of the planet.

Hoarsewhisperer , Jan 27 2021 16:26 utc | 8
...
With more than half of Washington's politicians in its pockets ("Israel") has no reason to fear any consequences.
Posted by b on January 27, 2021 at 15:32 UTC | Permalink

Precisely. And it's almost as bad in Oz, and even worse in the UK. Money is the only logical explanation for the "Israel" Worship indulged in by corrupt, amoral Western political 'leaders'.

William Gruff , Jan 27 2021 16:27 utc | 9
"The Washington borg immediately attributed the hack to Russia. Then President Trump attributed it to China."

Was there a better way for Trump to telegraph (or tweet, whatever) to the public that the establishment had no idea who was behind the hack?

If Trump said that he didn't believe Russia did it that would just give the establishment mass media ammunition to say he was Putin's puppet. After dozens of mass media products echo the narrative off each other to amplify a weak and vague suggestion and build it into something that the public perceives as truth, Trump crushed it all by just accusing someone else. Rather than laboriously dismantling the accusation aimed at Russia he just cut it off at the knees.

Unfortunately that is something only a President can do, and the current figurehead in that position absolutely will not be doing anything that might undermine the establishment narrative du jour. I miss Trump already for that alone.

librul , Jan 27 2021 16:28 utc | 10
b posted, "Is said to be operated from Russia" is quite a weak formulation

However, don't give the average reader of newsignorance
much credit. Even well above average readers can have a readiness for
confirmation bias.

side rant:
Human intelligence is just a tool. High intelligence does not guarantee
a dedication to a search for truth. High intelligence can give one
a developed skill at
rationalizing whatever beliefs one already holds.

-----
Privacy!

I just learned about this!
Check this out (always remember, though, "trust but verify")
And an alternative service that can rightly be trusted today
is not necessarily trustworthy tomorrow.

https://restoreprivacy.com/
lists alternative services for everything from Google Docs, iCloud, secure messengers, and search engines.

Bemildred , Jan 27 2021 16:35 utc | 11
Never trust your local FBI plant:

Exclusive: Proud Boys leader was 'prolific' informer for law enforcement

librul , Jan 27 2021 16:38 utc | 12
@Posted by: librul | Jan 27 2021 16:28 utc | 10

In my excitement I didn't realize that
restoreprivacy
does not appear to give video platforms.

Here are some suggested by a ZH article:

"video platforms like LBRY.tv (Odysee.com), Bitchute, Rumble, or Brighteon– places I'll be posting all my videos from now on."

https://www.zerohedge.com/news/2021-01-27/protecting-my-extremist-content-censorship

the pair , Jan 27 2021 16:45 utc | 13
some of the hack was semi-sophisticated ("semi" since it could have been an inside job) but some was just a typical PICNIC .

i've also been in various IT roles and it's funny how people ghettoize themselves...web design/"full stack" guys were always the worst but i had a lot of server/NAS guys who had ZERO clue about security and would use idiot passwords like that (and torrent episodes of "the wire" and watch sports on youtube and etc etc).

as for the israelis, the cellebrite guys and probably these jackasses are good examples of what happens when you get to sit around on stolen land and live off free money from the US. which is funny because a lot of skilled "1337hax0rz" also come from poor-ass areas of russia and the other former soviet areas.

librul , Jan 27 2021 16:46 utc | 14
@Posted by: Bemildred | Jan 27 2021 16:35 utc | 11

I saw that headline too.

I didn't (bother) to read it, but wondered why the MSM
would do everyone a favor and warn about this guy.

His usefulness had ended? So eke out that last drop of value from him
by sowing distrust within Proud Boys and other alternate organizations.
Or (heaven's forbid!) that guy is being set up for assassination
by the Deep State as a false-flag. (Outrageous, simply outrageous,
but imagine if they did a Navalny/Skripal on him - whoa!)

Bemildred , Jan 27 2021 16:53 utc | 15
Posted by: librul | Jan 27 2021 16:46 utc | 14

We do seem to have some disagreements among our ruling "elites" these days, and I think that may have something to do with it, but I really don't know and that is a good question. "Why are they telling me this" is always a good question.

Nevertheless, I think it is a good idea to warn the young these days, so I thought I'd post it.

librul , Jan 27 2021 17:00 utc | 16
@Posted by: Bemildred | Jan 27 2021 16:53 utc | 15

For sure, that is the rub.
When to self-censor, when to post.
Better to post and then discuss
then simply censor.

gm , Jan 27 2021 17:00 utc | 17
@Bemildred | Jan 27 2021 16:35 utc | 11

Yep. FBI is following the time-tested "proactive" standard playbook of synthetic terror/crime creation to support the Borg's agenda.

Some congressman a few years back got a hold of, and publically released official docs showing that FBI was budgeting a yearly payroll for nsome >15,000 paid confidential informants/agent provacatuers circa 2014(?).

This FBI practice goes all the way back to the 1960's and probably much earlier.

In the last 60+ years, there have been oo many FBI-created/supported domestic 'crime/terror' groups/leaderships to list in one post here.

Likely the leadership of both BLM and US antifa is also controlled by FBI (Euro antifa=>likely CIA). [CIA Operation Ajax/Kermit Roosevelt)was running paid *rent-a-mobs* all the way back in the 1953 overthrowal of Iran's Mossadegh govt].

Arch Bungle , Jan 27 2021 17:21 utc | 18

Wikipedia falsely claimed ...


Recently I've been unable to find anything on Wikipedia that has not been corrupted to some degree or other by lies.

What a disappointment of a once grand ideal.

Young , Jan 27 2021 17:52 utc | 19 I know it is OT, but, I was wondering what is happening with the Huawei Princess in Canada since the regime change in the USA?
gottlieb , Jan 27 2021 17:52 utc | 20
Good report. The Wikileaks Vault 7 release clearly shows the USA has tools to create false flag cyber warfare. To say one knows where a hack originates says more about the accuser than the accused. Ms. Webb's reporting on the Epstein case was profound, and her follow-up reporting on various threads has been stellar. There is no reason to doubt her reporting here. It is no accident that most of Webb's threads lead back to Israel. When one considers the USA's blind fealty to Israel, often alone in its support, one must consider that mass blackmailing of political leaders going back decades is a real possibility to explain the USA's Israel-centric foreign and domestic policy.
gm , Jan 27 2021 17:58 utc | 21
More on Proud Boys FBI Snitch Enrique Tarrio's long informant history with the FBI:

https://www.zerohedge.com/political/proud-boys-leader-was-prolific-fbi-snitch-court-docs

While US officials claim that 'far-right extremism' is one of the largest threats facing America, the leader of the group most commonly singled out as an example - the Proud Boys - was a 'prolific' informant for federal and local law enforcement, according to Reuters, citing a 2014 federal court proceeding.

Enrique Tarrio repeatedly worked undercover for investigators following a 2012 arrest, court documents reveal.

Curiously, Tarrio was ordered to stay away from Washington D.C. one day before the January 6 Capitol riot after he was arrested on vandalism and weapons charges - upon a request by government prosecutors that he be prohibited from attending. At least five Proud Boys members were charged as part of the riot.

In the 2014 hearing, a federal prosecutor, an FBI agent and Tarrio's attorney describe his undercover work - noting that the Proud Boys leader helped authorities prosecute over a dozen people in various cases involving drugs, gambling and human smuggling, accoding to Reuters.

In a Tuesday interview with Reuters, Tarrio denied working undercover or cooperating in cases.

"I don't know any of this," he said, adding "I don't recall any of this."

[...]

During Tarrio's 2014 hearing, both the prosecutor and Tarrio's defense attorney asked for a reduced prison sentence after pleading guilty in a fraud case related to the relabeling and sale of stolen diabetes test kits. In requesting leniency for Tarrio and two co-defendants, the prosecutor noted that Tarrio's information had resulted in the prosecution of 13 people on federal charges in two separate cases, and helped local authorities investigate a gambling ring.

Someone , Jan 27 2021 18:37 utc | 22
@dan of steel:gold is compact -- 1 kg gold fits in the back pocket of your jeans. Impossible with any currency bills worth $ 60K AFAIK
james , Jan 27 2021 18:40 utc | 23
good work b and whitney webb! i like how you and her connect the dots.... and as you note - 'nothing will change' when they find who is behind this..

wikipedia has been a write off for some time...

dan of steele , Jan 27 2021 18:46 utc | 24
Someone | Jan 27 2021 18:37 utc | 22

that is all true, but can you buy a cup of coffee or a sandwich with it? or a car? a credit card is a lot smaller and easier to use.

it just seems odd that someone would have all that gold in what looks like a workshop...a kind of messy one at that.

[Jan 22, 2021] Another Mega Group Spy Scandal- Samanage, Sabotage, And The SolarWinds Hack by Whitney Webb

Jan 22, 2021 | www.unz.com

Another Mega Group Spy Scandal? Samanage, Sabotage, and the SolarWinds Hack WHITNEY WEBB JANUARY 21, 2021 4,800 WORDS 13 COMMENTS REPLY Tweet Reddit 3 Share Share 2 Email Print More 5 SHARES RSS

The devastating hack on SolarWinds was quickly pinned on Russia by US intelligence. A more likely culprit, Samanage, a company whose software was integrated into SolarWinds' software just as the "back door" was inserted, is deeply tied to Israeli intelligence and intelligence-linked families such as the Maxwells.

In mid-December of 2020, a massive hack compromised the networks of numerous US federal agencies, major corporations, the top five accounting firms in the country, and the military, among others. Despite most US media attention now focusing on election-related chaos, the fallout from the hack continues to make headlines day after day.

The hack , which affected Texas-based software provider SolarWinds , was blamed on Russia on January 5 by the US government's Cyber Unified Coordination Group. Their statement asserted that the attackers were " likely Russian in origin ," but they failed to provide evidence to back up that claim.

Since then, numerous developments in the official investigation have been reported, but no actual evidence pointing to Russia has yet to be released. Rather, mainstream media outlets began reporting the intelligence community's "likely" conclusion as fact right away, with the New York Times subsequently reporting that US investigators were examining a product used by SolarWinds that was sold by a Czech Republic–based company, as the possible entry point for the "Russian hackers." Interest in that company, however, comes from the fact that the attackers most likely had access to the systems of a contractor or subsidiary of SolarWinds. This, combined with the evidence-free report from US intelligence on "likely" Russian involvement, is said to be the reason investigators are focusing on the Czech company, though any of SolarWinds' contractors/subsidiaries could have been the entry point.

Such narratives clearly echo those that became prominent in the wake of the 2016 election, when now-debunked claims were made that Russian hackers were responsible for leaked emails published by WikiLeaks. Parallels are obvious when one considers that SolarWinds quickly brought on the discredited firm CrowdStrike to aid them in securing their networks and investigating the hack. CrowdStrike had also been brought on by the DNC after the 2016 WikiLeaks publication, and subsequently it was central in developing the false declarations regarding the involvement of "Russian hackers" in that event.

There are also other parallels. As Russiagate played out, it became apparent that there was collusion between the Trump campaign and a foreign power, but the nation was Israel , not Russia. Indeed, many of the reports that came out of Russiagate revealed collusion with Israel , yet those instances received little coverage and generated little media outrage. This has led some to suggest that Russiagate may have been a cover for what was in fact Israelgate.

Similarly, in the case of the SolarWinds hack, there is the odd case and timing of SolarWinds' acquisition of a company called Samanage in 2019. As this report will explore, Samanage's deep ties to Israeli intelligence, venture-capital firms connected to both intelligence and Isabel Maxwell, as well as Samange's integration with the Orion software at the time of the back door's insertion warrant investigation every bit as much as SolarWinds' Czech-based contractor.

Orion's Fall

In the month since the hack, evidence has emerged detailing the extent of the damage, with the Justice Department quietly announcing , the same day as the Capitol riots (January 6), that their email system had been breached in the hack -- a "major incident" according to the department. This terminology means that the attack "is likely to result in demonstrable harm to the national security interests, foreign relations, or the economy of the United States or to the public confidence, civil liberties, or public health and safety of the American people," per NextGov .

The Justice Department was the fourth US government agency to publicly acknowledge a breach in connection to the hack, with the others being the Departments of Commerce and Energy and the Treasury. Yet, while only four agencies have publicly acknowledged fallout from the hack, SolarWinds software is also used by the Department of Defense, the State Department, NASA, the NSA, and the Executive Office. Given that the Cyber Unified Coordination Group stated that "fewer than ten" US government agencies had been affected, it's likely that some of these agencies were compromised, and some press reports have asserted that the State Department and Pentagon were affected.

In addition to government agencies, SolarWinds Orion software was in use by the top ten US telecommunications corporations, the top five US accounting firms, the New York Power Authority, and numerous US government contractors such as Booz Allen Hamilton, General Dynamics, and the Federal Reserve. Other notable SolarWinds clients include the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, Microsoft, Credit Suisse, and several mainstream news outlets including the Economist and the New York Times .

Based on what is officially known so far, the hackers appeared to have been highly sophisticated, with FireEye, the cybersecurity company that first discovered the implanted code used to conduct the hack, stating that the hackers "routinely removed their tools, including the backdoors, once legitimate remote access was achieved -- implying a high degree of technical sophistication and attention to operational security." In addition, top security experts have noted that the hack was " very very carefully orchestrated ," leading to a consensus that the hack was state sponsored.

FireEye stated that they first identified the compromise of SolarWinds after the version of the Orion software they were using contained a back door that was used to gain access to its "red team" suite of hacking tools. Not long after the disclosure of the SolarWinds hack, on December 31, the hackers were able to partially access Microsoft's source code, raising concerns that the act was preparation for future and equally devastating attacks.

FireEye's account can be taken with a grain of salt, however, as the CIA is one of FireEye's clients , and FireEye was launched with funding from the CIA's venture capital arm In-Q-tel. It is also worth being skeptical of the " free tool " FireEye has made available in the hack's aftermath for "spotting and keeping suspected Russians out of systems."

In addition, Microsoft, another key source in the SolarWinds story, is a military contractor with close ties to Israel's intelligence apparatus, especially Unit 8200, and their reports of events also deserve scrutiny. Notably, it was Unit 8200 alumnus and executive at Israeli cybersecurity firm Cycode, Ronen Slavin , who told Reuters in a widely quoted article that he "was worried by the possibility that the SolarWinds hackers were poring over Microsoft's source code as prelude to a much more ambitious offensive." "To me the biggest question is, 'Was this recon for the next big operation?'" Slavin stated .

Also odd about the actors involved in the response to the hack is the decision to bring on not only the discredited firm CrowdStrike but also the new consultancy firm of Chris Krebs and Alex Stamos, former chief information security officer of Facebook and Yahoo, to investigate the hack. Chris Krebs is the former head of the Department of Homeland Security's Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency (CISA) and was previously a top Microsoft executive. Krebs was fired by Donald Trump after repeatedly and publicly challenging Trump on the issue of election fraud in the 2020 election.

As head of CISA, Krebs gave access to networks of critical infrastructure throughout the US, with a focus on the health-care industry, to the CTI League , a suspicious outfit of anonymous volunteers working "for free" and led by a former Unit 8200 officer. "We have brought in the expertise of Chris Krebs and Alex Stamos to assist in this review and provide best-in-class guidance on our journey to evolve into an industry leading secure software development company," a SolarWinds spokesperson said in an email cited by Reuters .

It is also worth noting that the SolarWinds hack did benefit a few actors aside from the attackers themselves. For instance, Israeli cybersecurity firms CheckPoint and CyberArk, which have close ties to Israeli intelligence Unit 8200, have seen their stocks soar in the weeks since the SolarWinds compromise was announced. Notably, in 2017, CyberArk was the company that " discovered " one of the main tactics used in an attack, a form of SAML token manipulation called GoldenSAML. CyberArk does not specify how they discovered this method of attack and, at the time they announced the tactic's existence, released a free tool to identify systems vulnerable to GoldenSAML manipulation.

In addition, the other main mode of attack, a back door program nicknamed Sunburst, was found by Kaspersky researchers to be similar to a piece of malware called Kazuar that was also first discovered by another Unit 8200-linked company , Palo Alto Networks, also in 2017. The similarities only suggest that those who developed the Sunburst backdoor may have been inspired by Kazuar and "they may have common members between them or a shared software developer building their malware." Kaspersky stressed that Sunburst and Kazuar are not likely to be one and the same. It is worth noting, as an aside, that Unit 8200 is known to have previously hacked Kaspersky and attempted to insert a back door into their products, per Kaspersky employees.

Crowdstrike claimed that this finding confirmed "the attribution at least to Russian intelligence," only because an allegedly Russian hacking group is believed to have used Kazuar before. No technical evidence linking Russia to the SolarWinds hacking has yet been presented.

Samanage and Sabotage

The implanted code used to execute the hack was directly injected into the source code of SolarWinds Orion. Then, the modified and bugged version of the software was "compiled, signed and delivered through the existing software patch release management system," per reports . This has led US investigators and observers to conclude that the perpetrators had direct access to SolarWinds code as they had "a high degree of familiarity with the software." While the way the attackers gained access to Orion's code base has yet to be determined, one possibility being pursued by investigators is that the attackers were working with employee(s) of a SolarWinds contractor or subsidiary.

US investigators have been focusing on offices of SolarWinds that are based abroad, suggesting that -- in addition to the above -- the attackers were likely working for SolarWinds or were given access by someone working for the company. That investigation has focused on offices in eastern Europe, allegedly because "Russian intelligence operatives are deeply rooted" in those countries.

It is worth pointing out, however, that Israeli intelligence is similarly "deeply rooted" in eastern European states both before and after the fall of the Soviet Union, ties well illustrated by Israeli superspy and media tycoon Robert Maxwell's frequent and close associations with Eastern European and Russian intelligence agencies as well as the leaders of many of those countries. Israeli intelligence operatives like Maxwell also had cozy ties with Russian organized crime. For instance, Maxwell enabled the access of the Russian organized crime network headed by Semion Mogilevich into the US financial system and was also Mogilevich's business partner . In addition, the cross-pollination between Israeli and Russian organized crime networks (networks which also share ties to their respective intelligence agencies) and such links should be considered if the cybercriminals due prove to be Russian in origin, as US intelligence has claimed.

Though some contractors and subsidiaries of SolarWinds are now being investigated, one that has yet to be investigated, but should be, is Samanage. Samanage, acquired by SolarWinds in 2019, not only gained automatic access to Orion just as the malicious code was first inserted, but it has deep ties to Israeli intelligence and a web of venture-capital firms associated with numerous Israeli espionage scandals that have targeted the US government. Israel is deemed by the NSA to be one of the top spy threats facing US government agencies and Israel's list of espionage scandals in the US is arguably the longest, and includes the Jonathan Pollard and PROMIS software scandals of the 1980s to the Larry Franklin/AIPAC espionage scandal in 2009.

Though much reporting has since been done on the recent compromise of SolarWinds Orion software, little attention has been paid to Samanage. Samanage offers what it describes as "an IT Service Desk solution." It was acquired by SolarWinds so Samanage's products could be added to SolarWinds' IT Operations Management portfolio. Though US reporting and SolarWinds press releases state that Samanage is based in Cary, North Carolina, implying that it is an American company, Samanage is actually an Israeli firm . It was founded in 2007 by Doron Gordon, who previously worked for several years at MAMRAM , the Israeli military's central computing unit .

Samanage was SolarWinds' first acquisition of an Israeli company, and, at the time, Israeli media reported that SolarWinds was expected to set up its first development center in Israel. It appears, however, that SolarWinds, rather than setting up a new center, merely began using Samanage's research and development center located in Netanya, Israel.

Several months after the acquisition was announced, in November 2019, Samanage, renamed SolarWinds Service Desk, became listed as a standard feature of SolarWinds Orion software, whereas the integration of Samanage and Orion had previously been optional since the acquisition's announcement in April of that year. This means that complete integration was likely made standard in either October or November. It has since been reported that the perpetrators of the recent hack gained access to the networks of US federal agencies and major corporations at around the same time. Samanage's automatic integration into Orion was a major modification made to the now-compromised software during that period.

Samanage appears to have had access to Orion following the announcement of the acquisition in April 2019. Integration first began with Orion version 2019.4, the earliest version believed to contain the malicious code that enabled the hack. In addition, the integrated Samanage component of Orion was responsible for "ensuring the appropriate teams are quickly notified when critical events or performance issues [with Orion] are detected," which was meant to allow "service agents to react faster and resolve issues before . . . employees are impacted."

In other words, the Samanage component that was integrated into Orion at the same time the compromise took place was also responsible for Orion's alert system for critical events or performance issues. The code that was inserted into Orion by hackers in late 2019 nevertheless went undetected by this Samanage-made component for over a year, giving the "hackers" access to millions of devices critical to both US government and corporate networks. Furthermore, it is this Samanage-produced component of the affected Orion software that advises end users to exempt the software from antivirus scans and group policy object (GPO) restrictions by providing a warning that Orion may not work properly unless those exemptions are granted.

Samanage, Salesforce, and the World Economic Forum

Around the time of Samange's acquisition by SolarWinds, it was reported that one of Samanage's top backers was the company Salesforce, with Salesforce being both a major investor in Samanage as well as a partner of the company.

Salesforce is run by Marc Benioff, a billionaire who got his start at the tech giant Oracle. Oracle was originally created as a CIA spin-off and has deep ties to Israel's government and the outgoing Trump administration. Salesforce also has a large presence in Israel, with much of its global research and development based there . Salesforce also recently partnered with the Unit 8200-linked Israeli firm Diagnostic Robotics to "predictively" diagnose COVID-19 cases using Artificial Intelligence.

Aside from leading Salesforce, Benioff is a member of the Vatican's Council for Inclusive Capitalism alongside Lynn Forester de Rothschild, a close associate of Jeffrey Epstein and the Clintons, and members of the Lauder family, who have deep ties to the Mega Group and Israeli politics.

Benioff is also a prominent member of the board of trustees of the World Economic Forum and the inaugural chair of the WEF's Centre for the Fourth Industrial Revolution (C4IR), making him one of the most critical players in the unfolding of the WEF-backed Great Reset. Other WEF leaders, including the organization's founder Klaus Schwab, have openly discussed how massive cyberattacks such as befell SolarWinds will soon result in "even more significant economic and social implications than COVID-19."

Last year, the WEF's Centre for Cybersecurity, of which Salesforce is part, simulated a "digital pandemic" cyberattack in an exercise entitled Cyber Polygon . Cyber Polygon's speakers in 2020 included former UK Prime Minister Tony Blair, the Prime Minister of Russia Mikhail Mishustin, WEF founder Klaus Schwab, and IBM executive Wendi Whitmore , who previously held top posts at both Crowdstrike and a FireEye subsidiary. Notably, just months before the COVID-19 crisis, the WEF had held Event 201, which simulated a global coronavirus pandemic that crippled the world's economy.

In addition to Samanage's ties to WEF big shots such as Marc Benioff, the other main investors behind Samanage's rise have ties to major Israeli espionage scandals, including the Jonathan Pollard affair and the PROMIS software scandal. There are also ties to one of the WEF's founding " technology pioneers ," Isabel Maxwell (the daughter of Robert Maxwell and sister of Ghislaine), who has long-standing ties to Israel's intelligence apparatus and the country's hi-tech sector.

The Bronfmans, the Maxwells, and Viola Ventures

At the time of its acquisition by SolarWinds, Samanage's top investor was Viola Ventures, a major Israeli venture-capital firm. Viola's investment in Samanage, until its acquisition, was managed by Ronen Nir, who was also on Samanage's board before it became part of SolarWinds.

Prior to working at Viola, Ronen Nir was a vice president at Verint, formerly Converse Infosys. Verint, whose other alumni have gone on to found Israeli intelligence-front companies such as Cybereason . Verint has a history of aggressively spying on US government facilities, including the White House , and created the backdoors into all US telecommunications systems and major tech companies, including Microsoft, Google and Facebook, on behalf of the US' NSA.

In addition to his background at Verint, Ronen Nir is an Israeli spy , having served for thirteen years in an elite IDF intelligence unit, and he remains a lieutenant colonel on reserve duty. His biography also notes that he worked for two years at the Israeli embassy in Washington, DC, which is fitting given his background in espionage and the major role that Israeli embassy has played in several major espionage scandals.

As an aside, Nir has stated that "thought leader" Henry Kissinger is his "favorite historical character." Notably, Kissinger was instrumental in allowing Robert Maxwell, Israeli superspy and father of Ghislaine and Isabel Maxwell, to sell software with a back door for Israeli intelligence to US national laboratories, where it was used to spy on the US nuclear program. Kissinger had told Maxwell to connect with Senator John Tower in order to gain access to US national laboratories, which directly enabled this action, part of the larger PROMIS software scandal .

In addition, Viola's stake was managed through a firm known as Carmel Ventures, which is part of the Viola Group. At the time, Carmel Ventures was advised by Isabel Maxwell , whose father had previously been directly involved in the operation of the front company used to sell bugged software to US national laboratories. As noted in a previous article at Unlimited Hangout , Isabel "inherited" her father's circle of Israeli government and intelligence contacts after his death and has been instrumental in building the "bridge" between Israel's intelligence and military-linked hi-tech sector to Silicon Valley.

Isabel also has ties to the Viola Group itself through Jonathan Kolber, a general partner at Viola. Kolber previously cofounded and led the Bronfman family's private-equity fund, Claridge Israel (based in Israel). Kolber then led Koor Industries, which he had acquired alongside the Bronfmans via Claridge. Kolber is closely associated with Stephen Bronfman, the son of Charles Bronfman who created Claridge and also cofounded the Mega Group with Leslie Wexner in the early 1990s.

Kolber, like Isabel Maxwell, is a founding director of the Peres Center for Peace and Innovation. Maxwell, who used to chair the center's board, stepped down following the Epstein scandal, though it's not exactly clear when. Other directors of the center include Tamir Pardo, former head of Mossad. Kolber's area of expertise, like that of Isabel Maxwell, is "structuring complex, cross-border and cross industry business and financial transactions," that is, arranging acquisitions and partnerships of Israeli firms by US companies. Incidentally, this is also a major focus of the Peres Center.

Other connections to Isabel Maxwell, aside from her espionage ties, are worth noting, given that she is a "technology pioneer" of the World Economic Forum. As previously mentioned, Salesforce -- a major investor in Samanage -- is deeply involved with the WEF and its Great Reset.

The links of Israeli intelligence and Salesforce to Samanage, and thus to SolarWinds, is particularly relevant given the WEF's "prediction" of a coming "pandemic" of cyberattacks and the early hints from former Unit 8200 officers that the SolarWinds hack is just the beginning. It is also worth mentioning the Israeli government's considerable ties to the WEF over the years, particularly last year when it joined the Benioff-chaired C4IR and participated in the October 2020 WEF panel entitled "The Great Reset: Harnessing the Fourth Industrial Revolution."

Start Up Nation Central, an organization aimed at integrating Israeli start-ups with US firms set up by Netanyahu's longtime economic adviser Eugene Kandel and American Zionist billionaire Paul Singer, have asserted that Israel will serve a "key role" globally in the 4 th Industrial Revolution following the implementation of the Great Reset.

Gemini, the BIRD Foundation, and Jonathan Pollard

In addition to Viola, another of Samange's leading investors is Gemini Israel Ventures. Gemini is one of Israel's oldest venture-capital firms, dating back to the Israeli government's 1993 Yozma program.

The first firm created by Yozma, Gemini was put under the control of Ed Mlavsky, who Israel's government had chosen specifically for this position. As previously reported by Unlimited Hangout , Mlavsky was then serving as the executive director of the Israel-US Binational Industrial Research and Development (BIRD) Foundation, where "he was responsible for investments of $100 million in more than 300 joint projects between US and Israeli high-tech companies."

A few years before Gemini was created, while Mlavsky still headed BIRD, the foundation became embroiled in one of the worst espionage scandals in US history, the Jonathan Pollard affair.

In the indictment of US citizen Pollard for espionage on Israel's behalf, it was noted that Pollard delivered the documents he stole to agents of Israel at two locations, one of which was an apartment owned by Harold Katz, the then legal counsel of the BIRD Foundation and an adviser to Israel's military, which oversaw Israel's scientific intelligence-gathering agency, Lekem. US officials told the New York Times at the time that they believed Katz "has detailed knowledge about the [Pollard] spy ring and could implicate senior Israeli officials."

Subsequent reporting by journalist Claudia Wright pointed the finger at the Mlavsky-run BIRD Foundation as one of the ways Israeli intelligence funneled money to Pollard before his capture by US authorities.

One of the first companies Gemini invested in was CommTouch (now Cyren), which was founded by ex-IDF officers and later led by Isabel Maxwell. Under Maxwell's leadership, CommTouch developed close ties to Microsoft, partially due to Maxwell's relationship with its cofounder Bill Gates.

A Coming "Hack" of Microsoft?

If the SolarWinds hack is as serious as has been reported, it's difficult to understand why a company like Samanage would not be looked into as part of a legitimate investigation into the attack. The timing of Samanage employees gaining access to the Orion software and the company's investors including Israeli spies and those with ties to past espionage scandals where Israel used back doors to spy on the US and beyond raises obvious red flags. Yet, any meaningful investigation of the incident is unlikely to take place, especially given the considerable involvement of discredited firms like CrowdStrike, CIA fronts like FireEye and a consultancy firm led by former Silicon Valley executives with their own government/intelligence ties.

There is also the added fact that both of the main methods used in the attack were analogous or bore similarities to hacking tools that were both discovered by Unit 8200-linked companies in 2017. Unit 8200-founded cybersecurity firms are among the few "winners" from the SolarWinds hack, as their stocks have skyrocketed and demand for their services has increased globally.

While some may argue that Unit 8200 alumni are not necessarily connected to the Israeli intelligence apparatus, numerous reports have pointed out the admitted fusion of Israeli military intelligence with Israel's hi-tech sector and its tech-focused venture capital networks, with Israeli military and intelligence officials themselves noting that the line between the private cybersecurity sector and Israel's intelligence apparatus is so blurred, it's difficult to know where one begins and the other ends. There is also the Israeli government policy, formally launched in 2012 , whereby Israel's intelligence and military intelligence agencies began outsourcing "activities that were previously managed in-house, with a focus on software and cyber technologies."

Samanage certainly appears to be such a company, not only because it was founded by a former IDF officer in the military's central computing unit, but because its main investors include spies on "reserve duty" and venture capital firms linked to the Pollard scandal as well as the Bronfman and Maxwell families, both of whom have been tied to espionage and sexual blackmail scandals over the years.

Yet, as the Epstein scandal has recently indicated, major espionage scandals involving Israel receive little coverage and investigations into these events rarely lead anywhere. PROMIS was covered up largely thanks to Bill Barr during his first term as Attorney General and even the Pollard affair has all been swept under the rug with Donald Trump allowing Pollard to move to Israel and, more recently, pardoning the Israeli spy who recruited Pollard during his final day as President. Also under Trump, there was the discovery of "stingray" surveillance devices placed by Israel's government throughout Washington DC, including next to the White House, which were quickly memory holed and oddly not investigated by authorities. Israel had previously wiretapped the White House's phone lines during the Clinton years.

Another cover up is likely in the case of SolarWinds, particularly if the entry point was in fact Samanage. Though a cover up would certainly be more of the same, the SolarWinds case is different as major tech companies and cybersecurity firms with ties to US and Israeli intelligence now insist that Microsoft is soon to be targeted in what would clearly be a much more devastating event than SolarWinds due to the ubiquity of Microsoft's products.

On Tuesday, CIA-linked firm FireEye, which apparently has a leadership role in investigating the hack, claimed that the perpetrators are still gathering data from US government agencies and that "the hackers are moving into Microsoft 365 cloud applications from physical, on-premises servers," meaning that changes to fix Orion's vulnerabilities will not necessarily deny hacker access to previously compromised systems as they allegedly maintain access to those systems via Microsoft cloud applications. In addition to Microsoft's own claims that some of its source code was accessed by the hackers, this builds the narrative that Microsoft products are poised to be targeted in the next high-profile hack.

Microsoft's cloud security infrastructure, set to be the next target of the SolarWinds hackers, was largely developed and later managed by Assaf Rappaport , a former Unit 8200 officer who was most recently the head of Microsoft's Research and Development and Security teams at its massive Israel branch. Rappaport left Microsoft right before the COVID-19 crisis began last year to found a new cybersecurity company called Wiz.

Microsoft, like some of Samanage's main backers, is part of the World Economic Forum and is an enthusiastic supporter of and participant in the Great Reset agenda, so much so that Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella wrote the foreword to Klaus Schwab's book " Shaping the Fourth Industrial Revolution ." With the WEF simulating a cyber "pandemic" and both the WEF and Israel's head of Israel's National Cyber Directorate warning of an imminent " cyber winter ", SolarWinds does indeed appear to be just the beginning, though perhaps a scripted one to create the foundation for something much more severe. A cyberattack on Microsoft products globally would certainly upend most of the global economy and likely have economic effects more severe than the COVID-19 crisis, just as the WEF has been warning. Yet, if such a hack does occur, it will inevitably serve the aims of the Great Reset to "reset" and then rebuild electronic infrastructure.


The ADL hates me , says: January 22, 2021 at 5:36 am GMT • 8.7 hours ago

Israel is the gift that keeps on giving. Lol.

JFK
USS Liberty
91 gulf war
September 11 mossad/cia attack
03 Iraq war
Epstein/Wexner honeypot operations
Microsoft hack

Richard B , says: January 22, 2021 at 5:37 am GMT • 8.7 hours ago

Another great article from Whitney Webb.

Regarding the article, certainly one takeaway would be that, though they're good at acquiring power, they're no good at managing it.

Another way of putting this would be to say that, though they're good at infiltration, subversion, radical ingratitude, betrayal, insane hatred, vindictive hysteria, denial, projection, destruction and death, they're just no good at social management.

Case in point: A country they control whose social institutions are all in free fall, The United States of America. Which, if we were to be perfectly honest, we'd be better off simply referring to as The United States of Israel. In which case we'd have to replace each of the 50 stars on the flag with stars of David. Who knows? Maybe they will. Stranger things have happened in history.

But that would draw too much attention to the USA's many, many social failures. Which, of course, are always – always – the result of self-focused , low-character leadership .

And Character is, in this case, How we treat others .

Verymuchalive , says: January 22, 2021 at 9:52 am GMT • 4.4 hours ago

A very good article, with one point of dubiety.

A cyberattack on Microsoft products globally would certainly upend most of the global economy and likely have economic effects more severe than the COVID-19 crisis, just as the WEF has been warning.

A gross exaggeration, but the Western MSM can be relied upon to make such a cyberattack appear like a massive World crisis – just like they've done with COVID-19, which is nowhere near as virulent even as Hong Kong Flu.

Gerorge Orwell famously wrote:
"Who controls the past controls the future. Who controls the present controls the past."
To which he should have added: Who controls the media controls the present.
For the majority, indoctrinated by the MSM, this seems sadly to be true.

No Friend Of The Devil , says: January 22, 2021 at 9:52 am GMT • 4.4 hours ago

The U.S. military, surveillance state, and government have willingly sold off national security secrets and have made every American business, institution, and individual vulnerable as a result of it.

Bill Clinton permitted technology national security secrets developed by the military, U.S. companies, and universities, all financed by tax payers to be handed over to the CCP by U.S. tech companies that opened factories in China which required the blue prints to the technology in exchange for the CCP to allow them to do it.

NYC is now the new Mossad cyber front, after the NSA and US gov permitted them to all open office in NYC managing day to day operations of US gov., US businesses, and US citizens and residents communications systems and security.

The Negav Desert is the new home of almost every U.S. Silicon Valley company, all invited by Israel to open fronts there, after the US gov and tax payers catapulted the Silicon Valley Titans to unprecedented levels of wealth in world history.

The espionage perpetrated by the US government and survellance state is the primary problem!

There is no such thing as national security as long as these these foxes are guarding the hen house.

They really should all be tried for treason!

Cambridge Analytica was used to spy on US citizens during the 2016 election in order to shift the burden onto another country. They frequently hire intelligence agents from foreign countries as unofficial but frequently practiced policy.

I have noticed that spies have no loyalty to any country or institution. They often work together with spies fro other countries. They are thieves. People spy because they are sex offenders, thieves, intellectual property thieves, or identity thieves. There is no such thing as an honest spy. Their entire life is a series of lies, and it has to be since what they are doing is illegal. Then of course there is the Five Eyes apparatus strengthening bonds in the international surveillance state.

They will sell anything to anyone, and what has happened in Ametica is 100% proof. Nothing is off the table. Everything and everyone has a price as far they are concerned.

Andrea Iravani

Frank frank , says: January 22, 2021 at 11:18 am GMT • 3.0 hours ago
@Jiminy

I'm not sure I follow the twenty years interval or the significance of the three towers (being a 9/11 reference), but you seem to imply it's some eschatological and/or messianic thing. Could you or someone else explain?

The Soft Parade , says: January 22, 2021 at 11:29 am GMT • 2.8 hours ago

A tree is best measured when it's down.

The only question at hand–once the electronically addicted IQistas abandon their angle of dominating the world by means of interdependence–is that upon examining the size of whatever as will soon lie in the dust, (be it 911 or Microsoft) whether we should ever again allow ourselves to become so dependent upon a thing so large and vulnerable.

We did not need the computer to experience the beauty of America prior to abandoning the gold standard, and we don't need the computer now. Yeah, rave on with all that hype Steve Jobs gave to John Scully, ie, You want to sell sugar water all your life, or you want to come with me and change the world?

Jobs had a good mind, yet a monolithically weak objective when it came to change. There is nothing new under the sun. Let it crash.

Stan d Mute , says: January 22, 2021 at 11:54 am GMT • 2.4 hours ago

So they're laying out the groundwork for blaming "hackers" rather than central bankers and politicians when the financial system collapses?

Temporary Insanity , says: January 22, 2021 at 12:01 pm GMT • 2.3 hours ago

"Kissinger had told Maxwell to connect with Senator John Tower in order to gain access to US national laboratories, which directly enabled this action, part of the larger PROMIS software scandal."

You can blame the two Jews for obviously being Jews but John Tower should have been hanged, quartered and displayed in the four corners of these United States for disloyalty.

chuckywiz , says: January 22, 2021 at 12:31 pm GMT • 1.8 hours ago

Hope to see more articles like this instead of the good old beaten up concepts. Or opinionated write up.
Does anyone know what kind of job Jonathan Pollard got in Israel? Chief of intelligence collection agency.

dirtyharriet , says: January 22, 2021 at 12:47 pm GMT • 1.5 hours ago

Many years ago, on the Yahoo News message boards, after I was awakened to some hard truths about our country , I made a prediction that this day would come – that one day it would get pretty bad (free speech) in America, with the usual suspects behind it, and that the closer Americans get to the truth, the worse it will get.

We're here.

This fine article by Whitney Webb indicates what might be next. Pretty scary.

Just a note – Gab is a good alternative in case Unz finally gets taken down. And vice versa. They have a Dissenter browser that will allow you to comment on anything, evidently.

I lurk here a lot because the comments are the best I've ever seen anywhere.

God bless, everyone.

Ray Caruso , says: January 22, 2021 at 1:43 pm GMT • 34 minutes ago

The hack, which affected Texas-based software provider SolarWinds, was blamed on Russia on January 5 by the US government's Cyber Unified Coordination Group. Their statement asserted that the attackers were "likely Russian in origin," but they failed to provide evidence to back up that claim.

I wonder when the U.S. government last made a statement that wasn't a lie.

Bert33 , says: January 22, 2021 at 1:57 pm GMT • 20 minutes ago
@dirtyharriet

Democrats will never silence America. When you tell people to shut up in this country, it just makes them MORE angry, study more, take notes, etc. Myabe Twitterbook will be open next year maybe they won't.

[Jan 17, 2021] A lesson in cyber spying vs. cyber attack by Anatol Lieven

It is unclear whether it was Russians or this is another false flag. Anatol Lieven has zero credentials to discuss this complex subject as he has zero training in computer security and it looks like he has zero understanding of how easy you can create a false flag in this area. Looks like Lieven in not only incompetent but also a neocon. For example "The second entirely appropriate response is for Washington to intensify its own existing cyber-intelligence operations against Russia. " If this London professor thinks that GB can benefit for this, he is deeply mistaken.
Notable quotes:
"... the only countries that have to date carried out a truly successful and destructive act of cyber-sabotage are the U.S. and Israel, through the " Stuxnet " virus, which as introduced into the Iranian nuclear system and first uncovered in 2010. ..."
Jan 17, 2021 | responsiblestatecraft.org

... ... ...

The most important thing to remember in this regard is the difference between an "attack" and an act of espionage. The SolarWinds hack has been generally described in the United States as the former (including by incoming national security adviser Jake Sullivan , and Biden ), but was in fact the latter. Nobody is suggesting that the hackers in this case introduced viruses to paralyze U.S. state systems or damage domestic infrastructure and services. This was purely an information-gathering exercise.

This distinction is crucial. An attack on the citizens or infrastructure of another state has traditionally been considered an act of war. Actions by the United States, Russia, Israel and other countries in recent decades have somewhat blurred this distinction. But no one can doubt that if another country carried out a major act of sabotage on American soil, (especially one threatening the lives of citizens), then Washington's response would -- rightly -- be a ferocious one.

As a matter of fact, while Russia has engaged in limited operations against Estonia and Ukraine, the only countries that have to date carried out a truly successful and destructive act of cyber-sabotage are the U.S. and Israel, through the " Stuxnet " virus, which as introduced into the Iranian nuclear system and first uncovered in 2010.

Espionage by contrast is something that all states do all the time -- often to friends as well as adversaries. We may remember the scandal under the Obama administration when U.S. intelligence was found to have hacked into the communications of German Chancellor Angela Merkel and other senior leaders of NATO countries. The hacking of a Belgian telecom company by British intelligence (" Operation Socialist ") is another example. And I would be both shocked and deeply disappointed to learn that U.S. intelligence is not trying to penetrate the state information systems of Russia and China.

And for each revealed act of espionage there is a well-established and calibrated set of responses. The aggrieved country issues a formal protest and expels a given number of "diplomats" from the country responsible. That country expels an equal number of diplomats. The media and the writers of spy thriller writers have a party. Then everything goes back to normal. For after all, everybody knows that there is no chance whatsoever that states will ever give up spying.

There are, however, three aspects of cyber-espionage that make it different from and more dangerous than traditional espionage.

Firstly, as Jake Sullivan has pointed out, unlike most forms of espionage, hacking can be used both for spying and for sabotage, and one can form the basis for the other. A key goal of responsible statecraft should be to establish a clear line between the two when it comes to cyberspace: to develop a set of calibrated and limited responses to cyber-espionage, and to make clear that cyber-sabotage will lead to a much fiercer and more damaging retaliation.

Secondly, unlike traditional espionage, the cyber variety is an area where third parties, uncontrolled by either side, can play a major role and cause serious damage to relations (and of course this also gives all sides plausible deniability -- as with U.S. moves against Iran).

For example, those behind the authors of the 2011 cyber-attack on the G20 summit in Paris have never been identified. Several major hacks have been conducted by independent cyber-anarchists, or even by clever teenagers, sometimes it seems simply for fun. In the present atmosphere, however, all such hacks against the United States are likely to be blamed on Russia and to lead to a further deterioration of relations.

Thirdly, and in part because of these blurred lines, no clear and understood international traditions are in place concerning the response to cyber-espionage, and there is a serious risk of overreaction leading to a spiraling escalation of tension and retaliation.

This is what the Biden administration must avoid. Apart from the immediate damage to relations, overreaction would mean that when -- as is bound to happen someday -- Russia or China eventually discover a cyber-espionage operation against them by U.S. intelligence, they will not only look justified in a disproportionate and escalatory response -- they will actually be justified.

One thing that Biden must definitely not do is to follow the suggestion that the United States should shut Russia out of the SWIFT international bank transfer system which -- the most damaging of all U.S. sanctions against Iran, and one that would have a disastrous effect on Russian trade.

Last year, then Russian prime minister Dmitry Medvedev said that Russia would regard such a move as equivalent to an act of war and would respond accordingly. Various Russian responses would be possible, including a definitive move into the Chinese geopolitical camp and massive military aid to Iran. Without doubt however, one of them would be to move from cyber-espionage to cyber-sabotage against the United States.

The most sensible response would in fact be to follow literally President-elect Biden's statement that his administration will "respond in kind" to the attack is the most sensible -- that is to say in the cyber-field. The first step (as after any counter-intelligence failure) must obviously be to strengthen U.S. cyber-defenses which. Amongst other things, this requires using presidential orders to combine, streamline, and rationalize the competing plethora of U.S. agencies currently responsible for cyber-security.

The second entirely appropriate response is for Washington to intensify its own existing cyber-intelligence operations against Russia. That, however, is another reason not to engage in overblown moral outrage over the latest hack. The American pot already has quite a global reputation for calling kettles black, and there is no need to blacken it further.

Finally, the Biden administration should do everything possible to develop agreed international restraints on state cyber-operations, including an absolute ban on cyber-sabotage. This should involve opening new negotiations with Moscow on longstanding Russian proposals for an international "arms control" treaty in the area of cyber-warfare, and for a joint U.S.-Russian working group to establish mutual ground rules and confidence building measures.

These Russian proposals cannot be accepted as they stand (above all because of Moscow's desire to limit free flows of information); however, more than a decade ago, then- National Security Agency Director Keith Alexander said that "I do think that we have to establish the rules, and I think what Russia has put forward is, perhaps, the starting point for international debate." This remains true today, and the danger of a failure to reach international agreement has grown vastly since then.

One of the worst things about hysterical statements in the United States about "cyber-attacks" is that unwary readers might mistakenly conclude from them that things can't get any worse. They can get much, much worse.

[Jan 15, 2021] When we say "russian hacking" we mean CIA by Larry C Johnson It is illegal, or at least on paper it is, for the CIA to spy on American citizens on American soil. So why was the CIA spying on Mr. Edward Butowsky and/or Matt Couch? If you have read Joe Hoft's excellent piece ( It is illegal, or at least on paper it is, for the CIA to spy on American citizens on American soil. So why was the CIA spying on Mr. Edward Butowsky and/or Matt Couch? If you have read Joe Hoft's excellent piece ( It is illegal, or at least on paper it is, for the CIA to spy on American citizens on American soil. So why was the CIA spying on Mr. Edward Butowsky and/or Matt Couch? If you have read Joe Hoft's excellent piece ( see here ) on the latest trials and travails of Ty Clevenger, an intrepid attorney battling the Deep State, who has been fighting for more than three years to secure the release of damning documents exposing the Russia hoax and sedition by the Obama Administration, you know he is forcing the FBI to cough it up. But the latest response also contained this bombshell--the CIA was spying on his clients as well. Ty's latest account of this new info dump from the US Department of Justice is posted at But the latest response also contained this bombshell--the CIA was spying on his clients as well. Ty's latest account of this new info dump from the US Department of Justice is posted at But the latest response also contained this bombshell--the CIA was spying on his clients as well. Ty's latest account of this new info dump from the US Department of Justice is posted at LawFlog . Here are some key snippets:

Notable quotes:
"... In The Transparency Project v. Department of Justice, et al., my client asked to see records indicating whether the CIA or its Directorate of Digital Innovation, its contractors, etc. inserted Russian "fingerprints" into the metadata of the emails that were released publicly. (You can review the entire request by clicking here and reading Paragraph 11). ..."
"... In a joint report filed today , the CIA informed the court that it intends to assert a Glomar response to the request, i.e., that it "cannot confirm or deny" the existence of such records. . . . [In other words], The Central Intelligence Agency will neither confirm nor deny that it fabricated the Russian "fingerprints" in Democratic National Committee emails published in 2016 by Wikileaks and "Guccifer 2.0.", and the FBI implicitly acknowledged today that it never reviewed the contents of DNC employee Seth Rich's laptop despite gaining custody of the laptop after his murder. ..."
www.moonofalabama.org
In The Transparency Project v. Department of Justice, et al., my client asked to see records indicating whether the CIA or its Directorate of Digital Innovation, its contractors, etc. inserted Russian "fingerprints" into the metadata of the emails that were released publicly. (You can review the entire request by clicking here and reading Paragraph 11).

In a joint report filed today , the CIA informed the court that it intends to assert a Glomar response to the request, i.e., that it "cannot confirm or deny" the existence of such records. . . . [In other words], The Central Intelligence Agency will neither confirm nor deny that it fabricated the Russian "fingerprints" in Democratic National Committee emails published in 2016 by Wikileaks and "Guccifer 2.0.", and the FBI implicitly acknowledged today that it never reviewed the contents of DNC employee Seth Rich's laptop despite gaining custody of the laptop after his murder.

Full disclosure--Mr. Clevenger is a friend of mine. He writes in his article that he reached out to me and I made some phone calls to retired friends who held senior positions at the CIA. My friends and I agreed that a GLOMAR response to the basic question, Did you spy on Mr. Butowsky and/or Mr. Couch was a tacit admission-yes! Ty explains this point clearly and succinctly:

Allow me to illustrate the point. If I asked the CIA for intercepted emails from the president of another country, the CIA would rightly issue a Glomar response, because it would not want to confirm or deny that it has been spying on the foreign president. That's what Glomar is for, because the CIA is in the business of secretly spying on foreign presidents, officials, agents, etc.

My client's request, on the other hand, is more akin to asking the CIA for records showing whether it helped Lee Harvey Oswald assassinate President John F. Kennedy. We would expect the CIA to declare that it has no such records because it would never do such a thing.

Why would the CIA spy on Mr. Butowsky, for example. Ed Butowsky was brought into the Seth Rich saga in December 2016 by Ellen Ratner, the sister-in-law of Julian Assange's former lawyer. Ellen spoke with Julian in November 2016 and asked Mr. Butowsky to reach out to the parents of Seth Rich and get them some help investigating who murdered their son.

It should come as no surprise that the CIA, the NSA and Britain's GCHQ were monitoring every communication going in and out of Wikileaks, including all communications of all personnel working at or associated with Wikileaks.

We know this thanks to the evidence and writings of Mr. Edward Snowden. Once Snowden made his escape to Russia with the help of Wikileaks, Wikileaks became a number one intelligence target.

Both the United States and the United Kingdom had ample cause to ensure that no new secrets leaked out of Wiki and caught them unawares. In light of the comprehensive monitoring of all Wiki communications, I believe the intel folks knew exactly the contents of Ratner's chat with Assange, which ultimately led them to Ed (i.e, Ellen Ratner talked to Julian and then talked to Ed to relay a request from Julian to help the Rich family).

Now that Donald Trump has finally released FBI documents on Russiagate (I do not know if there are any CIA documents in the pile), we shall see what the FBI had to say about Mr. Rich. Too bad the President waited so long to do this. If he had forced the issue last year the plot to steal the 2020 election might have been disrupted.

[Jan 14, 2021] SolarWinds spyware attack - NSA and CIA did it?

Jan 14, 2021 | www.moonofalabama.org

Petri Krohn , Jan 14 2021 12:44 utc | 4

SolarWinds spyware attack - NSA and CIA did it?

All last year we were hearing how Huawei is a threat to US national security. Chinese state operatives would insert spyware into Huawei networking equipment. The software that runs on Huawei equipment is open source and open to inspections. It is unlikely to contain hidden threats. But similar backdoors and spy gates are sure to exist on Western equipment.

The real threat to US "security" comes from the US not being able to install their spyware on European networks.

It seems that a massive US spy operation has just been exposed. The US presidential elections have overshadowed this from the news, but at the end of December this was the top story in the US. Allegedly "Russian hackers" had infiltrated US government organizations. According to Lou Dobbs on Fox News this was a new Pearl Harbor.

The story broke out in mid December when the cyber security company FireEye noticed that their servers had been attacked and the code for their Red Team assessment tools had been stolen. They soon discovered that the attack had utilized a backdoor in SolarWind's Orion IT monitoring and management software. FireEye called it a supply-chain attack.

There are several layers of misinformation in the way the Western media reported this.

  1. Supposedly 18,000 organizations were attacked. This is the number of users of the SolarWinds network management software. No evidence has been presented that any of these organizations were actually attacked.
  2. The attackers were supposedly Russian. Cyber attribution is usually impossible. It could as well have been the NSA or CIA acting as "Russians". Actually no technical analysis has ever been presented that points the attack to Russia. The whole Russia story was invented by the media or by their masters in the US Intelligence Community.
  3. The real story not in how US government organizations were possibly attacked, but in how the spyware found its way into the SolarWinds source code in the first place.

The spyware was part of the source code for the "BusinessLayer.dll" shared library. I find it impossible that the spyware code was somehow inserted from Russia. It is likewise far fetched to assume that some Russian mole was working for SolarWinds and secretly inserting spyware into the source code. No such mole has been arrested. It is more likely that the malware was inserted by US actors.

This "sophisticated supply chain attack" would have been impossible without US insiders in the company. Most likely the whole software team was compromised. The attack vector must have been part of the specification of the software. Proof of this comes from the fact that it has taken several weeks and SolarWinds still has not fixed the problem. The spyware must be so embedded and intertwined with the rest of the software that they would not know what to remove. Instead, they said their "investigations are early and ongoing". They have the source code, yet they have not published any part of it.

No links in this post. I have collected some links and sources on my wiki.

[Jan 11, 2021] Fake news in action: the backdoor "resembles" a tool that is only "tied to" a hacking group which "Estonian authorities" "have said" (i.e. claim without evidence) serves the FSB.

Jan 11, 2021 | www.moonofalabama.org

vk , Jan 11 2021 11:56 utc | 104

Fake news:

SolarWinds hack linked to Russian spying tools, say researchers

Here's the "evidence":

Investigators at the Moscow-based cybersecurity firm Kaspersky said the "backdoor" used to compromise up to 18,000 customers of the US software maker SolarWinds closely resembled malware tied to a hacking group known as Turla, which Estonian authorities have said operates on behalf of Russia's FSB security service.

So, the backdoor "resembles" a tool that is only "tied to" a hacking group which "Estonian authorities" "have said" (i.e. claim without evidence) serves the FSB.

This is not the first time The Guardian uses absurd extrapolations to create a big fat lie. Last week, it put a criminal headline - with potentially grave consequences on public opinion and geopolitics - stating China had refused to receive a WHO team to investigate the origins of the SARS-CoV-2. China defused the fake news by releasing on its own MSM that they were still making the arrangements of the visit - which will happen this Thursday -, not that it had blocked the WHO.

What did The Guardian want to achieved with that headline? Prepare the British people for war against China? Are they insane?

uncle tungsten , Jan 11 2021 12:04 utc | 105

@vk

Mentioning Estonia at any time would indicate pure unmitigated BS. But mentioning BOTH Estonia and the Grauniad in the one post is just painfully obvious that the entire story is bollocks.

[Jan 06, 2021] Ex-AG Barr Reportedly Met With Jeffrey Epstein's Last Cellmate - Newsmax.com

Notable quotes:
"... Why would China be bounty hunting the cultivator and securer of its ME energy supplies? ..."
Jan 06, 2021 | www.newsmax.com

Ex-AG Barr Reportedly Met With Jeffrey Epstein's Last Cellmate bill barr stands at a podium and speaks Attorney General William Barr speaks at the National Religious Broadcasters Convention Feb. 26, 2020, in Nashville, Tenn. (AP Photo/Mark Humphrey)

By Charlie McCarthy | Tuesday, 05 January 2021 07:06 PM

Short URL | Email Article | Comment | Contact | Print | A A Copy Shortlink

Former Attorney General William Barr investigated the suicide of Jeffrey Epstein, reportedly even meeting with the multimillionaire sex offender's last cellmate.

Epstein was found hanging in his cell at the Metropolitan Correctional Center in lower Manhattan early on Aug. 10, 2019. Efrain "Stone" Reyes had shared the cell with Epstein until being transferred a day before the suicide.

Epstein's death rattled the highest levels of the Justice Department, according to the New York Daily News on Monday.

Following Epstein's death, Reyes was pulled from a privately run jail in Queens to meet frequently with authorities, once with the attorney general himself.

"Barr wanted to know about what was going on in [the Metropolitan Correctional Center]," a source told the Daily News. "Barr told him, 'I owe you a favor, thank you for telling us the truth.'

"He said [Barr] was a good guy. Barr was nice about it. He just wanted to know if [inmates] were being mistreated. What [Reyes] believed happened. Just basically that. He told them everything. He cooperated with Barr."

The Daily News source said he befriended Reyes when both were being held at the Queens jail, per the Daily Mail .

me title=

A Justice Department spokesman declined comment to the Daily News.

The New York Times reported previously that a "livid" Barr was personally overseeing four inquiries into Epstein's suicide.

Reyes caught coronavirus at the Queens Detention Facility earlier this year, was released in April and died last month. He was 51.

The source said he and Reyes watched a documentary about Epstein, who associated with some of the world's most powerful men while allegedly running an international child sex trafficking scheme.

"[Reyes] was like, 'I just didn't see that from him. I didn't see that side of him. I never pictured him being with young girls. Some guys like that are creepy,'" the source recalled. "He said he never really got that side of Epstein -- like he was someone who took advantage of girls. But we all have our secrets, you know? You never know."

Related Stories:

[Jan 06, 2021] Again the 'highly likely' -- US spies accuse Russia of SolarWinds hack in repeat of Russiagate hysteria by Nebojsa Malic

Jan 06, 2021 | www.rt.com

US intelligence and security agencies declared that the SolarWinds hack was 'likely Russian in origin,' echoing evidence-free mainstream media claims as well as their own language in the 'assessments' about the 2016 election.

In a joint statement on Tuesday, the FBI, NSA, Office of the Director of National Intelligence (ODNI) and the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency (CISA) said that their investigative work "indicates that an Advanced Persistent Threat (APT) actor, likely Russian in origin" was behind the compromise of SolarWinds Orion software, first revealed three weeks ago.

"At this time, we believe this was, and continues to be, an intelligence gathering effort. We are taking all necessary steps to understand the full scope of this campaign and respond accordingly," the statement added.

What does "likely of Russian origin" even mean? Don't expect the mainstream media outlets to ask – they've all been accusing Moscow for weeks, using unverifiable assertions by anonymous sources instead of any actual evidence.

Several things in the statement jump out. One, that CISA was put in charge of "asset response" and mitigation. This is the same agency that on November 13 hosted a statement – attributed to it by the media, but in reality coming from two advisory committees – declaring the 2020 US election "the most secure in American history," hastening to add that "There is no evidence that any voting system deleted or lost votes, changed votes, or was in any way compromised."

That was a remarkable rush to judgment, given the subsequent claims to the contrary that seem far more credible than any assessments of "likely" Russian hacking.

Americans can surely sleep easy knowing the FBI is the "lead agency for threat response," which is presently still collecting evidence, and analyzing it "to determine further attribution."

This is the agency once run by James Comey and Andrew McCabe, who discussed an "insurance policy" in case Donald Trump gets elected with senior staff like Peter Strzok and Lisa Page and framed General Michael Flynn over a perfectly legal and legitimate conversation with a Russian ambassador.

This is the same FBI that hastened to send 15 agents to investigate a garage rope pulley in Talladega, but sat on Hunter Biden's laptop for a year and did nothing with tips about the suspected Nashville RV bomber.

https://platform.twitter.com

Again, the mainstream media will not point any of this out, but will parse the "likely" as "definitely" and claim the statement somehow proves their claim Russia was behind the SolarWinds breach. Just watch.

That's precisely what happened with the infamous "Intelligence Community Assessment" published in January 2017. A handpicked group of FBI, CIA, ODNI and NSA staff was first conflated with "all 17 US intelligence agencies" and then their "assessment" treated as established fact. Only in November 2018, after the midterm elections, did the source material the ICA was based on see the light of day.

It was quickly forgotten, however, as it made clear that the assessment was based on wishful thinking about what the US spies believed was "consistent with the methods and motivations of Russian-directed efforts." Couldn't have this frank admission interfere with the fantasy political interests in Washington needed to believe, after all.

We want to believe: 'Russian hacking' memo REVEALS how US intel pinned leaks to Kremlin

Note also that no one involved in the exercise in dissembling that was Russiagate ever faced any consequences. Only one person – a FBI lawyer named Kevin Clinesmith – has been prosecuted for altering evidence in the Flynn case, and he got a slap on the wrist . Meanwhile DNI James Clapper and CIA chief John Brennan got cable news sinecures, while FBI director Comey landed lucrative book and TV deals. McCabe, Strzok and Page went on to become media darlings and heroes of the #Resistance.

With all that in mind, it's curious that the "likely" and "believe" are doing a lot of heavy lifting in that joining statement about the SolarWinds hack. Why should US spies couch their claims in bureaucratic language, designed to shield the author from consequences of being wrong, when impunity is the order of the day in Washington? Policy is based on assessments anyway, and it's pretty obvious at this point that evidence – or lack thereof – is an irrelevant detail to the US establishment.

But again, that's a question one shouldn't expect the mainstream media to ask.

[Jan 06, 2021] New York Times Still Stoking Alarm At 'Russian Hacking' by Ray McGovern

Jan 06, 2021 | original.antiwar.com

Forget what Vice President Pence has suggested he might do this week regarding counting the votes for president and forget President Trump's ominous military buildup near Iran, the Sunday New York Times two-column, above-the-fold lede tells us what we should really be worried about: "Scope of Russian Hacking Far Exceeds Initial Fears." The on-line title was " As Understanding of Russian Hacking Grows, So Does Alarm ."

Forget, too, that this latest NYT indictment of Russia, does not substantially advance the story beyond the information available two weeks ago, when "neither the actor, nor the motive, nor the damage done [was] known for certain in this latest scare story." Although no evidence is adduced to show that Russia is behind this latest flurry of hacking – Russia no doubt sits toward the top of a long list of suspects. The Times ominously quotes Suzanne Spaulding, a senior cyber official during the Obama administration, saying Russia is the foregone conclusion:

"We still don't know what Russia's strategic objectives were," she said "But we should be concerned that part of this may go beyond reconnaissance. Their goal may be to put themselves in a position to have leverage over the new administration, like holding a gun to our head to deter us from acting to counter Putin."

The Sanger Sewing Machine

NYT Chief Washington Correspondent David Sanger is listed first on the byline for Sunday's story together with Nicole Perlroth and Julian Barnes. That should give us a clue, given Sanger's record for sewing things out of whole cloth. In a word, Sanger enjoys an unenviably checkered record for reliability. Until we are shown more in the way of evidence attributing the recently discovered hacking to the Russians, we would do well to review his record.

Sanger's reporting on Iraq before the war was as wrong as it was consequential. Those who were alert at the time may remember that Sanger was second only to Judith Miller in spreading the party line on the existence of weapons of mass destruction in Iraq.

Seldom do historians obtain documentary evidence of plans for a war of aggression, but on May 1, 2005 the London Times published a paper (now known as the "Downing Street Memos") that recorded what Sir Richard Dearlove, head of MI6 (the UK counterpart to the CIA) relayed to Prime Minister Tony Blair on July 23, 2002 about what he was told by George Tenet at CIA headquarters on July 20, 2002. (No one has challenged the authenticity of the minutes.)

"C (Dearlove) reported on his recent talks in Washington. There was a perceptible shift in attitude. Military action was now seen as inevitable. Bush wanted to remove Saddam, through military action, justified by the conjunction of terrorism and WMD. But the intelligence and facts were being fixed around the policy. There was little discussion in Washington of the aftermath after military action." [Emphasis added.]

With David Sanger and his colleague Judith Miller having cried wolf on WMD so many times over the prior two years, the Times decided it would be best to suppress the embarrassing revelation that the "intelligence and facts were being fixed around the policy." So the Times ignored it for more than six weeks, when Sanger wrote an article to put the whole thing in perspective, so to speak.

The title of Sanger's June 13, 2005 article was "Postwar British Memo Says War Decision Wasn't Made." Those looking for a measure of Sanger's credibility could do no better than read this masterpiece of deceptive circumlocution. Here's the lead paragraph:

WASHINGTON, June 12 – A memorandum written by Prime Minister Tony Blair's cabinet office in late July 2002 explicitly states that the Bush administration had made "no political decisions" to invade Iraq, but that American military planning for the possibility was advanced. "

And those asking how Sanger could write that with a straight face need only to read the Downing Street Memos , which are quite succinct and clear.

One could almost sympathize with Sanger, who had co-authored a piece with Thom Shanker, on July 29, 2002 in which WMD were flat-facted into Iraq no fewer than seven times. See: " U.S. Exploring Baghdad Strike As Iraq Option of July 29, 2002 ." That was about a week after CIA Director Tenet had briefed Dearlove on the fixing of the intelligence and the facts. It is a safe bet that Sanger's sources in the intelligence community briefed him on what line to take on those (non-existent) WMD.

Years Later Still Drinking at the Government Trough

On July 26, 2016 , Candidate Clinton reportedly approved a "blame-Russia" plan. According to a letter from Director of National Intelligence John Ratcliffe to Sen. Lindsey Graham on Sept. 29, 2020, CIA Director John Brennan briefed President Obama on "Russian intelligence analysis" regarding "alleged approval by Hillary Clinton of a proposal from one of her foreign policy advisors to vilify Donald Trump by stirring up a scandal claiming interference by Russian security services."

The Russian intelligence analysis report was deemed important enough that on Sept. 7, 2016, US intelligence officials forwarded an "investigative referral" to FBI Director James Comey and Deputy Assistant Director of Counterintelligence Peter Strzok regarding it. ( Such a referral usually indicates that a leak has occurred about a particularly sensitive issue or program. Thus, it is possible that the putative leaker wished to get the information out into the open.)

But it is one thing to leak; quite another to get an Establishment journalist to write about it without checking beforehand with the intelligence community for a nihil obstat . There has been no additional reporting about the "investigative referral." But if it was about a leak, the information never saw the light of day at the time.

July 26, 2016 : The exact date timing may be coincidence, but on the same day Mrs. Clinton was alleged to have given the go-ahead for Russia-gate, Sanger co-authored an article with Eric Schmitt titled: "Spy Agency Consensus Grows That Russia Hacked D.N.C.":

"WASHINGTON – American intelligence agencies have told the White House they now have 'high confidence' that the Russian government was behind the theft of emails and documents from the Democratic National Committee, according to federal officials who have been briefed on the evidence."

There is much more that can be said about Sanger's reporting on very consequential issues. On Iran, for example, taking Sanger's reporting at face value, one would think he never read the National Intelligence Estimate that helped prevent a war planned by Cheney/Bush for 2008. I refer to the November 2007 NIE the unanimous, "high-confidence" key judgment of which was that Iran had stopped working on a nuclear weapon at the end of 2003 and had not resumed such work. That key judgment stands, but you would never know that from Sanger's reporting.

Beware chief Washington correspondents; or at least look at their record.

Ray McGovern works with Tell the Word, a publishing arm of the ecumenical Church of the Saviour in inner-city Washington. His 27-year career as a CIA analyst includes serving as Chief of the Soviet Foreign Policy Branch and preparer/briefer of the President's Daily Brief. He is co-founder of Veteran Intelligence Professionals for Sanity (VIPS).


[Jan 04, 2021] Brick Lives Matter: Vandalis carefully avided speing pain on brick while vandalising Pelosi's garage door under watchful eyes of Secret service agents

Looks like Nancy is just a regular type of gal ;-). No security at all. No even 24x7 cameras. Did they used Photoshop with masking to deface Piglosi's .jpg garage door ?
And amazingly enough the vandals remembered to bring masking tape or at least a peace of cardboard to protect the bricks.
Jan 04, 2021 | www.zerohedge.com

When you think of your average Antifa type ( these mug shots may be representative), does that Antifa guy or gal strike you as the kind of person who would carefully avoid getting any paint on bricks so as to spare Pelosi the inconvenience of getting the paint off the bricks?


Soloamber 3 hours ago

No doubt this was a false flag . You don't think Pelosi has security covering her yard, house, cars ?

Nobody gets that close to her house without a swat team there in a minute. So where is the video showing who did it , when , and how . This will be used to justify some full time guard house or something else .

lennysrv 2 hours ago

You are absolutely correct. Years ago, when John Kerry was a candidate in the Democrat primaries, I was walking near his neighborhood in Boston. Near. As in about eight blocks away. Not even close to his house. I didn't even know he was living there. I was challenged by a Secret Service agent and his backup friend (in a vehicle behind him). SS guy asked who I was, what I was doing, why I was there, etc. Spoke into a microphone beneath his overcoat. Told me that my chosen route was no longer available and that if I would be well-advised to head the other direction. The point being that nobody, not a single person, gets near Pelosi's house without a bunch of security knowing about it and stopping it.

This entire "vandalism" thing is a complete tub of BS.

JZ123 6 hours ago

Pelosi pulled a Juicy smollet? Nah, I think the hatred is real for these people. The volcano will erupt this year.

The Ordinal Numbers PREMIUM 4 hours ago remove link

I feel redeemed. I've been saying that these photoshopped since the news broke.

FAKE NEWS is real....

Lamejokes 7 hours ago

You don't understand. Russian agents, following the last plan written by Soleimani, arguably his master plan, tagged poor Nancy's door, and - and there's where you can see how tricky and evil Russians and Iranians are- they PURPOSEFULLY protected the walls, so people would think it's fake, and accuse poor Nancy, that gorgeous woman, that Saint, of manipulation attempt!

(Do I really need a /s here?)

SirBarksAlot 2 hours ago

And just like the Pentagon on 9-11, there were no pictures of the event

AlphaSnail 6 hours ago

the cameras were epsteined

6 hours ago

To those of you that noticed it was a hoax congratulations, you passed the ".gov finger on the pulse of society" test. For those of you who believed it hook, line, and sinker; get more omega 3 fatty acids in your diet, stop voting, and cut back on the high fructose corn syrup and Cheetos.

MieleBauknecht 7 hours ago

antifa's are vegetarian. The hogshead itself is sufficient proof of false flag.

Alexander 2 hours ago

You are fricken dreaming if you think nancy would even pay someone to clean this garage door. She's getting a new garage door and YOU are going to pay for it.

HomeBrewPrepper 2 hours ago

I thought she lived in a gated, luxurious house?

That looks like a house in Dundalk, Md. Outside of Baltimore.

toady 2 hours ago

That's her 4th house in the city where she houses her Chinese slaves.

Ms No PREMIUM 5 hours ago

...People should scream that at her: "Why did antifa use tape around your garage, you lying b*tch?"

[Jan 04, 2021] Brick Lives Matter: There's Something Peculiar About The Selectiveness Of Vandalism At Pelosi's House

Looks like Nancy is just a regular type of gal ;-). No security at all. No even 24x7 cameras. Did they used Photoshop with masking to deface Piglosi's .jpg garage door ?
And amazingly enough the vandals remembered to bring masking tape or at least a peace of cardboard to protect the bricks.
Jan 04, 2021 | www.zerohedge.com

When you think of your average Antifa type ( these mug shots may be representative), does that Antifa guy or gal strike you as the kind of person who would carefully avoid getting any paint on bricks so as to spare Pelosi the inconvenience of getting the paint off the bricks?

It's entirely possible that this was an Antifa effort and the person spraying paint had some residual compassion for Pelosi. But it's also possible that this is a false flag effort. I am not offering any suggestions as to who might have raised this false flag. I note only what others have pointed out before: Something's peculiar here.

ay_arrow

Soloamber 3 hours ago

No doubt this was a false flag . You don't think Pelosi has security covering her yard, house, cars ?

Nobody gets that close to her house without a swat team there in a minute. So where is the video showing who did it , when , and how . This will be used to justify some full time guard house or something else .

lennysrv 2 hours ago

You are absolutely correct. Years ago, when John Kerry was a candidate in the Democrat primaries, I was walking near his neighborhood in Boston. Near. As in about eight blocks away. Not even close to his house. I didn't even know he was living there. I was challenged by a Secret Service agent and his backup friend (in a vehicle behind him). SS guy asked who I was, what I was doing, why I was there, etc. Spoke into a microphone beneath his overcoat. Told me that my chosen route was no longer available and that if I would be well-advised to head the other direction. The point being that nobody, not a single person, gets near Pelosi's house without a bunch of security knowing about it and stopping it.

This entire "vandalism" thing is a complete tub of BS.

logically possible 4 hours ago

Instead of guessing who dun it' how about looking at the video footage from the camera on the wall, left side of the garage, the neighbors video footage too.

They don't want to show you.

snblitz 6 hours ago

As a person who paints houses on occasion, the perp, or should we say Agent Provocateur, used a piece of cardboard to protect the bricks.

You can even see the blow back from the paint bouncing off the cardboard.

You could even perform the test yourself and see the same results.

Maybe the whole thing is simply a photo-shop job?

Ms.Creant 5 hours ago

I was joking yesterday they masked it off to prevent overspray!!!

No joke.

gruden 5 hours ago

I saw those comments. Admittedly I was skeptical at first. Then I saw that it happened right before a confirmation vote as House Speaker, then it all suddenly made sense. A false flag to distance her from the demoturd whack-jobs and appear more moderate. A very simple explanation. That old lady has a few tricks still to turn in her old age.

HungryPorkChop 6 hours ago

Propaganda for the masses. They probably needed some "event" so they could get extra security detail as the Plan-Demic and lockdowns continue.

Handful of Dust 6 hours ago remove link

...If you think Pelosi's REAL home is not guarded 24/7 by armed security and camera surviellance, you are nuts.

This is a poorly executed stunt paid for by Nervous Nancy herself.

DurdenRae 7 hours ago

From yesterday's comment: I know a scam when I see one. If you look carefully you will see that nothing has been broken, only the garage door has been slightly defaced (and I'm sure it's going to be easily fixed). Should this have really been antifa, then would have spray painted the bricks and broken windows at the very least, not to mention thrown in a couple of molotovs. Here we have nothing spontaneous. The whole thing has taken between 10 to 30 minutes to put in place, and we are supposed to believe that nobody from the security detail saw anything on their monitoring cameras? Was epstein's phantom there to make security cameras not working that day?

bshirley1968 6 hours ago remove link

Any thinking person knows that this was nothing but a psyop.

Nobody is going to get that close to Pelosi's real house to carry out that kind of vandalism. What? You think there are no surveillance cameras that would have caught that activity? No security?

If Pelosi's property is that wide open to attack, then she isn't who we think she is.

Nice catch on the paint lines......and excellent point that something is up.

Mad Muppet PREMIUM 7 hours ago

The Dems are getting ready to throw the rioters under the bus. Night of The Long Knives style.

Zero-Hegemon 6 hours ago

Reichstag fire style, now that they think they're getting Kameltoe in office, Antifa, etc. have become very dispensible.

Automatic Choke PREMIUM 6 hours ago remove link

if you or I showed up at Nancy's with a can of spray paint, we'd be surrounded by a swat team before we finished shaking the can.

Kan 7 hours ago (Edited)

BLM and Antifa have been directed to reduce the Equity zones that Tech Stock owners have bought into to dodge capital gains tax. These zones are now going for 1/100 their value to the tech stock investors. https://www.youtube.com/watch?app=desktop&v=C1-0XKYAZII minute 29 explains it very well. Its amazing all the riots have benefited value for Gate and Bezos.

This pelosi and company riot is a ploy to change the spot light off the 90% pork in the latest free Trillion dollar handout to my friends.

Brought to you by Dominion Software....

Imagine a world where Pelosi has only won re-election the last 5 times because of the Software.

alexcojones 7 hours ago (Edited)

The pig's head was a nice touch, with that quart (gallon?) of blood, I mean water-based paint.

False Flag to gain some sympathy for the old witch.

Surprised "They" didn't leave a pallet of bricks too.

alienateit 6 hours ago

Where is the plastic bag which contained the pigs head?

No vandal would put that back into their designer backpack.

mike6972 6 hours ago

We live in a world of synthetic reality. Staged (fake) events like this are treated as real. Real events (Hunter Biden's laptop, rampant election fraud) are dismissed without examination. I yearn for the days when you could watch or read the news and it mostly corresponded with reality. Today's "news" would be just another form of entertainment if it were not so painful to watch.
13 play_arrow

BoomChikaWowWow 6 hours ago

100% fake, and not just because of the lack of paint on the brick.

I guarantee you a pig's head would be off limits for SF anarchists. The vegans in their ranks would literally be screaming bloody murder.

UselessEater 3 hours ago (Edited)

Its a false flag.

Everything is a lie.

Director of CIA William Casey, "We'll know our disinformation program is complete when everything the American public believes is false."

MASTER OF UNIVERSE 6 hours ago remove link

I agree that this has all the hallmarks of a False Flag Op due to the fact that there are no spelling mistakes on Pelosi's garage door, and the brick must have been shielded to avoid overspray from the spray paint can. Assume that a professional tagger painted the display on Pelosi's garage door and was instructed not to get paint on the brick beforehand.

In addition to this federal crime scene we have the evidence at Mitch McConnel's house where the message was misspelled 'weres the money' when it should have been written by a Democrat hooligan tagger that was educated enough to spell correctly as opposed to the Republican tagger hooligan that painted McConnel's door and misspelled the message.

It's clear that Democrat tagging hooligans are educated enough not to misspell words whereas it is also clear that Republican professional tagging hooligans cannot spell correctly when professionally tagging a known Republican home.

Clearly there is indeed a conspiracy to engender sympathy for the Democrats and Nanci Pelosi whereas no mention of Mitch McConnel's damage at his house.

In addition, the fact that no real pigs blood was evident suggests that the whole display was crafted by professionals knowledgeable in terms of theatrics and theatrical displays as well as propaganda.

Can you say G. Gordon Liddey, boys & girls?

Dadburnitpa 6 hours ago

Another case of GASLIGHTING. "Oh, look at what happened to poor nancy."

JZ123 6 hours ago

Pelosi pulled a Juicy smollet? Nah, I think the hatred is real for these people. The volcano will erupt this year.

[Dec 27, 2020] Welcome To RussiaGate 2.0, Right On Schedule - ZeroHedge

Dec 27, 2020 | www.zerohedge.com

Welcome To RussiaGate 2.0, Right On Schedule BY TYLER DURDEN SATURDAY, DEC 26, 2020 - 20:30

Authored by Tom Luongo via Gold, Goats, 'n Guns blog,

Now that a majority of the country believes the election was fraudulent and the Supreme Court has completely abdicated its authority the next obstacle in front of President Trump is here.

And, as always, it comes from his complicit Secretary of State who undermines Trump with his every move to turn the State, Defense and Intelligence apparatuses of the U.S. against Russia.

Pompeo goes on Mark Levin's show, whose ratings are through the roof right now, to tell all the slavering normie-conservatives that it was definitely the Russians who hacked our government.

From Zerohedge:

Without offering any evidence or specifics, Pompeo said Russia was "pretty clearly" behind the cyberattack during an appearance on the conservative talk radio Mark Levin Show .

"I can't say much more, as we're still unpacking precisely what it is, and I'm sure some of it will remain classified. But suffice it to say there was a significant effort to use a piece of third-party software to essentially embed code inside of US government systems and it now appears systems of private companies and companies and governments across the world as well," Pompeo explained .

Notice how there is no evidence given, just the typical intelligence agency, "believe me" line, which is your first clue that whoever it was behind this attack the one group who was definitely NOT behind it was the Russians.

This week's cyber attack on the U.S. government was perfectly timed with the Electoral College submitting its votes to the Congress and Joe Biden claiming he's president-elect.

The reason why the release of this 'attack' on our government was perfectly timed is because it is a distraction from the growing unrest over the Democrats' having stolen the election and cowering the courts into irrelevance.

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This is classic CIA-level misdirection from what was more likely a Chinese or, dare I say it, homegrown operation for the very purpose of blaming the Russians to tamp down the anger and confuse the MAGA crowd.

And it resurrects the ghost of RussiaGate for the libs by putting Trump in a Catch-22.

  • If he doesn't respond to this it keeps alive the smoldering embers of the TDS crowd watching Rachel Maddow that Trump really does have deep, covert ties to Russia.

  • If he does react, what possible reaction could he take to escalate the tensions with Russia that are already one step below open warfare?

Oh, and he has to respond to this while also fighting an uphill battle against the courts and his own bureaucracy to invoke his executive order involving outside interference into the election. And in classic Trump fashion he did:

https://platform.twitter.com/embed/index.html?dnt=false&embedId=twitter-widget-0&frame=false&hideCard=false&hideThread=false&id=1340333618691002368&lang=en&origin=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.zerohedge.com%2Fgeopolitical%2Fwelcome-russiagate-20-right-schedule&siteScreenName=zerohedge&theme=light&widgetsVersion=ed20a2b%3A1601588405575&width=550px

Provoking the exact reaction you'd expect from the BlueChecked Sneetches among the Twitterati. RussiaGate was an embarrassment that should have died years ago but it persists precisely because Trump refuses to formally concede and continues to give his people the opportunity to fight the Swamp.

The only way Putin and the Russians were behind this attack on the U.S. government was as a 5-d chess move where Trump invited them to do it on his behalf to 'prove' external interference in the election and allow Trump to cross the Rubicon, invoke the Insurrection Act and his 2018 EO on election interference.

Yeah, by the way, John Le Carre died this week, life ain't a movie and Trump isn't that savvy a player. Ye gods, I wish he was. That we are in this mess proves he isn't.

This pronouncement by Pompeo was just good ol' fashioned swamp double talk who continues his job of maintaining continuity of U.S. foreign policy on behalf of the Neoconservatives whose raison d'etre is the destruction of Russia to the exclusion of nearly every other consideration of any other human on the planet.

Don't be confused by this nonsense. Whoever was behind this attack wasn't the Russians. The motive for this operation lies squarely with China, The Davos Crowd , the Democrats and our own intelligence agencies trying to move the Overton Window away from the real problem, a stolen election.

Outing Solarwinds and tying it directly to Dominion Voting Systems is your smoking gun.

But the courts, as I said at the open, have left the building. Martin Armstrong pointed out the Supreme Court denied the 'shouting behind closed doors' because they met via Zoom call.

But they didn't deny the substance of the charge against them, that they bowed to political pressure thanks to the Democrats' open blackmail campaign of terror this past summer.

So, at this point there really is little hope of overturning the election. From what I've heard on the ground in Georgia the same Dominion Voting machines are in place there for the Senate runoffs. Those who voted didn't even get a receipt this time.

So the fix is in there too, folks.

There will be no victories in this fight. Every possible avenue of hope must be crushed if the Great Reset of The Davos Crowd is to occur. Pompeo plays his part just like everyone else in this pantomime, one day giving Trump supporters hope by saying he's preparing for a 2nd term, the next using that cache to undermine him with a far bigger betrayal.

This is how the Deep State works to protect itself and we have to be smart enough to see it for what it is: preparing the ground for the next phase of the greatest intelligence show on earth.

Same spook time, same spook channel.

* * *

Join my Patreon if you think Russia isn't the world's ultimate evil


President Joe Biden 1 hour ago

"
"most extensive and inclusive voter fraud organization in the history of American politics"

Russia made me say it.

gzorp 51 minutes ago remove link

Nope Obama did it

itstippy 1 hour ago

The Russians made the Check Engine light come on in my car today. Now I have to deal with that tomorrow, and it's colder than a witch's tit outside. I hate those guys.

JD Rock 1 hour ago

The incessant propaganda from the clever tribe is, so the 2 largest white nations dont align. That would set the zionists back 500 years.

MX_DOGG 58 minutes ago

... ironic that Russia will be our allies again. They know who their enemy is.

LibertarianMenace 9 minutes ago

Set them back permanently. Complete what Rome failed to.

No work on Sunday 49 minutes ago

Americans trust Russia and Putin more then ABC, NBC, CBS, FOX, CIA, FBI, swamp etc. that is a pitiful testament to how far the globalist agenda has gotten.

Doom Porn Star 55 minutes ago

"Russia SOMEHOW gained unrestricted access to all the back-doors in Microsoft enterprise software and MUST HAVE used their access to plant bugs in sensitive systems.

Bill gates and his cronies who CREATED the software and have always had access to all the back-doors in Microsoft enterprise software CERTAINLY DID NOT do it.

I'm the guy who told you earlier that I lie cheat and steal for a living . You can believe me . "

tion PREMIUM 1 hour ago (Edited)

'Russia' is quite literally used as a coverup code word for Israel. Hence why they declassified almost nothing.

https://www.forbes.com/sites/michelatindera/2020/10/15/sheldon-adelson-pumped-75-million-into-new-pro-trump-super-pac/?sh=26a7ad692ffe

https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-8041597/US-plotted-kill-Julian-Assange-make-look-like-accident.html

https://thegrayzone.com/2020/09/29/spanish-judge-sheldon-adelson-assange-spying/

https://www.timesofisrael.com/flynn-timeline-it-all-began-with-a-un-resolution-condemning-israeli-settlements/

https://www.timesofisrael.com/official-who-backed-fake-obama-wiretapping-theory-promoted-to-key-pentagon-post/

Really Ezra I hope you and the QuckTard do realize that the PEAD commentary wasn't exactly an invitation either, right.

Five_Black_Eyes_Intel_Agency 48 minutes ago (Edited)

Claiming to be playing 6D chess and keeping Pompeo on the team are mutually exclusive events.

Anyway, by now its clear as day that the Tweedle Dee Tweedle Dum American political system is a broken circus and not export-worthy.

On one side of the swamp, you have Team Blue, a Deep State subisdiary that pins the blame on Russia. On the other side you have Team Red, another Deep State subsidiary that pins the blame on China. Both however, agree fully on imperialism, fundamentalist Zionism and herding American cattle against their own interests.

How are you meant to reform this system by "voting"?>?>?

Mr. Apotheosis 55 minutes ago

Inside job, almost certainly.

tion PREMIUM 47 minutes ago

There is an extremist cult faction within the CIA that is attached to Mossad at the hip.

Snaffew 59 minutes ago remove link

Anyone that believes anything that comes out of the US "intelligence" agencies is part of the problem.

TheRealBilboBaggins 2 minutes ago

My first thought was . . . "inside job". Especially how quickly Russia was blamed with zero presentation of forensic evidence. Oh, I know, methods and sources must be protected. That usually means government criminals must be protected.

Do you ever ask yourself why the FBI, CIA, NSA, and DHS, get so little done that matters to Americans? Do you ever ask yourself how we possible still have organized crime, foreign gangs, and Antifa, with all the dough wasted on these "law enforcement agencies"? I do, and my conclusion is that these agencies are not about what they say they are. They are aimed at attacking various Americans as it helps the agencies.

Ms No PREMIUM 10 minutes ago

"This is classic CIA-level misdirection from what was more likely a Chinese or, dare I say it, homegrown operation"

Really?

You speak of misdirection and then go from Russia to suggesting CIA target China, because you know Trumpers have already figured out that is wasn't Russia, but still don't know they are manipulated in the same fashion about China?

That"s rich.

Simpson 1 minute ago

They spent 25 million 4 years on investigating the Russia hoax and came up with zero. With Hunter Biden they hid the evidence for two years till after the election. Images with under aged girls and smoking crack.

Democrats who sit on intelligence committees screwing a CCP Intelligence officer but nothing to see here.

FO with your gaslighting.

BendGuyhere 12 minutes ago

DC is in dire need of an attitude adjustment, as much for its own survival as the health of the country.

The more DC walls itself off from the rest of the country, the more likely becomes an explosive revolution that wipes their precious stats quo off the map.

Convulsively stabbing Trump in the back will not restore them, cargo cult style, to the glory days of Dubya, Clinton and Obama.

They've done a fabulous job impoverishing this country and enriching themselves.

[Dec 25, 2020] With Biden's New Threats, the Russia Discourse is More Reckless and Dangerous Than Ever - Glenn Greenwald

Dec 25, 2020 | greenwald.substack.com

With Biden's New Threats, the Russia Discourse is More Reckless and Dangerous Than Ever The U.S. media demands inflammatory claims be accepted with no evidence, while hacking behavior routinely engaged in by the U.S. is depicted as aberrational. Glenn Greenwald Dec 23 211 332


Then-Vice President Joe Biden speaks at the Brookings Institute May 27, 2015 in Washington, DC spoke about the Russia-Ukraine conflict (Photo by Mark Wilson/Getty Images)

To justify Hillary Clinton's 2016 loss to Donald Trump, leading Democrats and their key media allies for years competed with one another to depict what they called "Russia's interference in our elections" in the most apocalyptic terms possible. They fanatically rejected the view of the Russian Federation repeatedly expressed by President Obama -- that it is a weak regional power with an economy smaller than Italy's capable of only threatening its neighbors but not the U.S. -- and instead cast Moscow as a grave, even existential, threat to U.S. democracy, with its actions tantamount to the worst security breaches in U.S. history.

This post-2016 mania culminated with prominent liberal politicians and journalists ( as well as John McCain ) declaring Russia's activities surrounding the 2016 to be an "act of war" which, many of them insisted, was comparable to Pearl Harbor and the 9/11 attack -- the two most traumatic attacks in modern U.S. history which both spawned years of savage and destructive war, among other things.

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Sen. Jeanne Shaheen (D-NH) repeatedly demanded that Russia's 2016 "interference" be treated as "an act of war." Hillary Clinton described Russian hacking as "a cyber 9/11." And here is Rep. Jerry Nadler (D-NY) on MSNBC in early February, 2018, pronouncing Russia "a hostile foreign power" whose 2016 meddling was the "equivalent" of Pearl Harbor, "very much on par" with the "seriousness" of the 1941 attack in Hawaii that helped prompt four years of U.S. involvement in a world war.

https://www.youtube-nocookie.com/embed/1h94bBaME-w?rel=0&autoplay=0&showinfo=0

With the Democrats, under Joe Biden, just weeks away from assuming control of the White House and the U.S. military and foreign policy that goes along with it, the discourse from them and their media allies about Russia is becoming even more unhinged and dangerous. Moscow's alleged responsibility for the recently revealed, multi-pronged hack of U.S. Government agencies and various corporate servers is asserted -- despite not a shred of evidence, literally, having yet been presented -- as not merely proven fact, but as so obviously true that it is off-limits from doubt or questioning.

Any questioning of this claim will be instantly vilified by the Democrats' extremely militaristic media spokespeople as virtual treason. "Now the president is not just silent on Russia and the hack. He is deliberately running defense for the Kremlin by contradicting his own Secretary of State on Russian responsibility," pronounced CNN's national security reporter Jim Sciutto, who last week depicted Trump's attempted troop withdrawal from Syria and Germany as "ceding territory" and furnishing "gifts" to Putin. More alarmingly, both the rhetoric to describe the hack and the retaliation being threatened are rapidly spiraling out of control.

Democrats (along with some Republicans long obsessed with The Russian Threat, such as Mitt Romney) are casting the latest alleged hack by Moscow in the most melodramatic terms possible, ensuring that Biden will enter the White House with tensions sky-high with Russia and facing heavy pressure to retaliate aggressively. Biden's top national security advisers and now Biden himself have, with no evidence shown to the public, repeatedly threatened aggressive retaliation against the country with the world's second-largest nuclear stockpile.

Congressman Jason Crow (D-CO) -- one of the pro-war Democrats on the House Armed Services Committee who earlier this year joined with Rep. Liz Cheney (R-WY) to block Trump's plan to withdraw troops from Afghanistan -- announced : "this could be our modern day, cyber equivalent of Pearl Harbor," adding : "Our nation is under assault." The second-ranking Senate Democrat, Dick Durbin (D-IL), pronounced : "This is virtually a declaration of war by Russia."

Meanwhile, Sen. Mitt Romney (R-UT), who has for years been casting Russia as a grave threat to the U.S. while Democrats mocked him as a relic of the Cold War (before they copied and then surpassed him), described the latest hack as "the equivalent of Russian bombers flying undetected over the entire country." The GOP's 2012 presidential nominee also blasted Trump for his failure to be "aggressively speaking out and protesting and taking punitive action," though -- like virtually every prominent figure demanding tough "retaliation" -- Romney failed to specify what he had in mind that would be sufficient retaliation for "the equivalent of Russian bombers flying undetected over the entire country."

https://www.youtube-nocookie.com/embed/RdVQu18OWko?rel=0&autoplay=0&showinfo=0

For those keeping track at home: that's two separate "Pearl Harbors" in less than four years from Moscow (or, if you prefer, one Pearl Harbor and one 9/11). If Democrats actually believe that, it stands to reason that they will be eager to embrace a policy of belligerence and aggression toward Russia. Many of them are demanding this outright, mocking Trump for failing to attack Russia -- despite no evidence that they were responsible -- while their well-trained liberal flock is suggesting that the non-response constitutes some form of "high treason."

Indeed, the Biden team has been signalling that they intend to quickly fulfill demands for aggressive retaliation. The New York Times reported on Tuesday that Biden "accused President Trump [] of 'irrational downplaying'" of the hack while "warning Russia that he would not allow the intrusion to 'go unanswered' after he takes office." Biden emphasized that once the intelligence assessment is complete, "we will respond, and probably respond in kind."

Threats and retaliation between the U.S. and Russia are always dangerous, but particularly so now. One of the key nuclear arms agreements between the two nuclear-armed nations, the New START treaty, will expire in February unless Putin and Biden can successfully negotiate a renewal: sixteen days after Biden is scheduled to take office. "That will force Mr. Biden to strike a deal to prevent one threat -- a nuclear arms race -- while simultaneously threatening retaliation on another," observed the Times.


This escalating rhetoric from Washington about Russia, and the resulting climate of heightened tensions, are dangerous in the extreme. They are also based in numerous myths, deceits and falsehoods:

First, absolutely no evidence of any kind has been presented to suggest, let alone prove, that Russia is responsible for these hacks. It goes without saying that it is perfectly plausible that Russia could have done this: it's the sort of thing that every large power from China and Iran to the U.S. and Russia have the capability to do and wield against virtually every other country including one another.

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But if we learned nothing else over the last several decades, we should know that accepting claims that emanate from the U.S. intelligence community about adversaries without a shred of evidence is madness of the highest order. We just had a glaring reminder of the importance of this rule: just weeks before the election, countless mainstream media outlets laundered and endorsed the utterly false claim that the documents from Hunter Biden's laptop were "Russian disinformation," only for officials to acknowledge once the harm was done that there was no evidence -- zero -- of Russian involvement.

Yet that is exactly what the overwhelming bulk of media outlets are doing again: asserting that Russia is behind these hacks despite having no evidence of its truth. The New York Times ' Michael Barbaro, host of the paper's popular The Daily podcast, asked his colleague , national security reporter David Sanger, what evidence exists to assert that Russia did this. As Barbaro put it, even Sanger is "allowing that early conclusions could all be wrong, but that it's doubtful." Indeed, Sanger acknowledged to Barbaro that they have no proof, asserting instead that the basis on which he is relying is that Russia possesses the sophistication to carry out such a hack (as do several other nation-states), along with claiming that the hack has what he calls the "markings" of Russian hackers.

But this tactic was exactly the same one used by former intelligence officials , echoed by these same media outlets, to circulate the false pre-election claim that the documents from Hunter Biden's laptop were "Russian disinformation": namely, they pronounced in lockstep, the material from Hunter's laptop "has all the classic earmarks of a Russian information operation." This was also exactly the same tactic used by the U.S. intelligence community in 2001 to falsely blame Iraq for the anthrax attacks , claiming that their chemical analysis revealed a substance that was "a trademark of the Iraqi biological weapons program."

These media outlets will, if pressed, acknowledge their lack of proof that Russia did this. Despite this admitted lack of proof, media outlets are repeatedly stating Russian responsibility as proven fact .

"Scope of Russian Hacking Becomes Clear: Multiple U.S. Agencies Were Hit," one New York Times headline proclaimed, and the first line of that article, co-written by Sanger, stated definitively: "The scope of a hacking engineered by one of Russia's premier intelligence agencies became clearer on Monday." The Washington Post deluged the public with identically certain headlines:

Nobody in the government has been as definitive in asserting Russian responsibility as corporate media outlets. Even Trump's hawkish Secretary of State, Mike Pompeo, crafted his accusation against Moscow with caveats and uncertainty : " I think it's the case that now we can say pretty clearly that it was the Russians that engaged in this activity."

If actual evidence ultimately emerges demonstrating Russian responsibility, it would not alter how dangerous it is that -- less than twenty years after the Iraq WMD debacle and less than a couple of years after media endorsement of endless Russiagate falsehoods -- the most influential media outlets continue to mindlessly peddle as Truth whatever the intelligence community feeds them, without the need to see any evidence that what they're claiming is actually true. Even more alarmingly, large sectors of the public that venerate these outlets continue to believe that what they hear from them must be true, no matter how many times they betray that trust. The ease with which the CIA can disseminate whatever messaging it wants through friendly media outlets is stunning.

Second , the very idea that this hack could be compared to rogue and wildly aberrational events such as Pearl Harbor or the 9/11 attack is utterly laughable on its face. One has to be drowning in endless amounts of jingoistic self-delusion to believe that this hack -- or, for that matter, the 2016 "election interference" -- is a radical departure from international norms as opposed to a perfect reflection of them.

Just as was true of 2016 fake Facebook pages and Twitter bots, it is not an exaggeration to say that the U.S. Government engages in hacking attacks of this sort, and ones far more invasive, against virtually every country on the planet, including Russia, on a weekly basis. That does not mean that this kind of hacking is either justified or unjustified. It does mean, however, that depicting it as some particularly dastardly and incomparably immoral act that requires massive retaliation requires a degree of irrationality and gullibility that is bewildering to behold.

The NSA reporting enabled by Edward Snowden by itself proved that the NSA spies on virtually anyone it can . Indeed, after reviewing the archive back in 2013, I made the decision that I would not report on U.S. hacks of large adversary countries such as China and Russia because it was so commonplace for all of these countries to hack one another as aggressively and intrusively as they could that it was hardly newsworthy to report on this (the only exception was when there was a substantial reason to view such spying as independently newsworthy, such as Sweden's partnering with NSA to spy on Russia in direct violation of the denials Swedish officials voiced to their public).

Other news outlets who had access to Snowden documents, particularly The New York Times , were not nearly as circumspect in exposing U.S. spying on large nation-state adversaries. As a result, there is ample proof published by those outlets (sometimes provoking Snowden's strong objections) that the U.S. does exactly what Russia is alleged to have done here -- and far worse.

"Even as the United States made a public case about the dangers of buying from [China's] Huawei, classified documents show that the National Security Agency was creating its own back doors -- directly into Huawei's networks," reported The New York Times ' David Sanger and Nicole Perlroth in 2013, adding that "the agency pried its way into the servers in Huawei's sealed headquarters in Shenzhen, China's industrial heart."

In 2013, the Guardian revealed "an NSA attempt to eavesdrop on the Russian leader, Dmitry Medvedev, as his phone calls passed through satellite links to Moscow," and added: "foreign politicians and officials who took part in two G20 summit meetings in London in 2009 had their computers monitored and their phone calls intercepted on the instructions of their British government hosts." Meanwhile, "Sweden has been a key partner for the United States in spying on Russia and its leadership, Swedish television said on Thursday," noted Reuters , citing what one NSA document described as "a unique collection on high-priority Russian targets, such as leadership, internal politics."

Other reports revealed that the U.S. had hacked into the Brazilian telecommunications system to collect data on the whole population, and was spying on Brazil's key leaders (including then-President Dilma Rousseff) as well as its most important companies such as its oil giant Petrobras and its Ministry of Mines and Energy. The Washington Post reported : "The National Security Agency is gathering nearly 5 billion records a day on the whereabouts of cellphones around the world, according to top-secret documents and interviews with U.S. intelligence officials, enabling the agency to track the movements of individuals -- and map their relationships -- in ways that would have been previously unimaginable." And on and on.

[One amazing though under-appreciated episode related to all this: the same New York Times reporter who revealed the details about massive NSA hacking of Chinese government and industry, Nicole Perlroth, subsequently urged (in tweets she has now deleted) that Snowden not be pardoned on the ground that, according to her, he revealed legitimate NSA spying on U.S. adversaries. In reality, it was actually she, Perlorth, not Snowden, who chose to expose NSA spying on China, provoking Snowden's angry objections when she did so based on his view this was a violation of the framework he created for what should and should not be revealed; in other words, not only did Perlroth urge the criminal prosecution of a source on which she herself relied, an absolutely astonishing thing for any reporter to do, but so much worse, she did so by falsely accusing that source of doing something that she, Perlroth, had done herself: namely, reveal extensive U.S. hacking of China ].

What all of this makes demonstrably clear is that only the most deluded and uninformed person could believe that Russian hacking of U.S. agencies and corporations -- if it happened -- is anything other than totally normal and common behavior between these countries. Harvard Law Professor and former Bush DOJ official Jack Goldsmith, reviewing growing demands for retaliation, wrote in an excellent article last week entitled "Self-Delusion on the Russia Hack : The U.S. regularly hacks foreign governmental computer systems on a massive scale":

The lack of self-awareness in these and similar reactions to the Russia breach is astounding. The U.S. government has no principled basis to complain about the Russia hack, much less retaliate for it with military means, since the U.S. government hacks foreign government networks on a huge scale every day. Indeed, a military response to the Russian hack would violate international law . . . .

As the revelations from leaks of information from Edward Snowden made plain, the United States regularly penetrates foreign governmental computer systems on a massive scale, often (as in the Russia hack) with the unwitting assistance of the private sector, for purposes of spying. It is almost certainly the world's leader in this practice, probably by a lot. The Snowden documents suggested as much, as does the NSA's probable budget. In 2016, after noting "problems with cyber intrusions from Russia," Obama boasted that the United States has "more capacity than anybody offensively" . . . .

Because of its own practices, the U.S. government has traditionally accepted the legitimacy of foreign governmental electronic spying in U.S. government networks. After the notorious Chinese hack of the Office of Personnel Management database, then-Director of National Intelligence James Clapper said: "You have to kind of salute the Chinese for what they did. If we had the opportunity to do that, I don't think we'd hesitate for a minute." The same Russian agency that appears to have carried out the hack revealed this week also hacked into unclassified emails in the White House and Defense and State Departments in 2014-2015. The Obama administration deemed it traditional espionage and did not retaliate. "It was information collection, which is what nation states -- including the United States -- do," said Obama administration cybersecurity coordinator Michael Daniel this week.

But over the last four years, Americans, particularly those who feed on liberal media outlets, have been drowned in so much mythology about the U.S. and Russia that they have no capacity to critically assess the claims being made, and -- just as they were led to believe about "Russia's 2016 interference in Our Sacred Elections" -- are easily convinced that what Russia did is some shocking and extreme crime the likes of which are rarely seen in international relations. In reality, their own government is the undisputed world champion in perpetrating these acts, and has been for years if not decades.

Third , these demands for "retaliation" are so reckless because they are almost always unaccompanied by any specifics. Even if Moscow's responsibility is demonstrated, what is the U.S. supposed to do in response? If your answer is that they should hack Russia back, rest assured the NSA and CIA are always trying to hack Russia as much as it possibly can, long before this event.

If the answer is more sanctions, that would be just performative and pointless, aside from wildly hypocritical. Any reprisals more severe than that would be beyond reckless, particularly with the need to renew nuclear arms control agreements looming. And if you are someone demanding retaliation, do you believe that Russia, China, Brazil and all the other countries invaded by NSA hackers have the same right of retaliation against the U.S., or does the U.S. occupy a special place with special entitlements that all other countries lack?

What we have here, yet again, is the classic operation of the intelligence community feeding serious accusations about a nuclear-armed power to an eagerly gullible corporate media, with the media mindlessly disseminating it without evidence, all toward ratcheting up tensions between these two nuclear-armed powers and fortifying a mythology of the U.S. as grand victim but never perpetrator.

If you ever find yourself wondering how massive military budgets and a posture of Endless War are seemingly invulnerable to challenge, this pathological behavior -- from a now-enduring union of the intelligence community, corporate media outlets, and the Democratic Party -- provides one key piece of the puzzle.

Update, Dec. 24, 2020, 7:36 a.m. ET: Although the tweets from The New York Times ' Nicole Perlroth referenced above were deleted by her, as indicated, an alert reader notes that a Politico article at the time referenced part of my exchange with her, one prompted by anger from Washington Post reporters over an editorial by their own paper that argued against a Snowden pardon, even though that paper reported extensively on Snowden's documents and won a Pulitzer for doing so:

The editorial is nothing if not a good excuse for a Twitter debate. Some journalists continued to air outrage yesterday over the editorial board's defenestration of Snowden, while others either agreed with the board's argument or at least defended its right to take a stand that it knew would no doubt rankle many in the Post's newsroom. In one of the more notable exchanges, New York Times reporter cybersecurity reporter Nicole Perlroth tangled with Glenn Greenwald, who broke the Snowden/NSA story for The Guardian.

Perlroth: "Gotta say I agree w/ wapo. @Snowden leaked tens of thousands of docs that had nothing to do with privacy violations." http://bit.ly/2cLPeLY

Greenwald: "They can start an august club: Journalists In Favor of Criminal Prosecution For Our Sources" http://bit.ly/2cLLIRz

That's precisely what I was referencing here. It's utterly repugnant that Perlroth advocated that her own source be imprisoned on the ground that he leaked documents "that had nothing to do with privacy violations" when it was she, Perlroth, who decided to reveal details of NSA spying on China, angering Snowden in the process. Clicking on the above link to her tweet demonstrates that she since deleted it.

One last point: there is an outstanding op-ed in Thursday's New York Times about anger over the alleged Russian hack by Paul Kolbe, who served as a senior CIA clandestine operative for 25 years and is now director of the Intelligence Project at Harvard Kennedy School, entitled "With Hacking, the United States Needs to Stop Playing the Victim." It details that "the United States is, of course, engaged in the same type of operations at an even grander scale" and therefore "it's time for the United States to stop acting surprised and stop posturing."

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← Previous Randall Rose Dec 23

Greenwald is mistaken on one point. He discusses the aggressive, outraged words by American politicians and media about the recent spate of (allegedly) Russian hacking, and rushes to assume that it has a significant chance of escalating to nuclear war. Biden's language about wanting to "respond in kind" makes it clear enough that he's not going to do any sort of bombing, killing, invasion, or other equally warlike act in response. Likewise for Mitt Romney's language. Although I like just about everything else Greenwald says in this article, his repeated suggestions that the threats over this incident could end up going nuclear are difficult to believe.

Greenwald's perspective is that "Threats and retaliation between the U.S. and Russia are always dangerous" due to their massive stocks of nuclear weapons, particularly now that nuclear treaties have been weakened. Look, I get that escalation to nuclear war remains a serious danger, and that it would be better if the US and Russia didn't raise tensions. But as Greenwald knows, things like one country making off with another country's secret information are examples of the kind of aggressive action that it's very difficult to stop major powers from doing to other countries. And when a large or small country experiences this kind of aggressive action being done to it, isn't it inevitable that opinion leaders in that country are going to say: We won't stand for this, this is similar to an act of war, we must retaliate somehow? Most opinion leaders will always be upset when their own country is treated that way by another country, even if their own country has done the same thing and worse.

Greenwald seems to be looking for a world where opinion leaders in a major power like the US avoid encouraging retaliation, and avoid even portraying the hacking as an act of war. Nothing could stop opinion leaders as a group from doing that, unless maybe you could demonstrate to them that their rhetoric, and the retaliations it leads to, is too likely to encourage escalation to nuclear war. But the continuing pattern of major powers retaliating against each other by hacking and other relatively low-level aggression is not something we can realistically stop. The United States and other countries have come to accept that all major powers will carry out hacks and even low-level forms of violence directed at other major powers, that countries will express their outrage when another country does it to them, and that one country will retaliate at the same level when another country does these things. That's a pretty stable pattern, and there is no sign that anyone wants to disproportionately escalate their retaliation in a way that could lead to nuclear war. Given that, you can't reasonably convince opinion leaders to moderate their rhetoric further. The rhetoric coming from opinion leaders on this subject isn't particularly bloody anyway, at least by the standards of what historically leads to war. So for the short term at least, I just accept that opinion leaders are going to talk that way -- I do have long-term hopes of a more peaceful world, but there's no use pretending that the current less peaceful language puts us in imminent danger of nuclear holocaust.

The main reason why I am confident that outraged rhetoric about hacking secrets won't escalate into world war is because modern countries, and especially the United States, are vulnerable to cyber threats that are much worse than making off with information. It would be easy for an adversary to destroy most of American society by acts of massively lethal hacking and cyber sabotage. American decision-makers know that they must deter these kinds of attacks on the US by holding out the prospect of retaliating with nukes, world war, or similarly lethal cyber attacks. Since American leaders need to be able to use the prospect of massive retaliation to deter a cyber attack that would cause great destruction in the US, they can't risk using this kind of massive retaliation for hacking that just steals a lot of secrets. It has already been established that in the 21st century, countries routinely steal each other's secrets, so it's not possible to deter or compensate for another country's secret-stealing by threatening to escalate to bombing or killing or invasion.

Of the politicians that Greenwald quoted, the two whose rhetoric is most heated still stopped short of the kind of language that runs any risk of starting a nuclear war. Sen. Durbin said the hacking was "virtually a declaration of war", using an adverb that cooled down his point and being careful to avoid declaring himself that a war exists. The obscure Congressman Jason Crow said "Our nation is under assault" and that the hacking "could be" a "cyber equivalent of Pearl Harbor", where again his point is moderated by the words "could be" and "cyber equivalent". Sorry, I don't see a danger of a civilization-ending war there, nor do I see it in the corporate media's language.

Although Greenwald is right to say that politicians and the media are overhyping threats here, Greenwald is also, in his own way, overhyping a different alleged threat, the idea that outrage over hacking secrets will escalate to nuclear war. That said, I do think we need to do more to prevent other pathways of escalation to nuclear war that are more realistic than the one Greenwald alludes to here, and I agree with Greenwald's other points.

Reply 46 replies by Glenn Greenwald and others Randall Rose Dec 23

Does anyone have screenshots of the deleted hypocrtiical tweets by NY Times reporter Nicole Perlroth that Greenwald mentioned in this article? You would normally expect him to post screenshots, but he doesn't include them or link to them. The paragraph of Greenwald's article where he brings up her hypocrisy shows some signs of maybe being unfinished, with awkward square brackets. He should have also included the link to the NY Times article where Perlroth does the same thing she later condemned -- the link for that is here: https://www.nytimes.com/2014/03/23/world/asia/nsa-breached-chinese-servers-seen-as-spy-peril.html

[Dec 22, 2020] Snow job! SolarWinds Russian hack story proves the CIA writes US foreign policy, not the White House by Robert Bridge

Notable quotes:
"... the media – playing judge, jury and executioner – has leveled blame on the usual suspect. ..."
"... Did anyone actually believe that Russia would escape a major US election season without a ceremonial tarring and feathering by the media? It's almost as though frantic journalists, unable to sell the 'Trump Beats Biden with Kremlin Collusion' narrative, have dreamt up this latest work of pulp fiction to keep the ball of 'Russian villainy' bouncing into the next US administration. Heaven forbid if the media just sat by and let protracted peace break out between Washington and Moscow. ..."
"... By now it would seem that the mainstream media would use a bit more discretion before screaming 'Russia!' inside of a crowded planet every time a US computer system is hacked. After all, Russia is certainly not the only country in the world with a plethora of adventure-seeking hackers sitting around bored in their underwear, nor is it the only country in the world that may be tempted – theoretically speaking – to sneak a peek into Uncle Sam's software and, at the risk of sounding vulgar, hardware. ..."
"... Just ask Democratic Congressman Eric Swalwell, who allowed himself to be lured into a honey trap by a Chinese Communist spy named – I kid you not – Fang Fang. Aside from making James Bond thrillers essential reading for all politicians, the Democrats may wish to inquire how a member of the House INTELLIGENCE Committee fell for such a scheme. More to the point, however, Swalwell was one of those deranged Democrats screaming 'Russian collusion!' at the height of the Mueller investigation, another waste of taxpayer funds that turned up zero evidence of collusion between Trump and the Kremlin ..."
Dec 21, 2020 | www.rt.com

As incoming nominees of a future Biden administration have stopped short in naming a culprit in the SolarWinds hack, the media – playing judge, jury and executioner – has leveled blame on the usual suspect.

Did anyone actually believe that Russia would escape a major US election season without a ceremonial tarring and feathering by the media? It's almost as though frantic journalists, unable to sell the 'Trump Beats Biden with Kremlin Collusion' narrative, have dreamt up this latest work of pulp fiction to keep the ball of 'Russian villainy' bouncing into the next US administration. Heaven forbid if the media just sat by and let protracted peace break out between Washington and Moscow.

Indeed, when SolarWinds – a software platform that counts among its clients the Pentagon, State Department, Justice Department, and the National Security Agency – suffered an alleged hack, the Washington Post jumped on the evil Russia connection faster than Ian Fleming.

SolarWinds hack: US Treasury's unclassified systems breached as Washington points finger at Russia and China

"The Russian hackers breached email systems," wrote Ellen Nakashima and Craig Timberg in the Post without offering a stitch of evidence (Timberg, readers may recall, is the journalist who relied on a shady outfit known as PropOrNot to report , wrongly, that some 200 news outlets were peddling Russian-inspired "fake news."). Quoting those always handy "people who spoke on the condition of anonymity," the tag team claimed that the "scale of the Russian espionage operation appears to be large."

Ironically, the most reliable real-life entity that Nakashima and Timberg quoted in their story comes by way of the Russian Embassy in Washington, which called the reports of Russian hacking "baseless."

But never mind. If the Bezos-empire publication says Russia is the guilty party then who are we mere mortals to ask any questions. So now we're off again to the 'blame Russia' races.

At this point, it must be asked: who is more responsible for writing US foreign policy, the mainstream media, with their never-ending supply of 'anonymous sources' to substantiate their fantastic assertions, or the US government? That question seems reasonable after listening to interviews with freshly appointed members of the Biden administration, who apparently never got the memo about 'Russian baddies'.

Jennifer Granholm, for example, the energy secretary nominee, committed the cardinal sin of not recognizing the 'Russian bogeyman' in an interview with ABC talking head, George Stephanopolous.

"We don't know fully what happened, the extent of it, and, quite frankly, we don't know fully for sure who did it," Granholm said , leaving Stephanopoulos, deprived of clickable Russophobic sound bites, looking dejected and forlorn.

Perhaps Stephanopoulos was anticipating that Granholm would simply regurgitate media talking points about Russia's unproven hack, like the absolutely reckless one put out by Reuters.

Reporting on the SolarWinds hack, the Reuters article screamed 'Russia' from the opening gates. Yet not a single living person is quoted from the incoming Biden administration to take responsibility for a claim that has real-life consequences, especially when some members of Congress are calling the electronic breach an "act of war."

"President-elect Joe Biden's team will consider several options to punish Russia for its suspected role in the unprecedented hacking of US government agencies and companies once he takes office, from new financial sanctions to cyberattacks on Russian infrastructure, people familiar with the matter say."

Here we go again: Washington Post claims RUSSIA behind SolarWinds hack, citing same 'sources' as it did for Russiagate

The very same deplorable tactic was used in an interview 'Face the Nation' conducted with Ron Klain, the incoming White House chief of staff.

When pressed by the interviewer Margaret Brennan if there was "any doubt that Russia was behind [the hack]," Klain provided an answer that Brennan was clearly not satisfied with. In other words, Klain never mentioned the perennial villain Russia as a possible suspect.

"We should be hearing a clear and unambiguous allocation of responsibility from the White House, from the intelligence community," he said. "They're the ones who should be making those messages and delivering the ascertainment of responsibility."

Brennan was having none of it, however, and pushed on with the 'blame Russia' narrative.

"Well, the president-elect was pretty clear when he spoke to my colleague Stephen Colbert on CBS earlier this week, and he was asked about Russia and he said they'll be held accountable," Brennan remarked, desperate to hear Klain pronounce the name. "He said they'll face financial repercussions for what they did. Is that no longer the case? He no longer believes it's Russia?"

At this point, some very convenient technical problems helped to cut the pathetic excuse for journalism off the air.

By now it would seem that the mainstream media would use a bit more discretion before screaming 'Russia!' inside of a crowded planet every time a US computer system is hacked. After all, Russia is certainly not the only country in the world with a plethora of adventure-seeking hackers sitting around bored in their underwear, nor is it the only country in the world that may be tempted – theoretically speaking – to sneak a peek into Uncle Sam's software and, at the risk of sounding vulgar, hardware.

Just ask Democratic Congressman Eric Swalwell, who allowed himself to be lured into a honey trap by a Chinese Communist spy named – I kid you not – Fang Fang. Aside from making James Bond thrillers essential reading for all politicians, the Democrats may wish to inquire how a member of the House INTELLIGENCE Committee fell for such a scheme. More to the point, however, Swalwell was one of those deranged Democrats screaming 'Russian collusion!' at the height of the Mueller investigation, another waste of taxpayer funds that turned up zero evidence of collusion between Trump and the Kremlin.

Dream of alliance from Lisbon to Vladivostok dies: German efforts to create a Europe without Russia forged a Europe against Russia

In conclusion, it is worth noting that the timing of the purported attack on SolarWinds, coming as it does just weeks before Inauguration Day when Joe Biden is expected to be sworn in as the 46th POTUS, is extremely suspicious in of itself. Not only is there a power struggle going on behind the scenes for the White House, with the Trump administration claiming the election was marred by massive fraud, but Joe Biden's own son Hunter has been accused of influence-peddling in places like Ukraine and China.

The Biden family, naturally, has rejected the claims, while the media has practically buried the story. Meanwhile, Russia, much like in 2016 when it was accused of hacking Hillary Clinton's emails, is being dragged into another American political drama, at the most crucial time, without rhyme or reason. At least when it comes to Russia the media can take credit for being very predictable, albeit absolutely reckless and dangerous in its tactics. Would it kill them to take five minutes off poking the Russian bear?

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Robert Bridge is an American writer and journalist. He is the author of 'Midnight in the American Empire,'


Bill Spence 10 hours ago 21 Dec, 2020 04:28 PM

We are dealing with compound fraud but it is not clear how anyone gains an advantage when the propaganda against Russia has saturated the public mind.
Fenianfromcork Bill Spence 5 hours ago 21 Dec, 2020 08:45 PM
Simple magicians conjuring trick. Look here while Ido something else here.
DexterMont Bill Spence 9 hours ago 21 Dec, 2020 05:19 PM
It's just self delusion in the American political class. No one else is paying any attention to it.
It's me 9 hours ago 21 Dec, 2020 04:54 PM
Same old Same old, we don't have to prove Russians hacked the Election, because it was hacked. It's up to Russia to prove they didn't hack the Election.
VaimacaPiru 7 hours ago 21 Dec, 2020 06:55 PM
Mr Bridge! Your title should be more accurate! 'The Transnational Corporate Class that own the media sets US foreign policy' Thank you!
Bill Spence VaimacaPiru 7 hours ago 21 Dec, 2020 07:03 PM
Right now Donald Trump and Pompeo are setting the foreign policy not the transnational corporations who have no head. Generally the CIA and State Department set foreign policy not those corporations. The CIA has a different point of view, the national security point of view. Many of those corporations are happy trading with China. They have reached a contradictory position.
IslandT 2 hours ago 22 Dec, 2020 12:04 AM
According to the Trump administration, Russia is one of the actor behinds the dominion incident which helps Biden won the election, so if Trump continue in power, he might sanction Russia. And now we have this hacking incident under Trump administration, if you say this is a hoax and it comes from Biden camp, then this will not make sense at all because Biden has already won the election so he does not needs to use any hoax to down Trump anymore. If Russia is indeed hacking then those previous anti-Trump FBI and CIA directors should have used this as an issue to attack Russia and Trump before the election instead of creating the Afghan hoax which has no prove at all (did USA has proved on the hack? Nobody knows)! The present director for both FBI and CIA are all Trump men and thus I don't think Biden team is behinds this hacking incident hoax. I read the article and know that Trump team (especially Mike Pompeo) calls for maximum punishment on Russia, Russia needs to prepare and to avoid the worst case scenario before Biden takes power. I think there is no sense at all for deep state to hate Russia so much because all they want is profit, it is time for Russia to have a friendly chat with all those parties that involve in Russia-Hate campaign. You can't get blamed by everyone forever, this need to stop!
Jeffrey Perkins 9 hours ago 21 Dec, 2020 05:00 PM
pentagon propoganda money can control the media in many ways
Atilla863 1 hour ago 22 Dec, 2020 12:50 AM
Just wonder why the EU politicians haven't joined the US - chorus yet condemning the Russians.
EthanCarterIII 1 hour ago 22 Dec, 2020 12:49 AM
Maybe they should put more time and effort into increasing their security instead of blaming people? It seems every other month there's another story about hackers getting into the systems, and frankly they need to start looking in the mirror. Oh, but then Hillary wants to be Secretary of Defense and left a private top secret server in her bathroom hacked by anybody and everybody, so maybe it isn't so much "hacking" as incompetence?
dangood013 30 minutes ago 22 Dec, 2020 02:05 AM
Nakashima and other do not make stuff up. They just regurgitate what their National Security sources tell them upon penalty of " losing access " to their precious sources.
Fuzzerbear 2 hours ago 21 Dec, 2020 11:40 PM
oh no - not the Russians again. They are really bad bad bad - just as bad as Iran, Iraq, Syria . . . . . . .. Such a thorn for the USA, Israel, the 5 lies, etc. How boring will the reality be without all the fake news.
liarof1776 3 hours ago 21 Dec, 2020 11:10 PM
america is having ashkenazic genetic problem: paranoia
Atilla863 1 hour ago 22 Dec, 2020 12:36 AM
Don't worry Russia is ALWAYS the convenient scapegoat. What a shame American politicians and their supporters have turned out to be!, life is meaningless without Russian phantoms. Sad
Solecismcles 7 hours ago 21 Dec, 2020 06:41 PM
Cowhorts: Warshington & most media; though more overtly when Dem's have Executive influence. However, so much scum is entrenched throughout the bureaucracies that their evil lurks and preys regardless of which Party controls WH.

[Dec 22, 2020] Neoliberal MSM di not have enough of Russiagate, they again are playing judge, jury and executioner by Robert Bridge

Notable quotes:
"... the media – playing judge, jury and executioner – has leveled blame on the usual suspect. ..."
"... Did anyone actually believe that Russia would escape a major US election season without a ceremonial tarring and feathering by the media? It's almost as though frantic journalists, unable to sell the 'Trump Beats Biden with Kremlin Collusion' narrative, have dreamt up this latest work of pulp fiction to keep the ball of 'Russian villainy' bouncing into the next US administration. Heaven forbid if the media just sat by and let protracted peace break out between Washington and Moscow. ..."
Dec 21, 2020 | www.rt.com

As incoming nominees of a future Biden administration have stopped short in naming a culprit in the SolarWinds hack, the media – playing judge, jury and executioner – has leveled blame on the usual suspect.

Did anyone actually believe that Russia would escape a major US election season without a ceremonial tarring and feathering by the media? It's almost as though frantic journalists, unable to sell the 'Trump Beats Biden with Kremlin Collusion' narrative, have dreamt up this latest work of pulp fiction to keep the ball of 'Russian villainy' bouncing into the next US administration. Heaven forbid if the media just sat by and let protracted peace break out between Washington and Moscow.

[Dec 22, 2020] Those Russkies really kick butt. They are everywhere these days. The Onion puts out less ridiculous stories than the US "intelligence" agencies.

Dec 22, 2020 | www.zerohedge.com

OlderOldPhart 9 hours ago

The only information taken that rattles US.gov is how corrupt everyone is. The fear is having that become irrefutably public,

flyonmywall 9 hours ago

Those Russkies really kick butt. They are everywhere these days.

Unknown User 8 hours ago

The Onion puts out less ridiculous stories than the US "intelligence" agencies.

Dzerzhhinsky 6 hours ago

The Chinese are in the dark because they won't buy Australian coal, the Russian superhackers cracked the uncrackable Tradewinds123 password, and Iran is doing something ?

It's all a diversion, don't look at me look over there.

The intensity of the disinformation is directly related to the upcoming US collapse.

yewtee 2 hours ago

Will there be civil war ?

Lee Bertin 56 minutes ago

Have you not noticed that it has been going on for four years

BGen. Jack Ripper 9 hours ago

No enemy is more terrifying than the one in our midst.

Krinkle Sach 8 hours ago

🇮🇱💩🇮🇱💩🇮🇱

Whiteman_Sachs 9 hours ago

There is another headquarters in VA, specifically Langley that's more likely the intruder. Imagine this....The penetration of this intrusion is so vast and widespread. Access to hundreds of companies, contractors, military, ect. I doubt the a foreign entity could get so far inside. Imagine if our new leader ship at the Def Dept decided to shut the backdoor. Cutoff access to the bad actors a CIA. They've already closed off operational assistance to the CIA. The response has been so predicable....Russia Russia blah blah. I think many things are going on behind the scene. I think Trump is kneecapping his rivals on what could be the way out.

thezone 9 hours ago

PLEASE remember MIT Romney and all the swamp elite decried Trump for firing Chris Krebs.

Mr. 'there's never been a more secure' election.

Now we hear that Russia has owned government systems for a full year right under his nose.

jwoop66 8 hours ago

I just spent two hours watching this. Krebs is in it talking about all the bad actors out there trying to subvert our elections, and that its the first thing he thinks of in the morning, and the last thing he thinks of before he goes to bed.

yes, and then he says "perfect election" within days. f'ing frauds.

https://www.amazon.com/Perfect-Weapon-David-Sanger/dp/B08L7FKH6M/ref=sr_1_1?crid=2LMHJNQR5O468&dchild=1&keywords=the+perfect+weapon+2020&qid=1608608846&s=instant-video&sprefix=the+perfect+weapon%2Cinstant-video%2C165&sr=1-1

MysterySheepdog 9 hours ago

That crap of an article brought me 2 or 3 minutes closer to death.

And hell doesn't want me, Satan has a restraining order.

DurdenRae 26 minutes ago

They don't really qualify for intelligence if they all they can come up with is that kind of malarkey...

aberfoyle_crumplehausen 7 hours ago

As an average dude, I consider my initial thoughts and reactions to things typical of most others. When I first heard of this latest 'Russian Hack' I instantly thought "so the transition is almost here and they launch their first psyop".

So I am obviously not alone in my intuition and this means the media is becoming laughably irrelevant to the common folk.

Babadook 7 hours ago

See what happens when you elect incompetent, inept fools to run your government, they only appoint incompetent, inept fools to run the country's military, FBI & intel services.

sp0rkovite 7 hours ago

Barr is a democrat now?

You_Cant_Quit_Me 8 hours ago

Has anyone considered the US was simultaneously attacked with a biological weapon known as Covid-19 and hacked around the same time frame? Maybe the US with its constant false allegations against Russia has forced Russia to align with China making the US the common enemy?

Russia was not behind the hack attack despite what we are being told. It is a false flag with someone trying to frame Russia.

Kreditanstalt 8 hours ago

The other wing of The Party has its own "CHINA! CHINA! CHINA! propaganda campaign too

JackOliver4 8 hours ago (Edited)

They hate Russia because Russia tells the TRUTH !

Everything Russia says is well thought out and makes sense !

Once the US got away with the FAKE moon landing BS - they were enabled - sad !

I caught a glimpse of a 'Who wants to be a millionaire' episode - question was 'How many people have walked on the MOON' ?

Apparently the answer is 12 !!

The brainwashing runs DEEP !!

RKKA 8 hours ago

It's not about who breaks the networks or who attacks Nord Stream 2. The fact is that today's situation is even more explosive than during the Cold War.

The NATO alliance already borders on Russia and all the lines that were previously "red" are not recognized by anyone, primarily by the West.

The situation, thanks to aggressive rhetoric and the movement of military units, has become much more dangerous than it was during the Cold War.
This is confirmed by the German Foreign Minister. Frank-Walter Steinmeier called the confrontation between the West and Russia much more dangerous than that which took place between NATO countries and the Soviet Union during the Cold War.

Five_Black_Eyes_Intel_Agency 8 hours ago (Edited)

"intelligence" agencies

LOL

This is yet more squirming by an empire that looks increasingly bloated and its own worst enemy. Good luck clowns, but you wouldn't know what to do with it.

Xena fobe 9 hours ago

Xiden doesn't know Russia exists. No, this is not being done to persuade Xiden.

Late onset ADHD 9 hours ago (Edited)

Without the 'right' enemy, a politician is a useless appendage.

transcendent_wannabe 5 minutes ago

This youtuber gives a pretty good insider view of what has occurred. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZLhk_gqYaEg US TREASURY HACKED because of SOLARWINDS You have to watch all the way to the end to get the full picture.

Basically its our own good-ole-boy network of insiders stealing data to sell for money. Yeah, can you believe that our esteemed coke-addicted elite class would sell out their own country for cash? Heh, we always wanted full transparency in government, so now the data is exposed. I would expect the future to be sprinkled with embarrassing data revelations used to discredit various players. There has been too much secrecy in government anyways. Let the sun shine in on all those secrets.

Lee Bertin 52 minutes ago

This is just a distraction, just smoke and mirrors. Do not lose focus on the game that is played in front of your wide open eyes

Loanman26 1 hour ago

Dmitri Alperovitch.

Donde esta?

Theedrich 2 hours ago

From the article, " Pentagon, DHS, State Dept., 18,000 others possibly hacked by Russia, reports say ":

"While targets of the SolarWinds hack included the U.S. Treasury Department and the National Telecommunications and Information Administration (NTIA), there is no complete list of the government departments and agencies and U.S. companies compromised in the hack. Bloomberg reported U.S. government departments targeted included the Department of Homeland Security (DHS), the State Department, the National Institute of Health (NIH) as well as some parts of the Department of Defense were targeted in the hack. The New York Times reported SolarWinds products are used throughout nearly all Fortune 500 companies, including the New York Times itself. The New York Times also reported SolarWinds is used by the Los Alamos National Laboratory, which designs nuclear weapons, and by Boeing, a major U.S. defense contractor.

"Following the hack, the Verge reported SolarWinds deleted a list of high profile clients from its website, though an archived copy of the client page states 425 of the Fortune 500 companies use their products, as well as all branches of the U.S. military, the National Security Agency (NSA), and even the Office of the President of the United States. The company's software is also used by all of the top five U.S. accounting firms and hundreds of colleges and universities around the world. It is not immediately clear if these SolarWinds clients specifically used the affected products listed."

Since it now seems that the Dominion software used in the Nov. 3 presidential election was, contrary to law, connected to the internet, can we be sure that the election itself was unaffected?

As Hunter Biden would say: "Probably not."

apparently 5 hours ago

this is likely false, for the lack of specifics and associated journalist hot air.

amanfromMars 6 hours ago

Muddying the waters or clearing the air and the decks? With so many crazy actors dependent upon the continued existence of mad fields, one does have to expand one's horizons and include the full list of players in such great games. So ..... in praise of such a realisation and sensible development ......

amanfromMars 1 Mon 21 Dec 17:54 [2012211754] ........ being fair and inclusive on https://forums.theregister.com/forum/all/2020/12/21/solarwinds_sunburst_evolve/#c_4167885

Re: Pot and Kettle (again)........

Quote: "From the quality of the threat design, the range of techniques used, and the nature of its victims, this was a nation state at work and in MO and capabilities most likely Russia."
*
Rewrite required: "From the quality of the threat design, the range of techniques used, and the nature of its victims, this was a nation state at work. It could have been the NSA, GCHQ, the Russians or the Chinese. In MO most likely the NSA." ....... Anonymous Coward

You'll upset Israel if you leave them out of the picture, AC. And they'd love you to think they are capable of such a show of remote force even as they deny it straight to your face. They've built a tiny disparate nation upon such foundations. [More folk live in London than in Israel. That's how small it is]

The thing is, if it is none of the above and no nation state, is it something of an alien attack you didn't see coming, and that makes a lot of other vital things extremely vulnerable to similar unexpected events which can effortlessly deliver major catastrophic crises ....... flash market stock crashes.

It can be, and most probably more likely certainly is, given the fact there is no concrete evidence available to pin on a suspect and scapegoats, a wholly new APT Adept ACTive genre of disruptive mischief and creative destruction at ITs Work, Rest and Play.

APT.... Advanced Persistent Threat/Treat

ACT..... Advanced Cyber Threat/Treat

[Dec 21, 2020] A Pandemic of 'Russian Hacking' by Ray McGovern and Joe Lauria

Notable quotes:
"... The analysis the corporate press has relied on came from the private cyber-security firm FireEye. This question should be raised: Why has a private contractor at extra taxpayer expense carried out this cyber analysis rather than the already publicly-funded National Security Agency? ..."
"... Similarly, why did the private firm CrowdStrike, rather than the FBI, analyze the Democratic National Committee servers in 2016? ..."
"... Sanger is as active in blaming the Kremlin for hacking, as he and his erstwhile NYT colleague, neocon hero Judith Miller, were in insisting on the presence of (non-existent) weapons of mass destruction in Iraq, helping to facilitate a major invasion with mass loss of life. ..."
"... The Military-Industrial-Congressional-Intelligence-MEDIA-Academia-Think-Tank complex (MICIMATT, for short) needs credible "enemies" to justify unprecedentedly huge expenditures for arms -- the more so at a time when it is clearer than ever, that that the money would be far better spent at home. (MEDIA is in all caps because it is the sine-qua-non , the cornerstone to making the MICIMATT enterprise work.) ..."
"... Wasn't Fireeye the company that faced extremes of ridicule from the global IT community for trying to engage Hillary Clinton as their keynote speaker at a Cyber Defense Summit in 2019? ..."
"... Isn't this, just perhaps, precisely the fake news construct, planted in the minds of Americans ..."
"... As alluded to in the article, no-doubt part of the reason is because of the black-eye the intel agencies got (at least outside of The Beltway) in the 2003 Iraq WMDs debacle, which caused a lot of us (at least on the left-end of the political spectrum, who were already highly skeptical of US 'intelligence') to virtually completely disregard them as credible sources ..."
"... Not only will Americans be "stupid and or crazy enough" to believe this nonsense, but they will also attack anyone who questions their belief as a Putin apologist or conspiracy theorist. ..."
"... Always with the same mouthpieces, the same backdated investigations, the unnamed "official" sources. Phooey! ..."
"... The naked fear-mongering has become the stuff of jokes. I had a good laugh with my friends (over the phone) taking apart an article in the Guardian that claimed that Putin had surrounded himself with KGB agents. The article didn't mention that the KGB (and the USSR) have not existed in over a quarter century. Foreign policy narratives are great for laughs, ridicule, and satire. Too bad most so-called journalists are too ignorant or intellectually dishonest to come clean. ..."
Dec 21, 2020 | consortiumnews.com

Neither the actor, nor the motive, nor the damage done is known for certain in this latest scare story, write Ray McGovern and Joe Lauria.

The hyperbolic, evidence-free media reports on the "fresh outbreak" of the Russian-hacking disease seems an obvious attempt by intelligence to handcuff President-elect Joe Biden into a strong anti-Russian posture as he prepares to enter the White House. Biden might well need to be inoculated against the Russophobe fever.

There are obvious Biden intentions worrying the intelligence agencies, such as renewing the Iran nuclear deal and restarting talks on strategic arms limitation with Russia. Both carry the inherent "risk" of thawing the new Cold War.

Instead, New Cold Warriors are bent on preventing any such rapprochement with strong support from the intelligence community's mouthpiece media. U.S. hardliners are clearly still on the rise.

Interestingly, this latest hack story came out a day before the Electoral College formally elected Biden, and after the intelligence community, despite numerous previous warnings, said nothing about Russia interfering in the election. One wonders whether that would have been the assessment had Trump won.

Instead Russia decided to hack the U.S. government.

Except there is (typically) no hard evidence pinning it on Moscow.

Uncertainties

The official story is Russia hacked into U.S. "government networks, including in the Treasury and Commerce Departments," as David Sanger of The New York Times reported.

But plenty of things are uncertain. First, Sanger wrote last Sunday that "hackers have had free rein for much of the year, though it is not clear how many email and other systems they chose to enter."

The motive of the hack is uncertain, as well what damage may have been done.

"The motive for the attack on the agency and the Treasury Department remains elusive, two people familiar with the matter said," Sanger reported. "One government official said it was too soon to tell how damaging the attacks were and how much material was lost."

Sanger. (Wikimedia Commons)

On Friday, five days after the story first broke, in an article misleadingly headlined, "Suspected Russian hack is much worse than first feared," NBC News admitted:

" At this stage, it's not clear what the hackers have done beyond accessing top-secret government networks and monitoring data."

Who conducted the hack is also not certain.

NBC reported that the U.S. Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency "has not said who it thinks is the 'advanced persistent threat actor' behind the 'significant and ongoing' campaign, but many experts are pointing to Russia."

At first Sanger was certain in his piece that Russia was behind the attack. He refers to FireEye, "a computer security firm that first raised the alarm about the Russian campaign after its own systems were pierced." But later in the same piece, Sanger loses his certainty: "If the Russia connection is confirmed," he writes.

In the absence of firm evidence that damage has been done, this may well be an intrusion into other governments' networks routinely carried out by intelligence agencies around the world, including, if not chiefly, by the United States. It is what spies do. So neither the actor, nor the motive, nor the damage done is known for certain.

Yet across the vast networks of powerful U.S. media the story has been portrayed as a major crisis brought on by a sinister Russian attack putting the security of the American people at risk.

In a second piece on Wednesday, Sanger added to the alarm by saying the hack "ranks among the greatest intelligence failures of modern times." And on Friday Secretary of State Mike Pompeo claimed Russia was "pretty clearly" behind the cyber attacks. But he cautioned: " we're still unpacking precisely what it is, and I'm sure some of it will remain classified." In other words, trust us.

Ed Loomis, a former NSA technical director, believes the suspect list should extend beyond Russia to include China, Iran, and North Korea. Loomis also says the commercial cyber-security firms that have been studying the latest "attacks" have not been able to pinpoint the source.

Tom Bossert (Office of U.S. Executive)

In a New York Times op-ed , former Trump domestic security adviser Thomas Bossert on Wednesday called on Trump to "use whatever leverage he can muster to protect the United States and severely punish the Russians." And he said Biden "must begin his planning to take charge of this crisis."

[On Friday, Biden talked tough. He promised there would be "costs" and said: "A good defense isn't enough; we need to disrupt and deter our adversaries from undertaking significant cyberattacks in the first place. I will not stand idly by in the face of cyber-assaults on our nation."]

While asserting throughout his piece that, without question, Russia now "controls" U.S. government computer networks, Bossert's confidence suddenly evaporates by slipping in at one point, "If it is Russia."

The analysis the corporate press has relied on came from the private cyber-security firm FireEye. This question should be raised: Why has a private contractor at extra taxpayer expense carried out this cyber analysis rather than the already publicly-funded National Security Agency?

Similarly, why did the private firm CrowdStrike, rather than the FBI, analyze the Democratic National Committee servers in 2016?

Could it be to give government agencies plausible deniability if these analyses, as in the case of CrowdStrike, and very likely in this latest case of Russian "hacking," turn out to be wrong? This is a question someone on the intelligence committees should be asking.

Sanger is as active in blaming the Kremlin for hacking, as he and his erstwhile NYT colleague, neocon hero Judith Miller, were in insisting on the presence of (non-existent) weapons of mass destruction in Iraq, helping to facilitate a major invasion with mass loss of life.

The Military-Industrial-Congressional-Intelligence-MEDIA-Academia-Think-Tank complex (MICIMATT, for short) needs credible "enemies" to justify unprecedentedly huge expenditures for arms -- the more so at a time when it is clearer than ever, that that the money would be far better spent at home. (MEDIA is in all caps because it is the sine-qua-non , the cornerstone to making the MICIMATT enterprise work.)

Bad Flashback

In this latest media flurry, Sanger and other intel leakers' favorites are including as "flat fact" what "everybody knows": namely, that Russia hacked the infamous Hillary Clinton-damaging emails from the Democratic National Committee in 2016.

Sanger wrote:

" the same group of [Russian] hackers went on to invade the systems of the Democratic National Committee and top officials in Hillary Clinton's campaign, touching off investigations and fears that permeated both the 2016 and 2020 contests. Another, more disruptive Russian intelligence agency, the G.R.U., is believed to be responsible for then making public the hacked emails at the D.N.C."

That accusation was devised as a magnificent distraction after the Clinton campaign learned that WikiLeaks was about to publish emails that showed how Clinton and the DNC had stacked the deck against Bernie Sanders. It was an emergency solution, but it had uncommon success.

There was no denying the authenticity of those DNC emails published by WikiLeaks . So the Democrats mounted an artful campaign, very strongly supported by Establishment media, to divert attention from the content of the emails. How to do that? Blame Russian "hacking." And for good measure, persuade then Senator John McCain to call it an "act of war."

One experienced observer, Consortium News columnist Patrick Lawrence, saw through the Democratic blame-Russia offensive from the start.

Artful as the blame-Russia maneuver was, many voters apparently saw through this clever and widely successful diversion, learned enough about the emails' contents, and decided not to vote for Hillary Clinton.

4 Years & 7 Days Ago

Henry at the International Security Forum, Vancouver, 2009.
(Hubert K, Flickr)

On Dec. 12, 2016, Veteran Intelligence Professionals for Sanity (VIPS) used sensitive intelligence revealed by Edward Snowden, the expertise of former NSA technical directors, and basic principles of physics to show that accusations that Russia hacked those embarrassing DNC emails were fraudulent.

A year later, on Dec. 5, 2017, Shawn Henry, the head of CrowdStrike, the cyber firm hired by the DNC to do the forensics, testified under oath that there was no technical evidence that the emails had been "exfiltrated"; that is, hacked from the DNC.

His testimony was kept hidden by House Intelligence Committee Chairman Adam Schiff until Schiff was forced to release it on May 7, 2020. That testimony is still being kept under wraps by Establishment media.

What VIPS wrote four years ago is worth re-reading -- particularly for those who still believe in science and have trusted the experienced intelligence professionals of VIPS with the group's unblemished, no-axes-to-grind record.

Most of the Memorandum 's embedded links are to TOP SECRET charts that Snowden made available -- icing on the cake -- and, as far as VIPS's former NSA technical directors were concerned, precisely what was to be demonstrated QED .

Many Democrats unfortunately still believe–or profess to believe–the hacking and the Trump campaign-Russia conspiracy story, the former debunked by Henry's testimony and the latter by Special Counsel Robert Mueller. Both were legally obligated to tell the truth, while the intelligence agencies were not.

Ray McGovern works with Tell the Word, a publishing arm of the ecumenical Church of the Saviour in inner-city Washington. He was a Russian specialist and presidential briefer during his 27 years as a CIA analyst. In retirement he co-created Veteran Intelligence Professionals for Sanity (VIPS).

Joe Lauria is editor-in-chief of Consortium News and a former UN correspondent for The Wall Street Journal, Boston Globe , and numerous other newspapers. He was an investigative reporter for the Sunday Times of London and began his professional career as a stringer for The New York Times. He can be reached at [email protected] and followed on Twitter @unjoe .

Please Contribute to Consortium News'
25th Anniversary Winter Fund Drive

Tags: David Sanger Donald Trump hacking Hillary Clinton Joe Biden Joe Lauria Judith Miller National Security Agency Ray McGovern Thomas Bossert


robert e williamson jr , December 21, 2020 at 10:30

I listened as the mouth piece talked about how very good the Rouskies were at this hacking thing.

Takes me back to the days of Bill Hamilton when the U.S. government stole his PROMIS software during the INSLAW Octopus scandal something Bill Barr was said to be involved in BTW.

Seems the idea of secret back doors in software that allowed the users to be monitored was very popular. So popular in fact that our government reps from DOJ and NSA quickly allowed the Israelis to have it. ????????????? I mean our government still trusts Lyin' BeeBEE. ?????????????

If you know nothing of this story wiki it and then start you research on the history of what all happened and when.

The first two places to look for these hackers are inside the U.S. and Israeli governments. Maybe this is why the intelligence community is loath to give us any real proof, you know that computer forensics stuff.

The U.S. governments love affair with Israel is killing our democracy.

As for Putti, he is still be winning even when his shill Trump lost.

Ray, Joe great stuff and an expose' on what happens when lies go unchallenged and become accepted as truth.

Thanks CN you must make Robert very proud.

PEACE

DH Fabian , December 21, 2020 at 09:39

Maybe we could launch a fund-raising campaign to purchase some anti-malware software for the government's (obviously unsecured) computers. If possible, we could raise enough money to hire a teacher to instruct them on basic computer security. (Thrifty suggestion: Hire some local high school teens). Apparently, some kids in Russia made a hobby of hacking into the Pentagon, itself (I know this, because I just made it up), so on Monday, we need to launch this story on MSNBC, the official media of the New Democrat Party.

alice slater , December 21, 2020 at 09:12

You might want to remind people that Putin had made an offer to Obama in 2009 to negotiate a treaty to ban cyberwar, which the US rejected. See https://www.nytimes.com/2009/06/28/world/28cyber.html , U.S. and Russia Differ on a Treaty for Cyberspace
Thanks for this important article! Alice Slater

zhu , December 21, 2020 at 06:38

Was there any "hack" at all?

DH Fabian , December 21, 2020 at 09:45

Hacking attempts are routine, daily, and nearly always business-related. Few succeed, but when they do, it can be quite lucrative (until they're tracked down and arrested). Beyond that, the US has maintained its lead in efforts to hack into security computers of foreign countries. Of course, governments throughout history have used whatever tools they had, to track other governments, usually for their own security against aggressor states.

Tina Weiser , December 20, 2020 at 21:28

When I first heard of this Russian hacking and the story about Trump cavorting w Russians, I intuitively knew it was wrong and made up. It sounded too simplistic. What I can't fathom is how the public swallowed it. I didn't and a few friends didn't, but most folks did.

Gerald , December 20, 2020 at 17:32

Maybe it was the Russians, sending a message to Uncle Joe and the Dems, quite brilliant actually. It says, 'we own you' 'we know everything about you' and 'we can destroy you should you want a war' The Dems and Washington generally have been living in their own child like bubble for way too long, they need waking up and showing how far behind they are, military, technically and of course something we've all known a long time, morally. No damage was done during the hack (oh they could have been lots of damage) nothing was taken, or maybe not much. It was a warning and a wake up call, that's all it needed to be. Now we proceed to the negotiating table for START and maybe the Russians know a whole lot more than the US wishes it did. Putins press conference was quite interesting last week, normally he is quite shy about upsetting his 'western partners' this year he pulled no punches. When asked if it was true that Russian could destroy America in 30 minutes he replied 'No, actually quicker' and when goaded by the idiot BBC reporter about the farcical MI6 Navalny escapade, he said 'If the security services wanted Navalny dead he already would be'. Times are a changing. Things are warming up a little and the US are on the ropes in all spheres.

DH Fabian , December 21, 2020 at 09:50

No. I think most Americans today would be "outraged" to know how little interest Russia has in today's US. They had turned to the East years ago. The "dirty little secret" is that as the Western (US/UK) empire has been sinking for some years, most of the world has turned its attention Eastward (China, now Russia), as the light guiding the international community into the future.

JOHN CHUCKMAN , December 20, 2020 at 11:33

Yes, and it seems, if anything, a large-scale effort to collect information, not to damage anything.

Collecting information about others is what America's NSA, CIA, FBI, and other massive agencies do around the clock. Ditto, Britain's GCHQ and MI6.

The word "attack" only puts an unduly harsh name to the matter. I think it fair to say it is in keeping with America's now-always aggressive tone towards Russia, China, Iran, and others.

And still, we have no information at all about who is responsible with Trump claiming China and Pompeo claiming Russia, while neither of them has any information to support what he is saying. Israel is just as likely as any other candidate to be responsible for this. The US intelligence community recognizes Israel in private as extremely aggressive at collecting information.

Its name of course does not come up in our sanitized press, and if it proves true that it is responsible, we'll never see it reported.

Meanwhile, just as in the case of Skripal or Navalny, great fun can be had with Russia.

Realist , December 20, 2020 at 05:01

If any of Washington's designated enemies are NOT attempting to constantly monitor the byzantine genuine operative policies of America's Deep State they are being totally remiss. If all they had to go on were the strident public policies expressed and enacted by our leaders they would surely feel existentially threatened and compelled to launch defensive military actions just to preserve the continuity of their civilisations. Washington's endless effluvia of formal pronouncements, accusations, economic sanctions and provocative troop deployments fairly beg for the occasional miscalculation of a bellicose parry or counterpunch. Our chosen enemies need to know our real intentions and capabilities to PRECLUDE such eventualities. Moreover, the geeks in our cadre of spooks have been at the same game for the same reasons rather longer than theirs. It's probably safe to say we invented the game.

By way of example, Joe Biden constantly talks of making Russia "pay a price" for some list of imaginary offenses against American "interests," of which Special Prosecutor Mueller could not conjure up one example after nearly three years of investigation. If anyone "hacked the vote" last month, it was sure not the Russians who made Sleepy Joe the most popular president with the highest vote total ever elected. Talk about the implausible transformed into the new reality. Take another example, Mike Morell, probably the incoming head of the CIA, has on multiple occasions spoke of the need to "make Russians bleed" for attempting to limit the death and chaos inflicted upon Syria by American foreign policy and its cultivated mercenaries going by a different nom de guerre each week. JC did tell us that strange changes will happen in the vineyard, apparently even al Qaeda can reconcile with Uncle Sam. In the absence of detailed reliable information regarding the veracity of such narratives, President Putin (or Xi, or Rouhani) might feel constrained to be less tolerant, more aggressive and quicker to react against what can only be described as mostly baseless and far too numerous hostile American provocations. The bully struts around with a chip the size of a redwood on his shoulder. No one antagonizes him, they mostly try to give the crazy fellow a wide berth while keeping a vigilant eye on him. What's truly unfortunate is that Stephan F. Cohen is no longer on this Earth to keep the American public apprised of such truths, not that this world's most informed man on these subjects got any recent media exposure in the present climate of unhinged Russophrenia.

Tom Partridge , December 20, 2020 at 03:55

We know that governments and intelligence agencies tell us lies all the time. Lies that have justified the instigation of wars and lies that have precipitated wars by default. All of this is well documented in the written word and yet we continue to be fooled by the self same lies. Shame on us, but when the Doomsday Clock strikes midnight, it will be too late, there will be no one left to document the lies, there will be no more lies, instead there will be, just silence.

Eileen Coles , December 20, 2020 at 00:01

Wasn't Fireeye the company that faced extremes of ridicule from the global IT community for trying to engage Hillary Clinton as their keynote speaker at a Cyber Defense Summit in 2019?

michael888 , December 19, 2020 at 23:20

While I appreciate your article and agree with your conclusions, you are a voice crying in the wilderness or at least in a small bubble of like-minded people.
There is a part of the brain which is based on evidence-free, faith-based beliefs, and while religious impulses can be good (sometimes debatable), there is also a strong fear and hatred of the Other, and Russia has been elevated by Hillary, the DNC, the Intelligence Agencies, and the Establishment as the only acceptable Bogeyman. It is socially unacceptable to attack Blacks, Jews, Muslims, Mexicans, or Chinese (remember "Hug a Chinaman!" at the critical juncture where Covid-19 could have been stopped by shutting borders in mid-January as Asian countries did?), but the RUSSIANS!! are an acceptable target of vitriol (even though the Clintons and any of our other politicians will quickly take $500,000 from Putin as the Clintons did when Hillary was Secretary of State in 2010). Calling someone a Russian asset, as our CIA has done repeatedly, can destroy people's careers, and minimally untrack their criticisms.

Software generally has intentional backdoors (Ghislaine Maxwell's father made a career of selling such software so Israel could monitor their customers). We don't get much software from Russia! China is economically and politically a bigger threat, though like Israel probably monitoring rather than interfering through their software (which is probably the rule for all Intelligence Agencies). However 12 year olds can probably get into these same program backdoors, hacking is a hobby for many.
The use of non-government companies to do to questionable work is akin to big corporations bringing in consultants; scapegoats when things go wrong!

GMCasey , December 19, 2020 at 22:44

It's very difficult to believe a lot of what passes for news in America. For example, I always thought that if the hacking of Hillary ever happened, it was because when she was SOS, she refused to go into a secure room to make important calls. Instead , she stood in the hallway, but didn't want to go into the secure room. Add to that, the use of a personal computer at her home, keeping all kinds of her government information on it , which was also being sent to her associate's husband's computer.

I also wondered why the Russians were blamed for poisoning spies in the UK -- - spies traded a decade before -- especially since exchanged spies lived near where the UK's poison center was. This was supposed to be an attempt to poison 2 Russians, and this latest Russia news story seems just as silly. I am sure that any decent spy from any nation who decided to poison a person -- than it would be done.

I am wondering why America seems to be living back in the 1950s when that McCarthy person was making havoc with creating so many
untruths in major media -- it's sad that myself, and many others no longer believe a lot of the major media news -- and that is a sad state for a in a said- to- be democratic republic

Em Sos , December 19, 2020 at 21:39

Re: "A Pandemic of 'Russian Hacking'"

Isn't this, just perhaps, precisely the fake news construct, planted in the minds of Americans, by Trump, to which he may now turn, as his last-ditch pretext, to protect the National Security interests of the State; by attempting to declare Martial Law, at the last moment, just prior to January 20th 2021?

Eddie S , December 19, 2020 at 18:43

Good article! Especially the mentioning of the VERY 'convenient' timing of the latest 'Red Scare', vis-a-vis the upcoming transition to a new POTUS who has made vague references to modest moves towards cooling down the Cold War II (which I have little-faith will happen anyway, given the Biden cabinet picks). Also the excellent point about these reports apparently coming from private organizations as opposed to the massive US intelligence agencies (ie; the 17 agencies in the USG doing intelligence work, with the CIA & NSA being two of the largest) -- WTF are we funding them with multi-billion dollar budgets for so that they can quote some private start-up intel-groups??

As alluded to in the article, no-doubt part of the reason is because of the black-eye the intel agencies got (at least outside of The Beltway) in the 2003 Iraq WMDs debacle, which caused a lot of us (at least on the left-end of the political spectrum, who were already highly skeptical of US 'intelligence') to virtually completely disregard them as credible sources for anything other than a right-wing indicator.

All the major powers spy on each other, and some of the minor ones too, and sometimes it's on putative allies (ie; recall the controversy a number of years ago when Israel was caught spying/bugging US transmissions I don't recall any bluster about THAT being 'an act of war!'). And I not-too-long-ago read how there are constant, daily attempts by numerous entities (most suspected to be private scammers) attempt to hack computers & networks of ALL users (government, business, NGO's, private parties) -- it's ongoing 'background noise'.

And while we should all be strengthening our computer defenses against these intrusions, let's be very skeptical when someone pulls 'something' (reputedly) out of that background noise and hysterically proclaims it to be so MAJOR EVENT.

Theo , December 20, 2020 at 09:21

I agree. There was an interesting article on the Theamericanconservative.com under the title " The Russian Cyber Pearl Harbor that wasn't ". Some time ago in Germany the computers of big insurance companies were hacked and huge amounts of personal data of the clients were stolen. Big issue in Germany. Russia was the top suspect. It turned out that the bad guy was a teenage German school boy living peacefully with his parents. He was found very quickly because he didn't cover up his trails in the web. He didn't do it for money or political reasons. He did it just for fun and to proof to himself: Yes I can. Now he faces a prison term.

Eric Arnow , December 19, 2020 at 16:30

The real story here is not the latest eye roller, here-we-go-again, episode of Russo phobia, but the likelihood that majority of the Washington Consensus, and more likely, the American people will be stupid enough or crazy enough or both, to believe this.

David , December 21, 2020 at 10:12

Not only will Americans be "stupid and or crazy enough" to believe this nonsense, but they will also attack anyone who questions their belief as a Putin apologist or conspiracy theorist. I'm deeply appreciative of Ray's and Joe's insights but Michael888 is right. His voice is a "cry in the wilderness" which is "heard only by a small bubble of like minded people." I admire his perseverance in the face of that harsh reality. Thank you, Ray and Joe.

Robert Emmett , December 19, 2020 at 16:19

Always with the same mouthpieces, the same backdated investigations, the unnamed "official" sources. Phooey!

Maybe while the propaganda is being propagated & then catapulted into the public realm, nobody in "official" media remembers to check vault 7 for the inevitable Cyrillic fingerprints until it's too late? Oops!

And "artful maneuver"? Yeah, maybe if you mean kindergarten art. Or perhaps it's a forgery that depends on millions of uncritical viewers' unquestioning acceptance of a fake rationale for unbinding Biden so he can veer from a direction that he never intended to follow in the first place?

Jonny James , December 19, 2020 at 12:01

We are thankful that CN continues the tradition of Robert Parry to debunk the New Cold War propaganda. The Russia Hysteria (New Red Scare without "the Reds") is a pathetic and transparent attempt to manipulate public opinion.

The naked fear-mongering has become the stuff of jokes. I had a good laugh with my friends (over the phone) taking apart an article in the Guardian that claimed that Putin had surrounded himself with KGB agents. The article didn't mention that the KGB (and the USSR) have not existed in over a quarter century. Foreign policy narratives are great for laughs, ridicule, and satire. Too bad most so-called journalists are too ignorant or intellectually dishonest to come clean.

Russia did not want to end the ABM treaty, the INF treaty etc. etc. but of course it was the US who shredded all the treaties. The US has engaged in massive illegal activity with impunity: fomenting coups, meddling heavily in the affairs of other nations, war crimes etc. The US appears now to be a desperate rogue empire, pathetically clutching at notions of Full Spectrum Dominance. No informed person should believe this latest Russia narrative – it is ridiculous on multiple levels, just as Mr. Lauria and McGovern have outlined.

To underline the utter silliness of the narrative: my handle has become "Jonski Jamesovich" (a common Russian name lol) and I introduce myself as a Russian Agent. I know it's puerile and silly but that's the level of discourse we are dealing with. This intelligence-insulting BS has grown tiresome already. My British friends and I "take the piss" (ridicule) the narratives: the comedy material is written for us!

Realist , December 20, 2020 at 05:53

Jonny, I think your Russian name would be Ivan. Jamesovich if your father's name is James. Your piece is brilliant.

A great characterisation of America for what it has become during my life of 73 years: an outlaw state. What Reagan used to call an "evil empire," by which he meant the Soviet Union. I'm sure he thought that he and Gorbachev had achieved a lasting peace between Russia and the US. They came within an eyelash of eliminating all nukes.

The so-called "realists" in the deep state would not allow that, but did leave several nuclear nonproliferation treaties in place, which our foolish contemporaries have trashed. Would he be shocked if he could be reanimated! The first step to putting things right again would be for Europe to stop enabling Washington's warmongering in every corner of the world and to disband NATO, the biggest threat to world peace after the US federal government.

[Dec 21, 2020] To Blame Russia For Cyber-Intrusions Is Delusional

Dec 21, 2020 | www.moonofalabama.org

Simon , Dec 20 2020 11:33 utc | 55

Relentlessly, you go to stories in the New York Times. Like a dog returning to its excrement. Everybody knows it's an intelligence shill. Why do you bother? There are far more important things you could be reporting on.

[Dec 21, 2020] To Blame Russia For Cyber-Intrusions Is Delusional - A Treaty Is The Only Way To Prevent More Damage

Notable quotes:
"... In the issue of information security generally, including cyber-security and cyber-defence, it seems that there is one rule for the US and another for everyone else ..."
"... The US knows only one thing, and that is psychopathic schoolyard bullying. To have to work together with other nations, to have to accept other nations' rights to information and security, to recognise the need for compromise and continuous negotiation: all this is beyond the US ability to understand. ..."
"... Treaties would help no doubt but the only real solution is to not put things you want kept private on the internet. The internet is to publish stuff, not to store stuff securely. ..."
"... usa is not agreement capable.. they prove this time and time again, so any proposals of an agreement in any area is not realistic.. it is unfortunate.. ..."
"... the media will continue to be the service provider for the intel agencies and say whatever they want to say.. facts are irrelevant.. it is beyond naive to think that anything that gets said in the usa msm ( russia did it and etc. etc. ) have any relevance or value... ..."
"... the Wikileaks Vault 7 materials show clearly the US has tools to pin cybercrime on its 'enemies'. One thing we know for sure and that is the US government has one enemy above all others: the truth. ..."
"... The most obvious scenario is hiding in plain sight: FireEye is an corporation selling a defective, inferior product to the USG. To cut corners, it must employ a legion of non-unionized private contractors, who are a workforce of inferior quality and much lower morale (as they receive much lower salaries). In order to cut even more corners, most of these private contractors must receive a light version of clearance process, and must be more loosely managed. ..."
"... The USA is plagued with private contractors. They were the weapon of choice of the American capitalists and the USG to kill the unions and lower the value of the American labor power. When a random American tells you he/she works for, e.g. Microsoft, chances are he/she actually works for a private contractor who works for Microsoft - it's a process I like to call "domestic outsourcing": a process where, through political and structural reforms, the capitalist class of a given nation precarizes its own national labor power without literally exporting it to another country (e.g. telemarketing to India). ..."
"... enemy #1 of humanity are the global private finance elite, not Russia , nor China. ..."
"... I know quite a bit about those outages in Venezuela. I assure you that they were very well-planned. The people who did it were Venezuelan exiles in Canada and Houston, Texas (a lot of the opposition moved to Houston in addition to Miami). ..."
"... Is any evidence offered that there was any hack at all? Is the entire thing a fully fabricated false flag, yet another, in service of taking Nord Stream 2 down? ..."
"... Also note that the providers of the software are entirely responsible for making it easy to hack. As a software engineer, I have tried in vain for decades to convince companies producing critical infrastructure equipment to not use internet administration links, because they are not only hackable, but the encryption codes all have backdoors for "security" agencies. ..."
"... So no doubt SolarWinds did just that, got hacked by anybody anywhere, and is looking for an excuse to avoid losing their contract. ..."
"... The Germans and the Americans decided that it was worth to risk the entire German SCADA business to sting Iran and later Venezuela. Because that was what those attacks, in the absence of Iranian or Venezuelan capitulation meant, harm to German bussiness for no strategic gains. ..."
"... Ultimately, making a single software product secure will only achieve limited gains: Those gains evaporate in an instant one some junior cablemonkey plugs a secure server into the public DMZ using the wrong network interface. ..."
"... Where was the firewall admin in all this? Where was the Network administrator with his routing policies? ..."
"... Why, when SolarWinds has been a gaping security hole for more than 2 decades is it now all of a sudden the gateway for a massive attack from a foreign power? Shouldn't it have been a continuous vulnerability all along? By now, every vulnerable internet facing SW installation would have been wiped out ages ago due to the frequency of automated attacks carried out against infrastructure in general. ..."
"... We all know Micro$oft, Google, FB, Whatsapp, Instagram, ... are feeding US and Zionist intelligence agencies with all type of informations. Any international treaty on cyber-security would under this conditions be obsolete from the beginning. ..."
"... But it's just naive to think that CIA, NSA, Mossad are going to respect any international agreement in any area. Stuxnet virus and it's intrusion of the Iranian nuclear facilities or sabotage of Venezuelan power-grid facilities were not made by China, Russia or North Korea. ..."
"... These large, complicated, very expensive software "management" packages are largely butt-covering, to protect management from the threat of "doing nothing" when things go wrong. Some nice kickbacks in it too. ..."
"... I remember one "configuration management" package that was practically an operating system all by itself and absolutely a waste of time. Network management even more so. ..."
"... I haven't seen this level of propaganda since the buildup to the second Iraq war. They are obviously planning more aggression against Russia and have to keep the public at a fever pitch to get away with it. ..."
Dec 19, 2020 | www.moonofalabama.org

December 19, 2020 To Blame Russia For Cyber-Intrusions Is Delusional - A Treaty Is The Only Way To Prevent More Damage

The New York Times continues to provide anti-Russian propaganda and to incite against it:

Pompeo Says Russia Was Behind Cyberattack on U.S.
Secretary of State Mike Pompeo is the first member of the Trump administration to publicly link the Kremlin to the hacking of dozens of government and private systems.

The first paragraph:

Secretary of State Mike Pompeo said Friday it was clear that Russia was behind the widespread hacking of government systems that officials this week called "a grave risk" to the United States.

That is a quite definite statement.

But it is very wrong. Pompous did not say "that it was clear that Russia was behind" the IT intrusions.

The third paragraph in the NYT story, which casual readers will miss, quotes Pompous and there he does not say what the Times opener claims:

"I think it's the case that now we can say pretty clearly that it was the Russians that engaged in this activity," Mr. Pompeo said in an interview on "The Mark Levin Show."

Merriam Webster 's definition of 'pretty' as an adverb is "in some degree : moderately". The example it gives is "pretty cold weather". The temperature of pretty cold weather on a July day in Cairo obviously differs from the temperature of pretty cold weather during a December night in Siberia. "Pretty xxx" It is a relative expression, not an assertion of absolute facts.

The first paragraph of the Times statement tries to sell a vague statement as an factual claim.

Moreover - Pompous finds it amusing that the CIA lies, steals and cheats (vid). As a former CIA director he has not refrained from those habits. Whenever Pompous says something about a perceived U.S. 'enemy' it safe to assume that it he does not state the truth.

On top of that even his boss does not agree with his claim:

Contradicting his secretary of state and other top officials, President Donald Trump on Saturday suggested without evidence that China -- not Russia -- may be behind the cyberattack against the United States and tried to minimized its impact.

Trump AND Pompous both made their contradicting assertions "without evidence".

It is inappropriate for the media to accuse Russia - or China - of the recently discovered cyber-intrusion when there is zero evidence to support such a claim.

The Times did that at least twice without having any evidence to support the claim:

It also published a rather aggressive and stupid op-ed by Thomas A. Bossert, Trump's former cyber-security adviser:

The Russians have had access to a considerable number of important and sensitive networks for six to nine months. The Russian S.V.R. will surely have used its access to further exploit and gain administrative control over the networks it considered priority targets.
...
While all indicators point to the Russian government, the United States, and ideally its allies, must publicly and formally attribute responsibility for these hacks. If it is Russia, President Trump must make it clear to Vladimir Putin that these actions are unacceptable. The U.S. military and intelligence community must be placed on increased alert; all elements of national power must be placed on the table.

Where are the carriers? Man the guns! Put the nukes to Def Con 1!

Rep. Jason Crow @RepJasonCrow - 15:09 UTC · Dec 18, 2020

The situation is developing, but the more I learn this could be our modern day, cyber equivalent of Pearl Harbor.

This is lunatic. From all we know so far the so called 'hack' was a quite nifty cyber-intrusion for the sole purpose of gathering information. The intrusion has, as far as we know, not even reached any systems on the specially protected 'secret' networks. This was a normal spying operation, not an attack. To compare it to a deadly military attack like Pearl Harbor is self-delusional nonsense :

The lack of self-awareness in these and similar reactions to the Russia breach is astounding. The U.S. government has no principled basis to complain about the Russia hack, much less retaliate for it with military means, since the U.S. government hacks foreign government networks on a huge scale every day. Indeed, a military response to the Russian hack would violate international law. The United States does have options, but none are terribly attractive.

The news reports have emphasized that the Russian operation thus far appears to be purely one of espionage -- entering systems quietly, lurking around, and exfiltrating information of interest. Peacetime government-to-government espionage is as old as the international system and is today widely practiced, especially via electronic surveillance. It can cause enormous damage to national security, as the Russian hack surely does. But it does not violate international law or norms.
...
Because of its own practices, the U.S. government has traditionally accepted the legitimacy of foreign governmental electronic spying in U.S. government networks. After the notorious Chinese hack of the Office of Personnel Management database, then-Director of National Intelligence James Clapper said: "You have to kind of salute the Chinese for what they did. If we had the opportunity to do that, I don't think we'd hesitate for a minute."

One can not spy on other countries and then complain when they do something similar to oneself. Responding by waging destruction against another country's IT systems only guarantees that there will be a response in kind. If one wants to avert cyber-espionage and cyber-attacks there is only one way out.

We do not know if Israel, China, Russia or someone else is responsible for the recently discovered intrusion. But it is safe to assume that Russia's SVR is working on comparable projects just like the spy services of most other countries do.

But Russia has, in contrast to others, for years asked for bi-lateral treaties to prohibit malicious cyber operations. In September President Putin again offered one :

One of today's major strategic challenges is the risk of a large-scale confrontation in the digital field. A special responsibility for its prevention lies on the key players in the field of ensuring international information security (IIS). In this regard, we would like to once again address the US with a suggestion to agree on a comprehensive program of practical measures to reboot our relations in the field of security in the use of information and communication technologies (ICTs).
...
Third. To jointly develop and conclude a bilateral intergovernmental agreement on preventing incidents in the information space similarly to the Soviet-American Agreement on the Prevention of Incidents On and Over the High Seas in force since 25 May 1972.
...
We call on the US to greenlight the Russian-American professional expert dialogue on IIS without making it a hostage to our political disagreements.

Even conservative U.S. lawyers agree with Putin that such a treaty is the only way to protect the U.S. from potentially damaging operations:

Despite many tens of billions of dollars spent on cyber defense and deterrence and Defend Forward prevention, and despite one new strategy after another, the United States has failed miserably for decades in protecting its public and private digital networks. What it apparently has not done is to ask itself, in a serious way, how its aggressive digital practices abroad invite and justify digital attacks and infiltrations by our adversaries, and whether those practices are worth the costs. Relatedly, it has not seriously considered the traditional third option when defense and deterrence fail in the face of a foreign threat: mutual restraint , whereby the United States agrees to curb certain activities in foreign networks in exchange for forbearance by our adversaries in our networks. There are many serious hurdles to making such cooperation work, including precise agreement on each side's restraint, and verification. But given our deep digital dependency and the persistent failure of defense and deterrence to protect our digital systems, cooperation is at least worth exploring.

Dreams of being able to prevent intrusions on one's systems while insisting on intruding the opponent's systems are just that - dreams. There is likewise no reasonable way to deter an adversary from using such methods to gain an advantage.

To blame, without evidence, Russia for a 'hack' and to incite against it will not solve the above problems.

The only way to prevent potentially dangerous cyber-operations is too agree with adversaries on what is off-limits and to (verifiably) stick to that.

Posted by b on December 19, 2020 at 19:29 UTC | Permalink


Jen , Dec 19 2020 19:53 utc | 2
In the issue of information security generally, including cyber-security and cyber-defence, it seems that there is one rule for the US and another for everyone else: free and unfettered access to everyone's secrets for the US; and for everyone else, having to pay through the nose for anything the US deigns to dole out in amounts and at times of its own choosing.

The US knows only one thing, and that is psychopathic schoolyard bullying. To have to work together with other nations, to have to accept other nations' rights to information and security, to recognise the need for compromise and continuous negotiation: all this is beyond the US ability to understand.

Mao Cheng Ji , Dec 19 2020 20:06 utc | 3
Good post, but about this hypothetical treaty: how would you monitor and enforce that sort of thing? It seems to me the signatories are likely to continue doing it, and, assuming enough sophistication, proving a breach of the agreement seems virtually impossible...
dave , Dec 19 2020 20:40 utc | 4
Mao Cheng Ji: "virtually impossible" Good one :)

When I first read this story, I thought of the power outages in Venezuela the past year. Those attacks must have hit especially patients in hospitals or care residences that had no stand by generation.

I think Iran has been attacked a few times in this manner.

I can see the usefulness of treaty talks to address this issue. Talks between just two states, though, would leave a lot of would be targets, so United Nations might address the issue. If the Security Council, & United Nations generally, is supposed to mitigate violence of warfare, addressing cyber attacks must come under UNO purview.

I wonder if Lavrov, or a counterpart in another land, would find it useful to approach the United Nations on this.

karlof1 , Dec 19 2020 20:45 utc | 5
Mao Cheng JI @3--

Putin and Lavrov have pleaded for at least 5 years now going back to Obama/Biden about the need to negotiate a Cyber Treaty, and that it include as many nations as want to participate. But only silence is returned. It's entirely possible that this so-called series of hacks is no more than back-splash from some NSA or CIA hacking exercise. It certainly puts more wind in the sails for today's excursion back to the future by Pepe Escobar that's not behind a paywall. I will say there was one quote from it that stood out very far from the rest and is on the way to becoming reality. As the Outlaw US Empire falls further behind its competitors:

"the US will be able to bill itself as the first great post-industrial agrarian society."

I'm not so sure about the "great" part given our actual condition and direction.

Bemildred , Dec 19 2020 20:45 utc | 6
Treaties would help no doubt but the only real solution is to not put things you want kept private on the internet. The internet is to publish stuff, not to store stuff securely.
kooshy , Dec 19 2020 20:46 utc | 7
"The only way to prevent potentially dangerous cyber-operations is too agree with adversaries on what is off-limits and to (verifiably) stick to that."

Really? b with all due respect was, is, will be America ever capable or can it ever be trusted to hold to any a Treaty/ Agreement, this outlaw rogue regime in time of hypersonic missiles still believes she is protected by two oceans. Signing a treaty with this regime is a distasteful joke, not worth entertaining.

Canadian Cents , Dec 19 2020 20:48 utc | 8
Mao @3, had the same thought. Like the idea but how feasible is it?

I'd also like to see a Geneva Convention for the digital space (perhaps an expansion or update of the existing Geneva Conventions for the digital age.) So civilian cyber infrastructure (personal PCs, smartphones, tablets, routers, etc.) and civilian cyber content (social media, online dating profiles, forum posts, etc.) would be off-limits for state signatories. Again, not sure how feasible this is, but would like to see this.

Hoyeru , Dec 19 2020 20:51 utc | 9
I dont understand why people still waste their time writing article refuting USA's claims. Dont people understand already USA DOES NOT NEED NO STINKING EVIDENCE?

...back int he dark ages of in 1990 USA invented the story about Iraqi solders taking babies out of incubators and leaving them to die on the cold floor and sued that lie to attack Iraq

in 2001, USA immediately blamed Osam abin ALladin for the 9-11 attacks and used that like to attack and occupy Afghanistan.

in 2003, USA said Saddam has weapons of mass distraction and used that lie to attack Iraq for a 2nd time.

USA ALWAYS lies and uses that to do something.

Russia better prepare itself by buying a lot of lube and lube its collective asshole. It will get an ass fucking of a life time. and Russia deserves it by allowing Putin to act as a moronic wimp.

james , Dec 19 2020 21:03 utc | 10
thanks b... a few points...

usa is not agreement capable.. they prove this time and time again, so any proposals of an agreement in any area is not realistic.. it is unfortunate..

the media will continue to be the service provider for the intel agencies and say whatever they want to say.. facts are irrelevant.. it is beyond naive to think that anything that gets said in the usa msm ( russia did it and etc. etc. ) have any relevance or value...

it is the exact opposite.. expect more delusional ranting from these same wingnuts..the usa lost any integrity it had a long time ago.. getting it back is not going to happen quickly, or at all.. in fact, it is more likely the usa has to continue in its MAX 737 nosedive on all levels until they wake up and smell the coffee... until then - all bets are off for any light going off in the brains of usa leadership."

@ 4 dave... indeed.. the cardinal rule - 'do unto others as you would have them do unto you' is applicable here... for all the religious preaching from buffoons like pompous, the words and actions don't match the reality on the ground.. thanks for a clear reminder... it will be a long time before the usa gets its head out of its ass..

c1ue , Dec 19 2020 21:21 utc | 12
Sorry, folks, but as a practitioner in the field - the problem is systemic, not national or even international. Information Technology is a bloated mess. Banks, airports, utilities use software whose programmers are literally dying of old age and which literally have not been made for a generation.

Security is a laugh. You need $10M, ante, to have a moderately capable security program between expertise and tools - which means 90% of the companies will never be able to afford it.

Even among the 10% - the lack of even the most basic best practices mean that billion dollar companies constantly get tripped up or knocked flat by extremely simplistic attacks or accidents.

This is the real world of cyberspace: attackers are limited only by how much focus they want to put on any particular target.

The "attack" which brought about this latest session of Russo/Sino phobia - as b researched and documented well - did not employ any sophistication to gain entry. The subsequent activity was more sophisticated but even then, nothing more complex that $20K paid to a moderately capable programmer couldn't create.

gottlieb , Dec 19 2020 21:25 utc | 13
Cold War 2.0 to keep US enemies front and center is so the MIC can keep sucking the people dry. Additionally, the Wikileaks Vault 7 materials show clearly the US has tools to pin cybercrime on its 'enemies'. One thing we know for sure and that is the US government has one enemy above all others: the truth.
karlof1 , Dec 19 2020 21:29 utc | 14
gottlieb @13--

One thing we know for sure and that is the US government has one enemy above all others: the truth.

I hope you don't mind if I borrow your outstanding line of reason!!

vk , Dec 19 2020 21:31 utc | 15
Contradicting his secretary of state and other top officials, President Donald Trump on Saturday suggested without evidence that China -- not Russia -- may be behind the cyberattack against the United States and tried to minimized its impact.

Called it. FireEye purposefully chose the term "nation with top-tier offensive capabilities" so that they could please Greek and Trojans while at the same time exempting itself from delivering a defective commodity. Trump, for obvious reasons, chose to blame China; the establishment, for obvious reasons, chose to blame Russia. Trumpists will choose to blame China; Democrats and centrist Republicans will choose to blame Russia.

China or Russia - you can build your own narrative now!

The most obvious scenario is hiding in plain sight: FireEye is an corporation selling a defective, inferior product to the USG. To cut corners, it must employ a legion of non-unionized private contractors, who are a workforce of inferior quality and much lower morale (as they receive much lower salaries). In order to cut even more corners, most of these private contractors must receive a light version of clearance process, and must be more loosely managed.

Indeed, most of these smaller managers must also be private contractors themselves; maybe showing up one or two times per week in the workplace just to see if the private contractors workers are there and breathing. The whole thing must be a shitshow.

One of these private contractors probably sold the passwords or created a password which could be easily brute forced; or simply committed a rookie mistake (leaked e-mail, written password in the office's whiteboard, etc. etc.).

The USA is plagued with private contractors. They were the weapon of choice of the American capitalists and the USG to kill the unions and lower the value of the American labor power. When a random American tells you he/she works for, e.g. Microsoft, chances are he/she actually works for a private contractor who works for Microsoft - it's a process I like to call "domestic outsourcing": a process where, through political and structural reforms, the capitalist class of a given nation precarizes its own national labor power without literally exporting it to another country (e.g. telemarketing to India).

Mark Thomason , Dec 19 2020 21:34 utc | 16
A treaty would stop the US doing this to others. The US originated this. The US has every intention of doing this to many others. Those who complain the loudest are exactly the ones who have no intention of stopping.
Patroklos , Dec 19 2020 22:02 utc | 18
Aren't other things happening in the world more interesting than the soporific narcissism of what passes for 'politics' in the US?
uncle tungsten , Dec 19 2020 22:04 utc | 19
The USAi has been fleeced by an IT industry that is incapable of rendering a secure system! Well blow me down. What don't system buyers get from the words 'shonky thieves'. The USAi and its cosy bear partner UKi have perfected 'shonky thieves' as an industrial and financial strategy so dont be surprised when the thieves pick their pocket FROM WITHIN. It is the share sell off that is the clue - follow the money NOT the tabloids.

So far they have Russia being the most powerful IT centre on earth and the most hopeless CBW centre on earth. With IT they go everywhere yet with CBW they can't kill a fly.

uncle tungsten , Dec 19 2020 22:12 utc | 21
Patroklos #18

Other things and explore this site for a while. and another thing

psychohistorian , Dec 19 2020 22:19 utc | 22
@ Yahoodi | Dec 19 2020 22:12 utc | 20 who wrote

Why so much talk about Russia? China is enemy #1.

b doesn't like one liners much so he can delete my response as well to inform you that enemy #1 of humanity are the global private finance elite, not Russia , nor China.

norecovery , Dec 19 2020 22:20 utc | 23
Re: cybercriminal or rogue state tampering with power generation / power grids -- Why couldn't these computer systems be independent, isolated from the Internet and kept in high security lockdown? Besides, they operated just fine without computers in the past, when things were built to last.

These days, I wouldn't buy a new car that depends on sophisticated computer controls and diagnostic tools, let alone exclusive dealer service. Farmers lost their right to buy parts and service their own tractors independent of a dealer. How much would I bet the Chinese manufacturers will eventually take over that market ...as with almost every other market for durable goods short of proprietary military hardware? Unless of course, the Banksters prevent it for reasons of "national security."

uncle tungsten , Dec 19 2020 22:27 utc | 24
psychohistorian #22

Are you referring to these people as enemy #1 of humanity?

uncle tungsten , Dec 19 2020 22:34 utc | 25
Patroklas #18

First the world needs a treaty to dismantle this threat as it consumes millions in IT support and only delivers death.

Mark2 , Dec 19 2020 22:45 utc | 26
For years American governments have extracted profit from the US tax paying public, using the simple trick of giving them a series of imaginary external enemy's. Requiring ever more arms industry funding extra. Profit from paranoia !!

But here's the thing -- America has now backed itself into a corner re geopolitics. It would not surprise me if these cyberattacks are a joint effort by several nations. We could predict them. Just cause ya paranoid don't mean there not all out to get you.

Robert Lindsay , Dec 19 2020 23:47 utc | 27
@dave

I know quite a bit about those outages in Venezuela. I assure you that they were very well-planned. The people who did it were Venezuelan exiles in Canada and Houston, Texas (a lot of the opposition moved to Houston in addition to Miami). The opposition is very, very good and they sit up there in the US plotting schemes to destroy the economy. For instance, for a long time the fake exchange rate was being set by an opposition person in Houston who ran his own exchange rate site. He always deliberately inflated the street exchange rate in order to cause a currency crisis, which would devastate the economy. A lot of things caused that exchange rate crisis, but that guy sitting in Houston sabotaging the exchange rates to cause a monetary crisis was no small part of that.

The attacks were staged out of Canada and Houston. The people who did it had very intimate knowledge of those systems, mostly because those systems were using software made in Canada. The people in Canada had access to the source code of that software. Perhaps the company itself was in on the sabotage in the same way that the voting machine companies are in on rigging the voting machines to steal elections for Republicans. In that case, Rebuplican operatives have taken over the voting machine companies and the election hacking is done by those companies like E S & S themselves in coordination with people like Karl Rove and the Bush and Romney families. All of those computer machine companies are owned by the Bush and Romney families and Karl Rove also has a huge stake in them.

So it's quite possible that that Canadian software vendor was taken over by Venezuelan opposition people to gain access to the source code so they could hack those systems. With knowledge of that code, they hacked the systems from Canada and Houston. They were very good, excellent hackers. It's not known if they had state help from the US and Canadian governments, although I definitely would not rule it out.

Trudeau in particular has gone full fascist in his fanatical support for the Venezuelan opposition fascists.

Robert Lindsay , Dec 19 2020 23:52 utc | 28
The Venezuelan elite are classic Latin American elite fascists, a somewhat distinct type. Most of the elite down there has this "Latin American fascist" orientation.

It's generally not race-based, but the ruling elite tends to be lighter-skinned than the darker masses, even in Haiti. Instead, it's more like the "rightwing authoritarianism" or "rightwing dictatorships" that we saw so many of in the Cold War in Latin America and elsewhere.

These regimes were found most of Central America in Guatemala after 1954 and El Salvador and Honduras since forever, Nicaragua under the Somozas.

They were found in all of South America at one time or another. We can see them in the generals after 1964 in Brazil, the democratic facade duopoly regimes in Venezuela in Colombia (especially after 1947 and again in 1964, Ecuador, Peru until the generals' revolt in 1968, Bolivia under Banzer after 1953, Paraguay under Strausser, Argentina and Uruguay under the generals in the late 80's and early 90's, and Pinochet in Chile.

They were also seen in the Caribbean in Cuba under Bautista, the Dominican Republic under Trujillo, and Haiti under the Duvaliers.

In Southeast Asia, they were found in Thieu in South Vietnam, Sihanouk in Cambodia, the monarchy in Laos, the military regimes in Thailand, Suharto in Indonesia, the Sultan in Brunei, Marcos in the Philippines, and Taiwan under Chiang Kai Chek.

In Northeast Asia, a regime of this type was found in South Korea from 1947-on.

They were found South Asia with Pakistan under Generals like Zia, in Central Asia in the Shah of Iran, and in a sense, the Arab World with Saddam (Saddam was installed by the CIA), King Hassan in Morocco, the Gulf monarchies, and Jordan. Earlier, they were found in the monarchies in Libya and Egypt that were overthrown by Arab nationalists. Also, Israel played this sort of role with a democratic facade.

We also found them in the Near East in the military regimes in Turkey (especially Turgut Ozul) and for a while in Greece under the colonels in the late 1960's and early 1970's.

NATO formed the backbone of a "rightwing dictatorship" in the background of Western Europe (especially Italy), where Operation Gladio NATO intelligence essentially ran most of those countries as a Deep State behind the scenes. These regimes were found in Spain under Franco and in Portugal under Salazar along with its colonies.

These regimes were not so much in evidence in Africa except in South Africa and Rhodesia and most prominently, Mobutu in Zaire and Samuel Doe in Liberia.

The fascist forms of these rightwing dictatorships varied, most being nonracist fascism but a few being racist fascists (Turkey), and others being Mussolinists (Suharto in Indonesia with his "pangesila")

arby , Dec 19 2020 23:57 utc | 29
I can't say that I am a big Trump fan but I do like him for the very reason the Borg hates him. For saying things off script.

EG: "The Cyber Hack is far greater in the Fake News Media than in actuality. I have been fully briefed and everything is well under control. Russia, Russia, Russia is the priority chant when anything happens because Lamestream is, for mostly financial reasons, petrified of....
-- Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump)"

John , Dec 20 2020 0:09 utc | 30
To one who has investigated cybercrime, this appears certain to be a complete fake by the Texas company SolarWinds. Investigating internet copyright racketeering, I found two networks of shell corporations with dozens of websites which took orders, did payments, or passed codes between those layers to obscure the connections. One of the prominent sites had the absurd name "TsarMedia.com" to look Russian, but was based in – you guessed it – Texas. Recall that the Ukraine cybercrime software routinely inserted Cyrillic characters and Russian historical names into headers to permit crooks to claim that the source was Russia. Texans too need all-purpose monsters on whom to blame their wrongdoing.

Note that all of the responsible US government agencies Refused to investigate those copyright racketeering operations, even when given the evidence, and were therefore likely involved, using hundreds of websites far outnumbering legitimate sources, offering political works for free with one click, to deny the authors their income source.

Also note that these warmonger scammers are dependents of the military industry and secret agencies, directly or indirectly, extreme tribalist primitives whose ideology is bullying, tyranny, and power-grabs by foul means, who are enemies of democracy let alone sane foreign policy, and will say anything at all to get their way.

Also note that the providers of the software are entirely responsible for making it easy to hack. As a software engineer, I have tried in vain for decades to convince companies producing critical infrastructure equipment to not use internet administration links, because they are not only hackable, but the encryption codes all have backdoors for "security" agencies. It is beyond foolishness to allow any system administrator to control anything from anywhere. So no doubt SolarWinds did just that, got hacked by anybody anywhere, and is looking for an excuse to avoid losing their contract. Being Texans in need of a big excuse, that excuse could only be Russia, the all-purpose monster behind every tree.

p , Dec 20 2020 1:49 utc | 35
@27 re Venezuela

iirc the software for the hydro station came from Canada, and ran on XP (Russian Col. 'Cassad' blog)

Russian Deputy Foreign Minister Oleg Syromolotov 2019:

"According to the country's legitimate government headed by President Nicolas Maduro, as well as information from other credible sources, the electricity sector of Venezuela came under attack from abroad on March 7 of this year We provide all necessary assistance to Venezuelan friends on the basis of requests from the legitimate government...[this was] comprehensive remote influence on the control and monitoring systems of the main power distribution stations where the equipment produced in one of the Western countries has been installed...

They and the instigators of sabotage are responsible for the deaths of people, including of those in hospitals which were left without electricity..."

The civilian programmers are criminals, in the literal sense. When found, warrants must be placed with Interpol for their arrest.

With regard to government employees, in line with the Nuremburg trials, they cannot say they were acting on orders. They too, are criminally responsible. They could have refused orders, but didn't.

With regard to elected government officials, they carry diplomatic passports, and are immune while they do.

Lack of extradition treaties and the politicised and biased International Court of Justice means the politicians - murderers - will escape any punishment.

Notably, Blair, responsible for illegal aggression on a sovereign state resulting in mass murder of civilians, not only escaped any form of punishment, but has been made a very highly paid peace advisor.

ian , Dec 20 2020 1:56 utc | 36
I give zero weight to these opinions that only refer to anonymous 'experts' and never present any actual data. I get that the average NYT reader isn't an IT or cyber security expert, and has to let someone they trust interpret for them, but there are many people out there who are quite capable of looking at the data and drawing their own conclusions.
psychohistorian , Dec 20 2020 2:09 utc | 37
Reuters is now reporting a 2nd attempt of SolarWinds intrusion as described in the quote below

"Security experts told Reuters this second effort is known as "SUPERNOVA." It is a piece of malware that imitates SolarWinds' Orion product but it is not "digitally signed" like the other attack, suggesting this second group of hackers did not share access to the network management company's internal systems.

It is unclear whether SUPERNOVA has been deployed against any targets, such as customers of SolarWinds. The malware appears to have been created in late March, based on a review of the file's compile times.

The new finding shows how more than one sophisticated hacking group viewed SolarWinds, an Austin, Texas-based company that was not a household name until this month, as an important gateway to penetrate other targets."

j. casey , Dec 20 2020 2:24 utc | 38
Is any evidence offered that there was any hack at all? Is the entire thing a fully fabricated false flag, yet another, in service of taking Nord Stream 2 down?
CarlD , Dec 20 2020 3:10 utc | 39
Re Venezuela power outages.

When Maduro coalesced as a US target and his government was declared illegitimate, one of the first thing that happened was the destruction of the water turbines feeding the Venezuelan grid.

The US backed opposition claimed that this was the result of the Chavez and successors negligence towards thee maintenance of the generation equipment.

However, the Venezuelan Govt. had renovated all the dam equipment at the tune of 15+ billions with a German Firm in 2015.

Just as Stuxnet destroyed the Irani centrifuges, some entity derailed the governing system and led the Venezuelan turbines to death from overspeed.

Such hacking is lauded by the think tanks of the US. Was successful in causing widespread misery to millions.

But who gives a Flying F**k in the US about these things?

uncle tungsten , Dec 20 2020 3:23 utc | 40
psychohistorian #32
What an ugly way to run a society. Moving society to public finance and abolishing private finance is what is needed to save our species and what we can of the world we live in. I am with China in advocating for Ad Astra because we can see the end of our ability to live on this planet because of historical faith-based disrespect of it.

Thank you and it sure is ugly. Here is an interview with Kern Hudes for those interested.

On the IT story of the thread

Thank you to j. casey #38 for that question. Agreed the entire thing could be a hoax and the insider trading sting was the fee they got for going along with it.

Regardless of that the only way to ensure security is ably described by john #30:

Also note that the providers of the software are entirely responsible for making it easy to hack. As a software engineer, I have tried in vain for decades to convince companies producing critical infrastructure equipment to not use internet administration links, because they are not only hackable, but the encryption codes all have backdoors for "security" agencies.

It is beyond foolishness to allow any system administrator to control anything from anywhere. So no doubt SolarWinds did just that, got hacked by anybody anywhere, and is looking for an excuse to avoid losing their contract. Being Texans in need of a big excuse, that excuse could only be Russia, the all-purpose monster behind every tree.

Thank you for that brevity and deadly assassination of the idiots behind this.

Fyi , Dec 20 2020 3:36 utc | 41
Mr. CarlD

The Germans and the Americans decided that it was worth to risk the entire German SCADA business to sting Iran and later Venezuela. Because that was what those attacks, in the absence of Iranian or Venezuelan capitulation meant, harm to German bussiness for no strategic gains.

I suspect, like so much else that comes out of the Court of the Mad King and his minions, we are dealing with a form of Hubris: "We are the only suppliers of this type of equipment and we can abuse our customers..."

Hoarsewhisperer , Dec 20 2020 5:03 utc | 42
Yesterday, DW News compiled a report on Internet Anonymity focused on TOR as the most widely known example of anonymiser networks. They explained the mechanism by which one may access the www via the TOR network and shed one's own identity and replace it with one created in a TOR server, multiple times, until it becomes IMPOSSIBLE to trace the original identity.

The report was aired in the context of the current US cyber-intrusion claims and, although it didn't name names or point fingers, it concluded that anyone who says they know who expertly hacked their system is lying.

I thought it was jolly decent of DW to spell this out, considering all the US lap-doggish anti-Russia tropes the German govt has endorsed recently.

uncle tungsten , Dec 20 2020 5:15 utc | 43
Hoarsewhisperer #42

That is all very well fro DW to run that doco but TOR is not a wise choice to manufacture anonymity. There is a strong view that it is a flawed CIA construct. I am happy to be proven wrong but over the years some wise heads have urged caution.

Piotr Berman , Dec 20 2020 5:34 utc | 44
Sorry, folks, but as a practitioner in the field - the problem is systemic, not national or even international. Information Technology is a bloated mess.

Posted by: c1ue | Dec 19 2020 21:21 utc | 12

I think that this is a classic case when we can productively ask "cui bono"?

Big software companies like Google and Microsoft have goals that are against the users, and they can do it because of monopoly powers and users do not knowing any better.

From browser side, one goal is to please advertisers by enabling takeovers of your hardware to track you, make displays that annoy you -- but at occasion entice you to spend money on something, freeze you computer with lame attempts to make dynamic displays and so on.

Because this is how browsers are money cows, operating systems support those shenanigans in an increasing variety of ways. So from security point of view we have a fortress with wide ramparts and massive walls that are riddled with tunnels, each tunnel having a rickety gate, and hordes of people improving padlocks on those gates with weekly security fixes. For those unfamiliar with rickety gates, when you have a fenced facility, it is easiest to climb over the gates, you can grab the frames, barbed wire is straight up (easier than the inclined wires on the rest of the fence, and if you are in a hurry, just hit the gate with the front bumper.)

Next, operating system have to be out of date in few years so you are forced to buy a new one or to buy a new computer (Apple model). Instability of systems prevent security fixes to be completed in the lifetime of a system.

Those are commercial motivation. Then there are deep state shenanigans, they want some openness to Trojan horses.

Arch Bungle , Dec 20 2020 5:41 utc | 45
Posted by: John | Dec 20 2020 0:09 utc | 30
Also note that the providers of the software are entirely responsible for making it easy to hack. As a software engineer, I have tried in vain for decades to convince companies producing critical infrastructure equipment to not use internet administration links, because they are not only hackable, but the encryption codes all have backdoors for "security" agencies. It is beyond foolishness to allow any system administrator to control anything from anywhere. So no doubt SolarWinds did just that, got hacked by anybody anywhere, and is looking for an excuse to avoid losing their contract. Being Texans in need of a big excuse, that excuse could only be Russia, the all-purpose monster behind every tree.

I would shift the bulk of the blame off the software manufacturers and onto the IT departments and integrators responsible for installing those products into their infrastructure, for the following general reasons:

  • - No matter how secure a software/hardware product is, its security is be easily compromised by poor deployment into existing infrastructure. The onus is on the IT department to ensure the software is deployed securely. If a software product happens to have internet-facing administration interfaces with default passwords settings, then it is a sign the IT department has not locked down the solution during the deployment phase.
  • - It is the duty of any IT department to ensure infrastructure is deployed securely and continuously validated for security (by installing intrusion prevention and detection systems, multiple layers of firewalling, DMZs, zero trust infrastructure, honeypots, centralised authentication systems etc ...). That one could have an entire SCADA system sitting on the internet with a management interface using a default username or password.
  • - Frankly, every software product or network connected equipment should be considered as insecure as swiss cheese from the moment it's unpacked, then the work should begin to lock it down and secure it using a multi-layered security model. That is the approach taken in many secure enterprises that have a good security record.

Ultimately, making a single software product secure will only achieve limited gains: Those gains evaporate in an instant one some junior cablemonkey plugs a secure server into the public DMZ using the wrong network interface. No amount of code polishing, static analysis, secure software design is going to make even a dent when a careless admin sets the password to pass@123, disables TLS encryption and puts the management interface on the public network so he can easily run operations from the cafe' down the road.

Aside: I've had an on and off relationship with SolarWinds for 20 years, while it's been the running joke of IT admins the world over, exposing it's management interfaces to the public is something only the most amateurish IT departments would do. No, someone failed at the network administration layer: Where was the firewall admin in all this? Where was the Network administrator with his routing policies? Most of all the CTO/IT Director/IT managers clearly failed in the secure deployment and management of the product. Solarwinds doesn't put itself on the public Internet by accident!

Nothing really adds up about this whole story anyway:

- Why, when SolarWinds has been a gaping security hole for more than 2 decades is it now all of a sudden the gateway for a massive attack from a foreign power? Shouldn't it have been a continuous vulnerability all along? By now, every vulnerable internet facing SW installation would have been wiped out ages ago due to the frequency of automated attacks carried out against infrastructure in general.

Far from looking like an issue with SolarWinds, this looks like a massive and widespread failure in basic IT security by dozens of companies possibly connected by a single large service provider.

The media reporting around this issue also sounds to me like extreme coverup, take this WIRED magazine snippet:

"Over the past several years, the US has invested billions of dollars in Einstein, a system designed to detect digital intrusions. But because the SolarWinds hack was what's known as a "supply chain" attack, in which Russia compromised a trusted tool rather than using known malware to break in, Einstein failed spectacularly."

( https://www.wired.com/story/russia-solarwinds-hack-roundup/)

Really. They can't find any actual Russian malware, so instead it's "in which Russia compromised a trusted tool rather than using known malware to break in,"

Ha. Ha. Ha. Pull the other leg, Wired.

m , Dec 20 2020 8:25 utc | 46
China and Russia should conclude a cyber treaty among each other, work out the details of the verification mechanism (which is very difficult in this sphere)
and then invite other nations to join. Most other countries would probably eventually do that.

That wouldn't deter the USA or Israel from their maligne cyber activities, but it would make sure that any such move which becomes publicly known would come with a diplomatic cost.

Smith , Dec 20 2020 8:43 utc | 47
Now they are done with the anti-China phase, they are into anti-Russia?

Like clockwork, Russia should be careful though, it's by far the most vulnerable powers in the 3, US, China and Russia.

Framarz , Dec 20 2020 9:03 utc | 48
Bernhard: "The only way to prevent potentially dangerous cyber-operations is too agree with adversaries on what is off-limits and to (verifiably) stick to that."

One can not agree. We all know Micro$oft, Google, FB, Whatsapp, Instagram, ... are feeding US and Zionist intelligence agencies with all type of informations. Any international treaty on cyber-security would under this conditions be obsolete from the beginning.

Another matter is that as Bernhard correctly points out: "One can not spy on other countries and then complain when they do something similar to oneself. Responding by waging destruction against another country's IT systems only guarantees that there will be a response in kind. If one wants to avert cyber-espionage and cyber-attacks there is only one way out."

But it's just naive to think that CIA, NSA, Mossad are going to respect any international agreement in any area. Stuxnet virus and it's intrusion of the Iranian nuclear facilities or sabotage of Venezuelan power-grid facilities were not made by China, Russia or North Korea. US government and Zionist Apartheid regime did those, aiming to sabotage and do harm not only on facilities but also on humans. If we go back, the much praised (in western MSM) Stuxnet was the operation legitimizing all similar cyber attacks to follow in the future. ZioImperialists can not expect having free hands to physically terror other nations and not be considered as a legitim target by them.

Another issue is that by criminalizing whistle-blowing and whistle-blowers like Snowden, Manning et al, US government and Zionists shoot in their own knee. If the price of whistle-blowing of criminality is too high, then the whistle-blowers doesn't go public, he or she just provide the access to those who can cover the criminal acts from the distance.

Framarz , Dec 20 2020 10:11 utc | 49
About the "Russian", "Chinese" narrative, I admit, it's a bit strange that US government and MSM are still insisting on them. I find it somehow positive. They know who was behind, they blame it on someone else, this could mean: "We are not going to do anything about it!"

If this is the case, then it sound wise, who knows what is going to happen if they choose to act aggressive against one of many enemies while one of the enemies got access to among others the entire network of their energy security administration.

And, lets not forget that Zionists Apartheid regime put USA in the current humiliating position in the first place.
A very constructive approach by US government would be to drop all illegal sanctions against others, pull out of ME and focus on their own domestic business instead of servicing Zionist Apartheid regime.

peter , Dec 20 2020 11:12 utc | 53
"To blame, without evidence, Russia for a 'hack' and to incite against it will not solve the above problems."

Maybe this time it really was Russia, according to Doctorow:

"The allegations of Russian hacking made by the United States in the heat of Russia-gate were frivolous, appropriate to toddlers in a sandbox. Leaving fingerprints all over the supposed theft over the internet to get at Hillary's communications and tip the election in Trump's favor. Only a fool would think that the Kremlin operates at this level. And, as we know, there are plenty of fools in the USA, though it appears a disproportionate number of them are in the Democratic Party and its thought leaders like Chuck Schumer of New York and Rick Blumenthal of Connecticut.

This hacking was of a different scale and different nature entirely. It was massive. It had no friendly or other bear tags put on by the Ukrainians. It went straight for the jugular, the most secret and sensitive corners of the US government. And it apparently was not destructive, did nothing that could trigger a war, just make a point: gotcha!"

https://gilbertdoctorow.com/2020/12/20/the-russians-did-it/

Sounds reasonable to me - if the US persists in threats with devastating cyber attacks against the RF because of those idiotic Russia Gate claims - demonstrate what the RF really can do and prevent any planned stupidity by the USA.

chu teh , Dec 20 2020 11:29 utc | 54

Fyi | Dec 20 2020 3:36 utc | 41

re... risk the entire German SCADA business to sting Iran and later Venezuela.

Well, an obedient/coerced? Siemens can figure nicely into the calculus if you have a minute:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EgzB4_Zw3RE

"How the US dominates Tech" As recommended recently by uncle tungsten | Dec 17 2020 23:55 utc | 46

Big shout-out to "Canadian Cents"

Simon , Dec 20 2020 11:33 utc | 55
Relentlessly, you go to stories in the New York Times. Like a dog returning to its excrement. Everybody knows it's an intelligence shill. Why do you bother? There are far more important things you could be reporting on.
Bemildred , Dec 20 2020 11:54 utc | 56
Posted by: Johny Conspiranoid | Dec 20 2020 10:21 utc | 51

"It makes no sense to connect something to the internet and then expect it to remain secret."

Indeed. And yet they have been doing it vigorously for 30 years now, making a few shallow assholes very very rich, wasting huge quantities of natural resources, allowing many feckless bureaucrats to pretend to do something for somebody, screwing the heck out of most everybody else, and making everybody - and I do mean everybody - less secure. But hey, your phone can tell you how to get to the store.

Mark2 , Dec 20 2020 12:33 utc | 57
We know beyond doubt that the top shelf of our society have no regard what so ever for law and order international or national. They will break the law with impunity, turn a blind eye to their colleagues breaking the rules. They will impose the law on the public like a sledgehammer to oppress us.

Wouldn't we just love to be a 'fly on the wall' when they get together and conspire to commit there criminality !! ZOOM The soft vonrable underbelly of your criminal elite.

Bemildred , Dec 20 2020 12:50 utc | 58
@Ghost Ship | Dec 20 2020 10:25 utc | 52

These large, complicated, very expensive software "management" packages are largely butt-covering, to protect management from the threat of "doing nothing" when things go wrong. Some nice kickbacks in it too. The usual effect is to make the sysadmins spend all their time trying to make the package work right. Security theater and treated like it too, fancy costumes out in front, bare wall behind the curtain. I remember one "configuration management" package that was practically an operating system all by itself and absolutely a waste of time. Network management even more so.

Norwegian , Dec 20 2020 12:56 utc | 59
@ james | Dec 19 2020 21:04 utc | 11
When did your moderator assignment here begin?
Norwegian , Dec 20 2020 13:04 utc | 60
@Hoyeru | Dec 19 2020 20:51 utc | 9
I dont understand why people still waste their time writing article refuting USA's claims. Dont people understand already USA DOES NOT NEED NO STINKING EVIDENCE?
That is plainly obvious, yes. The criminal US regime does what it does and their claims against other countries are almost universally without evidence. Spending energy refuting baseless claims can even provide an impression of legitimacy around those insane and baseless claims. The question is how to expose the lies without giving the liars legitimacy.
Norwegian , Dec 20 2020 13:14 utc | 61
@gottlieb | Dec 19 2020 21:25 utc | 13
One thing we know for sure and that is the US government has one enemy above all others: the truth.
Unfortunately, this is true not only for the US government, but for the "western" governments, establishments and media in general. To them, lies are no problem but truth is a deadly enemy. I could tell a personal story about that, but it would be off topic for this thread so I will not. But the observation that truth is the enemy to these people is key, even if it seems simplistic. The fact is that you cannot reason with people who have truth as their enemy.
Norwegian , Dec 20 2020 13:34 utc | 62
@j. casey | Dec 20 2020 2:24 utc | 38
Is any evidence offered that there was any hack at all? Is the entire thing a fully fabricated false flag, yet another, in service of taking Nord Stream 2 down?
That's a key question, I agree. The proper position to take is that it is all baseless lies unless verifiable evidence that the 'hack' actually occurred is presented. Never mind the claims of 'who did it' when there is no evidence that anything happened at all.

The situation in the west now is such that all information is centrally controlled, and face to face communication has been severely limited. It is not a coincidence.

pretzelattack , Dec 20 2020 13:39 utc | 63
I haven't seen this level of propaganda since the buildup to the second Iraq war. They are obviously planning more aggression against Russia and have to keep the public at a fever pitch to get away with it. it serves so many purposes, not just politically for the dnc and rnc, but for nato, the vastly overfunded intel community, etc. the domestic arm of the fake war on terror is of course the cops, and the various federal cops. Here the propaganda seems aimed mainly at republicans, with the "marxist blm" and "marxist fascist antifa" exciting the republican base into a frenzy, and the main foreign "villain" is said to be china. the propaganda aimed at the democrats focuses on russia; that product already has a proven track record of success with the democratic base, and the lies are aimed at whitewashing biden and harris and their abysmal records of support for police violence. nato and the us intel community have to justify their existence by stirring up the populace against imaginary foreign aggression, and it has succeeded spectacularly with the public in the u.s.

in short, these idiots want to take us to the edge of a major world war so they can continue to loot and control us, and they seem to think they will do just fine in a post nuclear war future.

Norwegian , Dec 20 2020 13:48 utc | 64
@Piotr Berman | Dec 20 2020 5:34 utc | 44
From browser side, one goal is to please advertisers by enabling takeovers of your hardware to track you, make displays that annoy you -- but at occasion entice you to spend money on something, freeze you computer with lame attempts to make dynamic displays and so on.
You have many good points, thanks. For the time being, I would recommend the Brave Browser https://brave.com/ as a countermove to these issues. It is super fast, ad free (or you can choose to get paid to see ads) and generally very good. I use it under Windows, Linux, Android and on my iPhone. As for operating systems becoming 'obsolete' forcing you to buy a new computer: Unless you have very special requirements, Linux Ubuntu will do all you need for free on your existing hardware. It is easy to install, very secure and virus free (the Windows virus business model does not work everywhere).
William Gruff , Dec 20 2020 14:04 utc | 65
Norwegian @60:
@gottlieb | Dec 19 2020 21:25 utc | 13
One thing we know for sure and that is the US government has one enemy above all others: the truth.

Unfortunately, this is true not only for the US government, but for the "western" governments, establishments and media in general.

It is worse even than that. The aversion to truth permeates western cultures. The obese American looks in the mirror and sees fitness. The educated fool looks in the mirror and sees wisdom. The boy raised to believe that being a white male is bad looks in the mirror and sees a virtuous girl trapped in the evil enemy's body, or even worse he sees a mountain panda. The young woman with no accomplishments but endless praise and petting of her ego looks in the mirror and sees vague exceptionality and formless superiority. The fascist looks in the mirror and sees a noble warrior for social justice.

The US government can get away with existing in denial because the population relies upon denial as well.

librul , Dec 20 2020 14:51 utc | 66
A fait accompli (fa) for headline readers.

On Reuters main webpage is a heading that reads: "Biden's options for Russian hacking punishment: sanctions, cyber retaliation"

The accusation, investigation and trial phases are as good as done, only the setting of the punishment phase remains.

It is for the benefit of headline readers. In the body of the article itself Reuters used the words "suspected hack" once. When will Reuters move the goal posts and quietly drop the word "suspected". It is guaranteed that they will, the question is how long before they weasel it away. The timing is certainly not dependent upon "evidence", more dependent upon how long until they think people won't notice the change.

(actually, there are two (fa) in the headline, Russia is guilty of hacking and Biden is President)

https://www.reuters.com/article/usa-cyber-breach-biden/bidens-options-for-russian-hacking-punishment-sanctions-cyber-retaliation-idUSKBN28U0DV

---
---

(over the top idea, I hope it is just an idea)

A scary thought is that all this is prepping the American Sheeple for a vast shutdown of communication ("the Russian's did it!")
in the event the Deep State is not getting it's way with stealing this election.

Rao , Dec 20 2020 14:52 utc | 67
Norwegian@60
For those who wish to use linux from windows is there is puppylinux frugal install.
You can start from pendrive install with in 10 minutes.
Rao
pretzelattack , Dec 20 2020 14:52 utc | 68
i'm sure the most murderous cops look in the mirror and see noble warriors for social justice, just as many of them did when they were slaughtering Iraqis in the street from a helicopter or in fallujah.
vk , Dec 20 2020 15:07 utc | 70
The whole thing is already beginning to crumble: White House Backs Away From Issuing Statement Blaming Russia for 'Sunburst' Attack, Reports Say

This "backing down at the eleventh hour" came just after this: 2nd Hacking Group 'Affected' US SolarWinds Software, Microsoft Says as Trump Questions Russian Role

This time, SolarWinds didn't blame another nation. It just stated it was "investigating". Even for Trump's rabid anti-Sinicism, it was too much, so he toned down on his Twitter:

...discussing the possibility that it may be China (it may!). There could also have been a hit on our ridiculous voting machines during the election, which is now obvious that I won big, making it an even more corrupted embarrassment for the USA. @DNI_Ratcliffe @SecPompeo
-- Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) December 19, 2020

From "it was China!" to "discussing the possibility that it may be China" there's an abyssal distance. Trump is also backing down.

There's a clear pattern here: the American Governments and MSM initiate a very virulent propaganda attack, based on outright fake news, against Russia and/or China. A burst of hysteria takes over the nation. Then it quickly, almost aggressively, backs down and tones down on the propaganda warfare.

Of course that there's an element of "bend but not break" here, as credibility is a finite resource the MSM and the USG have to use carefully and with moderation. Plausible deniability is a necessary tool in order to not spend your whole credibility at once and to replenish it, while also giving the masses a credible scenario (not perfect, not dystopian: in the middle of the road).

But there's also a nobler objective with this: to preserve the company's stock market prices. By creating a panacea over a foreign enemy, SolarWinds/FireEye calm down the shareholders and Wall Street, thus preserving or at least softening the blow to the realization their product is inferior in quality, even borderline useless. It's not that the shareholders and Wall St. don't know that, but that they are now ensured the masses won't know that.

We have a scenario here where the American MSM and the USG are now completely fused to Wall Street. As junior partners.

William Gruff , Dec 20 2020 15:41 utc | 71
pretzelattack @68

Denial is how so many Americans can live with themselves. It is why I despair of America saving itself.

William Gruff , Dec 20 2020 16:03 utc | 73
So Trump is attributing the obvious issues in the election to this hack attack? Now the pieces begin to fall together. I would say that evidence has been uncovered (but lot yet leaked) that the vote tabulation was altered and that is why we have suddenly been treated to the "Foreign baddies hacked us!" media spectacle while nothing has been said of what these hackers actually did: The public needs to be primed with the diversion before the leaks are sprung. Basically, the manipulation of the vote counts by the "We lie, we cheat, we steal!" gang has been uncovered and the suspicion that it was a domestic job has to be headed off. A narrative needs to be generated and installed in the public consciousness in which the evidence that the CIA was behind the hack was actually planted by clever Russian/Chinese/Iranian bad guys and the CIA is innocent.

A CYA operation for the CIA? That is what it is starting to look like to me.

chu teh , Dec 20 2020 17:51 utc | 77
Posted by: William Gruff | Dec 20 2020 15:41 utc | 71

re ...Denial is how so many Americans can live with themselves....

Indeed that is workably true. More broadly for all humans, might be restated as: Automatically creating justifications is how the mind* "protects" its owner from confronting being "wrong". *mind--whatever that is; there is much disagreement about that.

fyi , Dec 20 2020 18:19 utc | 78
Mr. chu teh

Yes, the stupid avarice at the Court of the Mad King is remarkable. It demonstrates a species of Hubris which assumes that no one can retaliate against them.

I note here that the Russians have now full legal and financial control of their aerospace firms and their new mid-size passenger jet does not have foreign content.

Basically, the Mad King has alerted other sovereigns in the world of their vulnerabilities and they are proceeding to address those items - likely taking 20 or 30 years.

pretzelattack , Dec 20 2020 19:45 utc | 79
denial is probably the way the cops who run down protestors, or shoot them in the back, live with themselves. and true, a lot of americans cheer those cops on, and pretend they are justified, just as many americans cheer on the troops overseas who are also thought to be protecting freedom, like those in the wikileaks video who shot at children in the street. "fighting terrorism for freedom" my ass. this kind of denial is certainly a lot more consequential than the tendency to deny one is overweight or losing their hair, and i don't think it is the same process.

i don't know about the republican caucus in iowa, but i know what the dnc rigged the cauces in iowa against sanders, so it's not like the process can't be interfered with, whether by an app that doesn't work or simple old fashioned cheating like pretending to flip a coin.

pretzelattack , Dec 20 2020 20:06 utc | 80
another thing about cops who are about to commit violence they can't justify; they often turn off their body cams, or claim they forgot to turn them on, or they weren't working. that's not denial; that's premeditation.
arby , Dec 20 2020 20:20 utc | 81
I read somewhere that human beings are not rational but rationalizing. Sounds about right to me.

c1ue , Dec 21 2020 1:59 utc | 82

@Piotr Berman #44

No, cui bono is irrelevant. IT is a mess because despite the pace of historical change, the effects on productivity are remarkable. If one can improve productivity by double digits with half-assed IT efforts - why bother with more coherent and considered planning or execution?

Now repeat this every 3 years or so. The result is an ungodly hodgepodge in very little time.

Posted by: c1ue | Dec 21 2020 1:59 utc | 82

Antonym , Dec 21 2020 3:33 utc | 83
I see it now simple thus: Anglo Deep $tate cannot defeat China MIL plus Russia so it needs them split. That's how Kissinger "won" the Vietnam war by cozying up to Mao. Quite a Pyrrhic victory on the short (Vietnam) and the long (PR China today) run. Any crap is being hauled up to tar Russia, from MH17, via Skripal to cyber false flaggery.
James joseph , Dec 21 2020 4:17 utc | 84
For me, the incredible truth is that greed overcame all other emotions: patriotism? ...just a adman's final lever; exceptionalism could have no other end other than the bonfire of the vanities. Greed, by the very few ultra rich, the lucre flowing down to control all segments of the society, the body now being feasted on, until there are few specs left , worthy of the effort.

[Dec 21, 2020] It make sense to look for articles written by qualified specialists and ignore neoliberal MSM coverage

Dec 21, 2020 | www.theamericanconservative.com

>

Kent Pete Barbeaux 2 days ago • edited

I disagree. What aggression did the Russians take? A Russian pilot flying over a US aircraft carrier and taking pictures is intelligence gathering. A Russian bomber trying to bomb a US aircraft carrier is an act of aggression.

By that definition, this is normal intelligence gathering. Not something that requires killing people.

Edited to add: Of course it was legitimately signed. Solarwinds signed it and pushed it out. That only means the software came from Solarwinds internal builds. Shame on Solarwinds for not maintaining simple checksum chains of its object code to insure it hasn't been overwritten. Shame on the defense department for not requiring Solarwinds to maintain secure source control.

sarsfield Kent 2 days ago

Shame on Solarwinds for not maintaining simple checksum chains of its object code to insure it hasn't been overwritten. Shame on the defense department for not requiring Solarwinds to maintain secure source control.

This is the first indication i have seen anywhere on this breach which suggests SolarWinds could have taken basic precautions in pushing out its firmware updates. I am going to look for articles written by Cyber people on this and ignore the press.


Tom Sadlowski
sarsfield 2 days ago

Yes, Tech in this current era, is neglecting the most foundational checks and balances. In a twenty-four span, we had the SolarWinds/Microsoft 365 Hack and the Google Cloud global failure, after having the entire world's internet stopping due to a bad mass deployed firmware update to the switches. Therefore, I believe the Federal Government is best to create its own proprietary system than outsourcing to Microsoft, Amazon, or Google.


kouroi
Pete Barbeaux a day ago

Some edits would be useful, like instead of: "containing a direct back door to the Russian military" one should have written "containing a direct back door to any knowledgeable hacker". Something that Snowden for YEARS has complained about. And this is why HUAWEI is so hated, because it doesn't offer backdoors to be exploited, in a handshake understanding with US intelligence corps.

some antigovernment lunatic 2 days ago

Until now all I've seen were anonymous sources claiming that it kind of feels like those dastardly Russkies were behind it again. Did I miss the part where actual evidence was provided?

[Dec 21, 2020] Boomerang returns: methods pioneered in Stuxnet and Flame return and bite the USA in the butt

CISA is an agency full of bureaucrats, not computer specialists. So any judgement is highly suspect. In my view "computer security bureaucrat" is typically a parasite or a charlatan. Traditionally computer security departments in large corporations often serve as a place to exile incompetent wannabes. I do not think the government is different. Real high quality programmers usually prefer to write their own software not to spend their time analyzing some obtuse malware code. Often high level honchos in such department are so obviously incompetent that it hurts. This is the same agency that declared Presidential election 2020 to be the most secure in history. So their statements are not worth the electrons used to put them on the screen, so say nothing about a ppar , if they manage to get into such rags as NYT or WaPo.
We need clear-eyed assessment from a real Windows OS specialists like for Stuxnet was Mark Russinovich , which is difficult in current circumstances.
Dec 21, 2020 | arstechnica.com

The supply chain attack used to breach federal agencies and at least one private company poses a "grave risk" to the United States, in part because the attackers likely used means other than just the SolarWinds backdoor to penetrate networks of interest, federal officials said on Thursday. One of those networks belongs to the National Nuclear Security Administration, which is responsible for the Los Alamos and Sandia labs, according to a report from Politico .

"This adversary has demonstrated an ability to exploit software supply chains and shown significant knowledge of Windows networks," officials with the Cybersecurity Infrastructure and Security Agency wrote in an alert . "It is likely that the adversary has additional initial access vectors and tactics, techniques, and procedures (TTPs) that have not yet been discovered." CISA, as the agency is abbreviated, is an arm of the Department of Homeland Security.

Elsewhere, officials wrote: "CISA has determined that this threat poses a grave risk to the Federal Government and state, local, tribal, and territorial governments as well as critical infrastructure entities and other private sector organizations."

Reuters, meanwhile, reported that the attackers breached a separate major technology supplier and used the compromise to get into high-value final targets. The news services cited two people briefed on the matter.

FURTHER READING Premiere security firm FireEye says it was breached by nation-state hackers The attackers, whom CISA said began their operation no later than March, managed to remain undetected until last week when security firm FireEye reported that hackers backed by a nation-state had penetrated deep into its network . Early this week, FireEye said that the hackers were infecting targets using Orion, a widely used network management tool from SolarWinds. After taking control of the Orion update mechanism, the attackers were using it to install a backdoor that FireEye researchers are calling Sunburst. Advertisement

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FURTHER READING Russian hackers hit US government using widespread supply chain attack Sunday was also when multiple news outlets, citing unnamed people, reported that the hackers had used the backdoor in Orion to breach networks belonging to the Departments of Commerce, Treasury, and possibly other agencies. The Department of Homeland Security and the National Institutes of Health were later added to the list. Bleak assessment

Thursday's CISA alert provided an unusually bleak assessment of the hack; the threat it poses to government agencies at the national, state, and local levels; and the skill, persistence, and time that will be required to expel the attackers from networks they had penetrated for months undetected.

"This APT actor has demonstrated patience, operational security, and complex tradecraft in these intrusions," officials wrote in Thursday's alert. "CISA expects that removing this threat actor from compromised environments will be highly complex and challenging for organizations."

The officials went on to provide another bleak assessment: "CISA has evidence of additional initial access vectors, other than the SolarWinds Orion platform; however, these are still being investigated. CISA will update this Alert as new information becomes available."

The advisory didn't say what the additional vectors might be, but the officials went on to note the skill required to infect the SolarWinds software build platform, distribute backdoors to 18,000 customers, and then remain undetected in infected networks for months.

"This adversary has demonstrated an ability to exploit software supply chains and shown significant knowledge of Windows networks," they wrote. "It is likely that the adversary has additional initial access vectors and tactics, techniques, and procedures that have not yet been discovered."

Among the many federal agencies that used SolarWinds Orion, reportedly, was the Internal Revenue Service. On Thursday, Senate Finance Committee Ranking Member Ron Wyden (D-Ore.) and Senate Finance Committee Chairman Chuck Grassley (R-Iowa) sent a letter to IRS Commissioner Chuck Rettig asking that he provide a briefing on whether taxpayer data was compromised.

Advertisement

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They wrote:

The IRS appears to have been a customer of SolarWinds as recently as 2017. Given the extreme sensitivity of personal taxpayer information entrusted to the IRS, and the harm both to Americans' privacy and our national security that could result from the theft and exploitation of this data by our adversaries, it is imperative that we understand the extent to which the IRS may have been compromised. It is also critical that we understand what actions the IRS is taking to mitigate any potential damage, ensure that hackers do not still have access to internal IRS systems, and prevent future hacks of taxpayer data.

IRS representatives didn't immediately return a phone call seeking comment for this post.

The CISA alert said the key takeaways from its investigation so far are:

This is a patient, well-resourced, and focused adversary that has sustained long duration activity on victim networks The SolarWinds Orion supply chain compromise is not the only initial infection vector this APT actor leveraged Not all organizations that have the backdoor delivered through SolarWinds Orion have been targeted by the adversary with follow-on actions Organizations with suspected compromises need to be highly conscious of operational security, including when engaging in incident response activities and planning and implementing remediation plans

What has emerged so far is that this is an extraordinary hack whose full scope and effects won't be known for weeks or even months. Additional shoes are likely to drop early and often.

[Dec 21, 2020] Are you insinuating the fake news factory aka The NY Times is not a credible source ;)

When I see "cybersecurity specialist" on national TV I always suspect he/she is a crook ;-)
Dec 21, 2020 | www.theamericanconservative.com

some antigovernment lunatic 2 days ago

Until now all I've seen were anonymous sources claiming that it kind of feels like those dastardly Russkies were behind it again. Did I miss the part where actual evidence was provided?

smallprint some antigovernment lunatic 2 days ago • edited

Are you insinuating the fake news factory aka The NY Times is not a credible source ;)

kouroi smallprint a day ago

https://www.livetube.tv/blo...

smallprint kouroi a day ago • edited

The NY Times used to have an entire department focusing on selling the Iraq war. Google "Judith Miller", who was the chief sell-Iraq-war propagandist and liar. The NY Times has a bad record of being the "publication of record" among the corporate mainstream media.

kouroi byersbewhere a day ago

4 years of Russiagate should make anyone a bit mistrustful, then WMD & Iraq War before that?

some antigovernment lunatic byersbewhere 19 hours ago • edited

"Your honor, you are quite right about the lack of evidence. The problem is...you shouldn't want me to show you the evidence! That would be tantamount to revealing my investigative techniques!"

"Well, when you put it that way..."

And of course the sources were anonymous. Don't you read the WaPo like a good citizen?

The Russian hackers, known by the nicknames APT29 or Cozy Bear, are part of that nation's foreign intelligence service, the SVR, and they breached email systems in some cases, said the people familiar with the intrusions, who spoke on the condition of anonymity because of the sensitivity of the matter

https://www.washingtonpost....

Daniel Baker 2 days ago

Is there any precedent for declaring pure espionage/intelligence gathering, even on a very large scale, to be an armed attack warranting an armed response? I can't think of any.

A major breach of U.S. security calls for a robust law enforcement response and cybersecurity measures, and arguably even for the longstanding death penalty for espionage if the offenders are caught, but not for cries of "declaration of war," like Dick Durbin's.


Greengrocer
2 days ago

It's curious how all this official talk of cyber-spying never mentions one particular country that does a ton of it to us: Israel.


smallprint
Greengrocer 2 days ago

That's because God told them they own whatever they're stealing from the US. Ask any Palestinian, they'll tell you how it works.


Annie from Alaska
Rkramden66 2 days ago

We do not know whether the perps were Chinese or not. The claims of attribution are coming from motivated speakers and lack credibility.

butseriouslynow Annie from Alaska 2 days ago

I'm beginning to understand why conservatives in Alaska say they can see Russia from their back door.

smallprint Annie from Alaska 2 days ago • edited

That applies to the same sources "informing" us about the so-called Russian hack.
Remember when we were "informed" N. Korea hacked into Sonny's and "downloaded" an entire movie, which was not even released?! Turned out that was an inside job by a woman who had worked at Sonny for ten years. I smell the same BS from the likes of the NY Times.

[Dec 21, 2020] The Russian 'Cyber Pearl Harbor' That Wasn't

Dec 21, 2020 | www.theamericanconservative.com

Home / Articles / Policy / The Russian 'Cyber Pearl Harbor' That Wasn't POLICY The Russian 'Cyber Pearl Harbor' That Wasn't

The recent SolarWinds hack is no excuse for doomsday rhetoric, especially from those who have been leveling it for decades. (Shutterstock/solarseven)

DECEMBER 18, 2020

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12:01 AM

SEAN LAWSON AND BRANDON VALERIANO

For almost three decades, we have awaited a mythical "cyber Pearl Harbor," the harbinger of digital doom that the U.S. cybersecurity community assumes to be inevitable. Strangely enough, some believe this cyber Pearl Harbor already happened twice within the last two months.

Though warnings of cyber Pearl Harbor emerged as early as 1991, former defense secretary Leon Panetta is perhaps best known for promoting the idea, warning in 2012 of an impending "cyber-Pearl Harbor that would cause physical destruction and the loss of life, an attack that would paralyze and shock the nation." Such a grand event would be tough to miss.

me title=

Last week, Sidney Powell, a one-time member of the president's legal team, continued to promote her conspiracy theory that the Venezuelans, the Chinese, and "other countries" had exploited voting machines to rig the election for President-elect Joe Biden. This fictitious "attack," she told Fox Business host Lou Dobbs, amounted to nothing less than "cyber Pearl Harbor." Apparently the rest of us just missed it.

Cybersecurity experts, including Christopher Krebs, the former head of the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency who was fired by President Trump in November, have refuted these claims. Krebs called them "farcical" and "nonsensical." Officials have said there was no interference with voting machines of the kind claimed by Trump supporters and that the election was "the most secure in American history."

This week began with the news of cybersecurity breaches at a growing list of private companies and government agencies, including the Department of Homeland Security and even the Pentagon, perpetrated by APT29 , the Russian SVR. Dubbed SolarWinds after the company whose software served as the vector for the intrusions, the scope of the operation and the fact that it impacted defense and intelligence agencies sparked an online debate as to whether it had constituted an "attack" on the United States. Others did not wait to learn the extent of the damage before declaring that the United States had been "hit with 'Cyber-Pearl Harbor.'" Senator Richard Durbin went so far as to call the hack "virtually a declaration of war."

National Review 's Jim Geraghty implied that the United States missed the SolarWinds intrusions because it failed to take the 2015 Office of Personnel Management (OPM) breach at the hands of Chinese hackers seriously enough, focusing instead on Russian disinformation in the wake of that country's interference in the 2016 presidential election. The OPM incident, he said, "was widely described as the 'cyber Pearl Harbor' and yet most Americans didn't notice."

me title=

00:11 / 01:00

Calling any of these incidents "cyber Pearl Harbor" is inaccurate at best and inherently dangerous. The impacts of the OPM and SolarWinds hacks in no way approximate the kind of death and destruction most often associated with the use of the "cyber Pearl Harbor" analogy. The whole point of a cyber Pearl Harbor is that we would not miss the significance of such a major catastrophe since it would lead to an inevitable reconstitution of the cyber security threat environment.

This continued use of doomsday rhetoric is dangerous because it distorts our understanding of the cyber threats we do face, the implications of real incidents when they occur, and our possible response options. As Director of National Intelligence James Clapper said in 2015, the OPM breach was representative of the real cyber threats we face not because it was the fulfillment of a long-awaited " cyber Armageddon scenario ," but because it was not. It was not an "attack," he said, but an incident of the kind of cyber espionage we witness regularly. That the cyber domain is dominated by espionage and represents a wider intelligence contest demonstrates the continuing misapplication of strategic thought surrounding cyber security violations.

Five years later, it is still unhelpful to frame incidents like SolarWind as the arrival of digital apocalypse instead of another major incident of cyber espionage . Continued hyperbole surrounding every new cyber incident encourages the kind of craven misappropriation of fears of cyber doom by those who seek to inflate threats for political gain.

We do not know the scope of SolarWinds mainly because the domain has no conception of measuring impact. In an arena obsessed with battle damage estimates, the Department of Defense simply has no interest in measuring the impact of their operations and the utility of defend forward operations that provide little leverage against espionage operations.

The FY2021 NDAA contains the most significant cyber security legislation to date. Helping the government organize in order to deny operations in the cyber environment is a critical task. There are provisions for threat hunting, organizational coordination, and more funding for cyber operations to maintain and defend cyberspace. Yet the deeper challenge is how we defend against espionage.

The real lesson of Pearl Harbor is the desperation of Japan to preemptively eliminate the United States as a threat to Japanese operations in the Pacific and the U.S. intelligence failures that enabled the attack in the first place. Taking the analogy in the correct direction suggests that the U.S. needs to seek to deny attack options to prevent infiltrations such as the SolarWinds event. The U.S. also needs to do better of understanding the strategic motivations of our adversaries. In this case, being distracted by the possibility of a major hack during the 2020 election led to a comprehensive violation of almost every government agency.

Hyperbole needs to stop and rational consideration of the impact of the SolarWind operation will take time and sober thought, not instant hot takes. Infiltration and extracting information is not an act of war, but evidence of the typical espionage operations that are conducted against near peer adversaries. Denying future operations will require a sober assessment of how to enable the defense when the attacker has many attack options. This will likely not come solely through government action, but collaboration between industry, the private sector, and government agencies that provide for collective defense.

Sean Lawson is associate professor of Communication at the University of Utah and non-resident fellow at the Krulak Center at the Marine Corps University.

Brandon Valeriano is the Donald Bren Chair of Military Innovation at the Marine Corps University located at the Krulak Center. He also serves as a senior fellow at the Cato Institute and a senior advisor to the U.S. Cyber Solarium Commission.


Connecticut Farmer 2 days ago

Connecticut Farmer 2 days ago

Excellent article. Hyperbole is about the last thing we need at this point in time. Unfortunately, hyperbole is standard fare these days. The result? Misinformation and half-truths, followed by hasty (and often erroneous) conclusions, followed by incorrect remedies which, more often than not, tend to make what are already bad situations only worse.

M Orban Connecticut Farmer 2 days ago • edited

Unfortunately when it comes to cyber attacks, unlike an actual Pearl Harbor, the damage is invisible to most of us. So are the perpetrators. We can't directly see the trail of evidence that connects the crime to the suspects, so we have to rely on the testimony of experts.
Then we have political pressure groups that are interested in up or down playing the severity of the breach.
On top of all, we have a population that is utterly ignorant but 'been trained to distrust experience.
As I am typing this, I am less and less optimistic.

Sourpuss M Orban 2 days ago

Even worse, we have a severely alienated population that is tired of being played by elites with constant hype about alleged foreign enemies. We have a population that sees more immediate threat from its own elites than Russian spies. The headline reads like "Deep State has Russkies in its Shorts Again" and la dee dah, why do I even care? Are Russkies gonna take my job, lock me down, or cancel me? Too late, Vlad, I've already been done.

smallprint M Orban 2 days ago

What breach bro?!

[Dec 20, 2020] In 2012 Kaspersky Russian Virus Lab detected, decrypted a unknown computer Virus which is now named the Flame Virus

Dec 20, 2020 | www.rt.com

A. Smith 23 hours ago 19 Dec, 2020 02:55 PM

In 2012 Kaspersky Russian Virus Lab detected, decrypted a unknown computer Virus which is now named the Flame Virus. It had been written by the CIA, Mossad and used a compromised Windows updater server to infect Windows servers globally. Kaspersky alerted the World to this threat. The US Gov then went all-out to punish Kaspersky AV Lab forbidding them from US Gov contracts.
A. Smith 23 hours ago 19 Dec, 2020 02:49 PM
In 2012 didn't the CIA,Mossad create the Flame computer virus using a Windows update server to globally infect Windows servers? Wasn't Obama and Joe Biden in Office and ordered it under the guise of attacking Iran? Its still infecting computers across US with backdoors. Now the same folks are blaming Russia for a similar act 8 years later?

[Dec 20, 2020] Caitlin Johnstone- Secret, invisible evidence of Russian hacking is not actually evidence by Caitlin Johnstone

Dec 18, 2020 | www.rt.com

By Caitlin Johnstone , an independent journalist based in Melbourne, Australia. Her website is here and you can follow her on Twitter @caitoz

We've landed in a world where diplomacy, sanctions, even war can be decided by mere claims, and evidence is optional. Yet those proudly displaying the badge of 'public trust' are the worst of the serial, politically-driven liars.

The Communist Party of China has been covertly sending arms to extremist Antifa militants in the United States in preparation for the civil war which is expected to take place after Joe Biden declares himself President for Life and institutes a Marxist dictatorship. The weapons shipments include rocket launchers, directed energy weapons, nunchucks and ninja throwing stars.

Unfortunately I cannot provide evidence for this shocking revelation as doing so would compromise my sources and methods, but trust me it's definitely true and must be acted upon immediately. I recommend President Trump declare martial law without a moment's hesitation and begin planning a military response to these Chinese aggressions.

How does this make you feel? Was your first impulse to begin scanning for evidence of the incendiary claim I made in my opening paragraph?

It would be perfectly reasonable if it was. I am, after all, some random person on the internet whom you have probably never met, and you've no reason to accept any bold claim I might make on blind faith. It would make sense for you to want to see some verification of my claim, and then dismiss my claim as baseless hogwash when I failed to provide that verification.

If you're a more regular reader, it would have also been reasonable for you to guess that I was doing a bit. But imagine if I wasn't? Imagine if I really was claiming that the Chinese government is arming Antifa ninja warriors to kill patriotic Americans in the coming Biden Wars. How crazy would you have to be to believe what I was saying without my providing hard, verifiable evidence for my claims?

Now imagine further that this is something I've made false claims about many times in the past. If every few years I make a new claim about some naughty government arming Antifa super soldiers in a great communist uprising, which turns out later to have been bogus.

Well you'd dismiss me as a crackpot, wouldn't you? I wouldn't blame you. That would be the only reasonable response to such a ridiculous spectacle.

And yet if I were an employee of a US government agency making unproven incendiary claims about a government that isn't aligned with the US-centralized power alliance, the entire political/media class would be parroting what I said as though it's an established fact. Even though US government agencies have an extensive and well-documented history of lying about such things.

https://platform.twitter.com/embed/index.html?creatorScreenName=RT_com&dnt=false&embedId=twitter-widget-0&frame=false&hideCard=false&hideThread=false&id=1339405363825807361&lang=en&origin=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.rt.com%2Fop-ed%2F510107-russia-hacking-secret-evidence%2F&siteScreenName=RT_com&theme=light&widgetsVersion=ed20a2b%3A1601588405575&width=550px

Today we're all expected to be freaking out about Russia again because Russia hacked the United States again right before a new president took office again, so now it's very important that we support new cold war escalations from both the outgoing president and the incoming president again. We're not allowed to see the evidence that this actually happened again, but it's of utmost importance that we trust and support new aggressions against Russia anyway. Again.

The New York Times has a viral op-ed going around titled "I Was the Homeland Security Adviser to Trump. We're Being Hacked. " The article's author Thomas P Bossert warns ominously that "the networks of the federal government and much of corporate America are compromised by a foreign nation" perpetrated by "the Russian intelligence agency known as the S.V.R., whose tradecraft is among the most advanced in the world."

Rather than using its supreme tradecraft to interfere in the November election ensuring the victory of the president we've been told for years is a Russian asset by outlets like The New York Times , Bossert informs us that the SVR instead opted to hack a private American IT company called SolarWinds whose software is widely used by the US government.

"Unsuspecting customers then downloaded a corrupted version of the software, which included a hidden back door that gave hackers access to the victim's network," Bossert explains, saying that "The magnitude of this ongoing attack is hard to overstate." Its magnitude is so great that Bossert says Trump must "severely punish the Russians" for perpetrating it, and cooperate with the incoming Biden team in helping to ensure that that punishment continues seamlessly between administrations.

https://platform.twitter.com/embed/index.html?creatorScreenName=RT_com&dnt=false&embedId=twitter-widget-1&frame=false&hideCard=false&hideThread=false&id=1339287068120322051&lang=en&origin=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.rt.com%2Fop-ed%2F510107-russia-hacking-secret-evidence%2F&siteScreenName=RT_com&theme=light&widgetsVersion=ed20a2b%3A1601588405575&width=550px

The problem is that, as usual, we've been given exactly zero evidence for any of this. As Moon of Alabama explains , the only technical analysis we've seen of the alleged hack (courtesy of cybersecurity firm FireEye) makes no claim that Russia was responsible for it, yet the mass media are flagrantly asserting as objective, verified fact that Russia is behind this far-reaching intrusion into US government networks, citing only anonymous sources if they cite anything at all.

And of course where the media class goes so too does the barely-separate political class. Democratic Senator Dick Durbin told CNN in a recent interview that this invisible, completely unproven cyberattack constitutes "virtually a declaration of war by Russia on the United States." Which is always soothing language to hear as the Russian government announces the development of new hypersonic missiles as part of a new nuclear arms race it attributes to US cold war escalations.

Journalist Glenn Greenwald is one of the few high-profile voices who've had the temerity to stick his head above the parapet and point out the fact that we have seen exactly zero evidence for these incendiary claims, for which he is of course currently being raked over the coals on Twitter.

"I know it doesn't matter. I know it's wrong to ask the question. I know asking the question raises grave doubts about one's loyalties and patriotism," Greenwald sarcastically tweeted . "But has there been any evidence publicly presented, let alone dispositive proof, that Russia is responsible for this hack?"

https://platform.twitter.com/embed/index.html?creatorScreenName=RT_com&dnt=false&embedId=twitter-widget-2&frame=false&hideCard=false&hideThread=false&id=1339564485598720000&lang=en&origin=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.rt.com%2Fop-ed%2F510107-russia-hacking-secret-evidence%2F&siteScreenName=RT_com&theme=light&widgetsVersion=ed20a2b%3A1601588405575&width=550px

"Perhaps they have information sources they can't describe without compromising sources and methods?" chimed in Ars Technica 's Timothy B Lee in response to Greenwald's query, a textbook reply from establishment narrative managers whenever anyone questions where the evidence is for any of these invisible attacks on US sovereignty.

"Of course they can't show us the evidence!" proponents of establishment Russia hysteria always say. "They'd compromise their sources and methods if they did!"

US spook agencies always say this about evidence for US spook agency claims about governments long targeted for destruction by US spook agencies. We can't share the evidence with you because the evidence is classified. It's secret evidence. The evidence is invisible.

Which always works out very nicely for the US spook agencies, I must say.

https://platform.twitter.com/embed/index.html?creatorScreenName=RT_com&dnt=false&embedId=twitter-widget-3&frame=false&hideCard=false&hideThread=false&id=1319827403594629122&lang=en&origin=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.rt.com%2Fop-ed%2F510107-russia-hacking-secret-evidence%2F&siteScreenName=RT_com&theme=light&widgetsVersion=ed20a2b%3A1601588405575&width=550px

Secret, invisible evidence is not evidence. If the public cannot see the evidence behind the claims being made by the powerful, then those claims are unproven. It would never be acceptable for anyone in power to say "This important thing with potentially world-altering consequences definitely happened, but you'll just have to trust us because the evidence is secret." In a post-Iraq invasion world it is orders of magnitude more unacceptable, and should therefore be dismissed until hard, verifiable evidence is provided.

Isn't it interesting how all the Pearl Harbors and 9/11s of our day are completely invisible to the public? We can't see cyber-intrusions for ourselves like we could see fallen buildings and smoking naval bases; they're entirely hidden from our view. Not only are they entirely hidden from our view, the evidence that they happened is kept secret from us as well. And the mass media just treat this as normal and fine. Government agencies with an extensive history of lying are allowed to make completely unsubstantiated and unverifiable claims about governments long targeted by those same government agencies, and the institutions responsible for informing the public about what's going on in the world simply repeat it as fact.

Sure it's possible that Russia hacked the US. It's possible that the US government has been in contact with extraterrestrials, too. It's possible that the Chinese government is covertly arming Antifa samurai in preparation for a civil war. But we do not imbue these things with the power of belief until we are provided with an amount of evidence that rises to the level required in a post-Iraq invasion world.

These people have not earned our trust, they have earned our pointed and aggressive skepticism. We must act accordingly.

Think your friends would be interested? Share this story!

The statements, views and opinions expressed in this column are solely those of the author and do not necessarily represent those of RT.



Midnight10 1 day ago 18 Dec, 2020 03:03 PM

The US isn't know mm for its independent thought processes. The "secret, invisible evidence" comes right out of WADA's planbook for banning Russian athletes from the Olympics, by their use of "disappearing positives". It would be a mistake to consider the Pentagon any smarter then the WADA Committee. Remember Lance Armstrong was allowed to continue for seven years without a peep from WADA, or CAS, or the US doping agency. Not a peep. Must have used magic, like the Pentagon and WADA does now.
Frank Hood Midnight10 1 day ago 18 Dec, 2020 05:05 PM
Its astounding that U.S ath letes using ster.oids of some sort are not under the same rules as Rus sian athletes. To ex clude many of the worlds best and still continue to compete
Vikiiing Midnight10 1 day ago 18 Dec, 2020 04:36 PM
Armstrong was cuaght doping during his first tour win, twice! UCI and other clowns bought Drugstrongs excuse. And I mean bought 2 years later Dopestrong secretly gave the UCI over $100,000 for fighting doping....And dont forget Armstrong stole money intended for his charity....I'm sure he's waiting for an appropriate time to give it back....
Bill Spence 1 day ago 18 Dec, 2020 03:09 PM
Stealing a few secrets by hacking into US networks is very minor compared to the acts of war that the United States has committed against Iran Russia China and North Korea. The whole thing is boring because nothing was damaged according to the claims. Show me some damage or be silent.
Frank Hood Bill Spence 1 day ago 18 Dec, 2020 05:23 PM
Even if it is minor, proof would be nice. The people are just starting to question what we have been told for decades. Mind you Assange actually provided proof for all of us,but regardless the world still ignored the provided proof. Allegations are the name of the game, and a good enough reason to continue pressure on certain countries in the form of physical and economic war since WW2. BUT, "times are a changin" folks.
MotorSlug Bill Spence 1 day ago 18 Dec, 2020 03:18 PM
thanks to Vault 7 and Wikileaks, we know 99% of the shots are taken by the CIA
EarthBotV2 1 day ago 18 Dec, 2020 03:38 PM
Here's the question well-programmed Americans never think to ask: Who gains? A coup has occurred in the U.S.. The evidence of fraud is overwhelming. How do the coup perpetrators plan to dispose of this evidence? -- by blaming Russia! We'll be told that Russia manufactured the evidence, just as we were told that Russia manufactured Hunter Biden's laptop. And those who attempt to prosecute the fraudsters will be called "Russian Agents".
shadow1369 1 day ago 19 Dec, 2020 12:13 PM
Wikileaks Vault 77 disclosures revealed that US terrorist intelligence agencies can make a hack look like it coes from wherever they choose. Even before that, and the ease with which CGI can make dead people talk, we were living in an entirely fake paradigm created by corporate media.
DeathbyDissent 1 day ago 18 Dec, 2020 06:30 PM
If anyone doubts that the US would use this evidence-free false-flag as a pretext for attacking Russia, just go to Youtube and search Russian, Hack, Bolton. There, you will see John Bolton on MSNBC saying the US should "retaliate" in a many-fold worse way. Bolton is a representative of the deep state in the US; he is a neocon, and neocons have driven our foreign policy for over 20 years.
DeathbyDissent 1 day ago 18 Dec, 2020 05:34 PM
Whenever the US wants to commit crimes against other countries, it manufactures the reasons for doing so. it's been doing this for many decades. This "hack" is nothing more than a pretext for 1) demonizing Russia, and 2) advancing a foreign policy action in opposition to Russia. If you don't know that the United States is the main purveyor of lies in the world by now, you need a giant red pill.
Twills93 DeathbyDissent 1 day ago 18 Dec, 2020 05:43 PM
How many lies is too many?
Forgotten9 1 day ago 18 Dec, 2020 05:01 PM
2020 should go into genius records as the largest coincidental (propagated proxi) in the history of the world
Forgotten9 1 day ago 18 Dec, 2020 04:57 PM
The greatest question is why has the left administration lied, covered up, misinforming the american people of their global military actions? PROXI wars? Misuse of NATO assets for EU and personal gains... Allied with Xi Jinping , striking chinese assets to stimulate the cultural uprising that put Xi into power in 2012, turning full socialist communist in 2013, deploying a centralized military power to enforce the territory display in the new map of china presented December 2012, and full gov backed boycott of western goods, transitioned to cut trade fully with the western conventional allies china allowed its economy to fully contract... all covered up by liberal media and made public in their US conservative opponent's administration..
Forgotten9 1 day ago 18 Dec, 2020 03:53 PM
Did the EU push NATO integration of such technologies making NATO suspect?

[Oct 11, 2020] Does Perlosi wants to help Trump to win re-election by buying Crowdstyke stock?

Looks like we have an incestuous relationship of collusion between democrat politicians, democrat operatives in the executive branch, and MSM
Oct 11, 2020 | www.realclearinvestigations.com
Thinkitthrough larrydoyle 15 hours ago When you buy a companies stock you are effectively making a loan to the company with the expectation of gaining a return on your investment. Stock purchase price $129.25 Stock value now $142.97 gain on investment $13.72 per share $1,000,000 divided by the stock purchase price of $129.25 equals 7,737 shares. 7,737 multiplied by $13.72 equals a profit of $106,151.64 gained in only two months. Smells highly of insider trading. Somehow, you can tell us that this article is " Just sound and fury". Is the article "Just sound and fury" or is your comment "Just sound and fury" Reply merkinmuffy 16 hours ago "The Pig" may not have been aware of her husband's investments, but she and her Party sure benefitted from them. And don't think her husband didn't know it, either! And notice she's still plugging the Russia hoax! CrazyLady 11 hours ago On March 31, 2017 WikiLeaks released the most damaging disclosure up to that point from what it called "Vault 7" – a treasure trove of CIA cybertools leaked from CIA files. This disclosure featured the tool "Marble Framework," which enabled the CIA to hack into computers, disguise who hacked in, and falsely attribute the hack to someone else by leaving so-called telltale signs – like Cyrillic, for example.

The CIA documents also showed that the "Marble" tool had been employed in 2016. This is why the real reason CIA wants Assange. Why didn't Comey ever take the actual servers?

Comey explained "A Higher Loyalty." He wrote, "I was making decisions in an environment where Hillary Clinton was sure to be the next president." TGrade1 14 hours ago Dems wouldn't let the FBI examine the DNC server--only Crowdstrike, a company whose founder and CTO is Russian! Reply 9

  • nealmcelroy TGrade1 10 hours ago Transcript of Donald Trump's Ukraine phone call shows he pushed for investigation. Trump wants to know about CrowdStrike. Trump wants to fully expose what happened in 2016. He wants to drain the swamp. He wants to expose all of the corruption and the shenanigans that have been going on in this country, in the deep state for decades. He doesn't care who he runs against in 2020. He isn't trying to eliminate Biden from the race as much as he wants to expose the corruption surrounding the Obama administration! Reply 5
  • nealmcelroy TGrade1 10 hours ago When it was learned that somebody had hacked the DNC computers, Comey's boys from the FBI showed up and asked to see and investigate and inspect the servers. And Debbie "Blabbermouth" Schultz told 'em to go pound sand. "We're not letting you look at our servers! We've been breaking the law left and right. We got a scheme going here to deny Bernie Sanders the nomination. We've rigged this for Hillary Clinton. I'll be damned if we're gonna let you and the FBI in here to find it." Comey said, "Oh, okay," and the FBI slinks away. I mean, Debbie "Blabbermouth" Schultz does scare me too. Can you imagine being married to that? Anyway So the DNC turned They turned to a third-party forensic unit, an outfit called CrowdStrike. Now, CrowdStrike is a domestic computer forensics firm, private sector. The FBI's got all these forensics investigators, they've got these massive hackers themselves, and they've got massive tools, and the DNC and Debbie "Blabbermouth" told 'em to pound sand. CrowdStrike comes in there, and the FBI just accepted what CrowdStrike said. They just accepted it -- and, of course, nothing to see here. What they were looking for is evidence that the Trump team had hacked in, but Trump didn't have anybody who knew how to do this. The founder's actually Russian, but he's worked with the Ukrainians. CrowdStrike - sound familiar?
cjones1 1 day ago Nancy Pelosi's Democrats had their emails exfiltrated by the Awan brothers and several national security sensitive email accounts of ranking House Democratic Committee members (Homeland Security, Foreign Affairs, & Intelligence) were accessed illegally. Perhaps CrowdStrike helped Nancy cover up the House Democrats with their email scandal when they muddied the truth concerning the DNC email scandal where the Awan brothers also operated. It could be the Pelosis are paying up. Reply 34
el tejano perdido 21 hours ago Decades ago concern was expressed about the revolving door between people in government and lobbyists. The relationship was too cozy and led to improprieties, and both major political parties were complicit. Nowadays we have an incestuous relationship of collusion between democrat politicians, democrat operatives in the executive branch, and democrat media. A case in point is Shawn Henry, CEO at CrowdStrike, at the center of the DNC data breach attempt and at the core of the democrat conspiracy to attack candidate Trump to skew the results of the 2016 election and when that failed, to overthrow a duly-elected president. Pelosi's conflict of interest aside (which she by law is supposed to report), Henry previously worked as assistant director to Rbt. Mueller at the FBI, and also previously worked for MSNBC. This is as cozy as it gets. DC truly is a swamp, exactly the type of corruption our Founding Fathers were trying to prevent.

[Oct 11, 2020] Pelosis Take a Big Stake in CrowdStrike, Democrat-Connected Linchpin of Russia Probe - RealClearInvestigations

Oct 11, 2020 | www.realclearinvestigations.com

The cybersecurity firm CrowdStrike rose to global prominence in mid-June 2016 when it publicly accused Russia of hacking the Democratic National Committee and stealing its data. The previously unknown company's explosive allegation set off a seismic chain of events that engulfs U.S. national politics to this day. The Hillary Clinton campaign seized on CrowdStrike's claim by accusing Russia of meddling in the election to help Donald Trump. U.S. intelligence officials would soon also endorse CrowdStrike's allegation and pursue what amounted to a multi-year, all-consuming investigation of Russian interference and Trump's potential complicity.

With the next presidential election now in its final weeks, the Democrats' national leader, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, and her husband, Paul Pelosi, are endorsing the publicly traded firm in a different way. Recent financial disclosure filings show the couple have invested up to $1 million in CrowdStrike Holdings. The Pelosis purchased the stock at a share price of $129.25 on Sept. 3. At the time of this article's publication, the price has risen to $142.97.

Drew Hammill, spokesman for Pelosi, said: "Speaker Pelosi is not involved in her husband's investments and was not aware of the investment until the required filing was made. Mr. Pelosi is a private investor and has investments in a number of publicly traded companies. The Speaker fully complies with House Rules and the relevant statutory requirements."

The Pelosis' sizeable investment in CrowdStrike could revive scrutiny of the company's involvement in the Trump-Russia saga since the Democrats' 2016 election loss.

Dmitri Alperovitch: The CrowdStrike co-founder reportedly was thanked by a senior U.S. official "for pushing the government along" in its DNC hacking probe. CrowdStrike.com

After generating the hacking allegation against Russia in 2016, CrowdStrike played a critical role in the FBI's ensuing investigation of the DNC data theft. CrowdStrike executives shared intelligence with the FBI on a consistent basis, making dozens of contacts in the investigation's early months. According to Esquire, when U.S. intelligence officials first accused Russia of conducting malicious cyber activity in October 2016, a senior U.S. government official personally alerted CrowdStrike co-founder Dmitri Alperovitch and thanked him "for pushing the government along." The final reports of both Special Counsel Robert Mueller and the Senate Intelligence Committee cite CrowdStrike's forensics. The firm's centrality to Russiagate has drawn the ire of President Trump. During the fateful July 2019 phone call that would later trigger impeachment proceedings, Trump asked Ukraine's Volodymyr Zelensky to scrutinize CrowdStrike's role in the DNC server breach, suggesting that the company may have been involved in hiding the real perpetrators.

Pelosi's recent investment in CrowdStrike also adds a new partisan entanglement for a company with significant connections to Democratic Party and intelligence officials that drove Russiagate.

DNC law firm Perkins Coie hired CrowdStrike to investigate the breach in late April 2016. At the outset, Perkins Coie attorney Michael Sussmann personally informed CrowdStrike officials that Russia was suspected of breaching the server. By the time CrowdStrike went public with the Russian hacking allegation less than two months later, Perkins Coie had recently hired Fusion GPS, the opposition research firm that produced discredited Steele dossier alleging a longstanding conspiracy between Trump and Russia.

Shawn Henry: Behind closed doors, the CrowdStrike president admitted under oath in December 2017 that his firm "did not have concrete evidence" that Russian hackers actually stole any emails or other data from the DNC servers. "There's circumstantial evidence, but no evidence that they were actually exfiltrated." CrowdStrike.com

CrowdStrike President Shawn Henry, who led the team that remediated the DNC breach and blamed Russia for the hacking, previously served as assistant director at the FBI under Robert Mueller. Since June 2015, Henry has also worked as an analyst at MSNBC, the cable network that has promoted debunked Trump-Russia innuendo perhaps more than any other outlet. Alperovitch, the co-founder and former chief technology officer, is a former nonresident senior fellow at the Atlantic Council, the Washington organization that actively lobbies for a hawkish posture toward Russia.

Campaign disclosures also show that CrowdStrike contributed $100,000 to the Democratic Governors Association in 2016 and 2017.

The firm's multiple conflicts of interest in the Russia investigation coincide with a series of embarrassing disclosures that call into question its technical reliability.

In early 2017, CrowdStrike was forced to retract its allegation that Russia had hacked Ukrainian military equipment with the same malware the firm claimed to have discovered inside the DNC server.

During the FBI's investigation of the DNC breach, CrowdStrike never provided direct access to the pilfered servers, rebuffing multiple requests that came from officials all the way up to then-Director James Comey. The FBI had to rely on CrowdStrike's own images of the servers, as well as reports that Justice Department officials later acknowledged were delivered in incomplete, redacted form. James Trainor, who served as assistant director of the FBI's Cyber Division, complained to the Senate Intelligence Committee that the DNC's cooperation with the FBI's 2016 hack investigation was "slow and laborious in many respects" and that CrowdStrike's information was "scrubbed" before it was handed over. Alperovitch, the former CTO, has claimed that CrowdStrike installed its Falcon software to protect the DNC server on May 5, 2016. Yet the Democratic Party emails were stolen from the server three weeks later, from May 25 to June 1.

Yet the most damaging revelation calling into question CrowdStrike's Russian hacking allegations came with an admission early in the Russia probe that was only made public this year. Unsealed testimony from the House Intelligence Committee shows that Henry admitted under oath behind closed doors in December 2017 that the firm "did not have concrete evidence" that Russian hackers actually stole any emails or other data from the DNC servers. "There's circumstantial evidence, but no evidence that they were actually exfiltrated," Henry said. "There are times when we can see data exfiltrated, and we can say conclusively. But in this case it appears it was set up to be exfiltrated, but we just don't have the evidence that says it actually left."

The Henry testimony was among a trove of damning transcripts released by House Intelligence Committee Chairman Adam Schiff only after pressure from the then-acting Director of the Office of the Director of National Intelligence, Richard Grenell.

As RealClearInvestigations reported last month, Henry's House testimony also conflicts with his testimony before the Senate Intelligence Committee two months prior, in October 2017. According to the Senate report, Henry claimed that CrowdStrike was "able to see some exfiltration and the types of files that had been touched," but not the files' content. Yet two months later, Henry told the House that "we didn't see the data leave, but we believe it left, based on what we saw."

Notably, Henry's acknowledgment to the House that CrowdStrike did not have evidence of exfiltration came only after he was interrupted and prodded by his attorneys to correct an initial answer. Right before that intervention from CrowdStrike counsel, Henry had falsely asserted that he knew when Russian hackers had exfiltrated the stolen information:

Adam Schiff: CrowdStrike testimony was released by the House Intelligence Committee chairman only after pressure from the then-acting Director of National Intelligence, Richard Grenell. AP Photo/Alex Brandon

Adam Schiff: Do you know the date in which the Russians exfiltrated the data from the DNC?

Shawn Henry: I do. I have to just think about it. I don't know. I mean, it's in our report that I think the Committee has.

Schiff: And, to the best of your recollection, when would that have been?

Henry: Counsel just reminded me that, as it relates to the DNC, we have indicators that data was exfiltrated. We do not have concrete evidence that data was exfiltrated from the DNC, but we have indicators that it was exfiltrated.

Henry then improbably argued that, in the absence of evidence showing the emails leaving the DNC server, Russian hackers could have taken individual screenshots of each of the 44,053 emails and 17,761 attachments that were ultimately put out by WikiLeaks.

Keeping Henry's admission under wraps for nearly four years was highly consequential. The allegation of Russian hacking was elevated to a dire national security issue, and anyone who dared to question it – including President Trump – was accused of doing the Kremlin's bidding. The hacking allegation also helped plunge U.S.-Russia relations to new lows. Under persistent bipartisan pressure over allegations of Russian meddling, Trump has approved a series of punitive measures and aggressive policies toward Moscow, shunning his own campaign vow to seek cooperation.

Wikipedia/CrowdStrike.com

Meanwhile, during the several years that CrowdStrike's own uncertainty about its hacking allegation was kept from the public, the firm has enjoyed a stratospheric rise on Wall Street. In 2017, one year after lodging its Russia hacking allegations, CrowdStrike had a valuation of $1 billion. Three years later, after going public in 2019, the firm's valuation was set at $6.7 billion, and soon hit $11.4 billion. Just over a year later, its market cap was $31.37 billion. CrowdStrike has more than doubled its revenue on average every year, going from $52.75 million in 2017 to $481.41 million in 2020.

CrowdStrike and Fusion GPS, which spread Trump-Russia collusion allegations via the Steele dossier, are not the only private companies to play a critical and lucrative role in the Trump-Russia saga.

The firm New Knowledge, staffed by several former Democratic Party operatives and intelligence officials, authored a disputed report for the Senate Intelligence Committee that accused a Russian troll farm of a sophisticated social media interference campaign that duped millions of vulnerable Americans. Ironically, the company itself took part in a social media disinformation operation in the 2017 Alabama Senate race to help elect the ultimate victor, Democratic candidate Doug Jones. Just as the Democratic Party's impeachment proceedings were in full swing a year ago, another cybersecurity firm with Democratic Party ties, Area One, accused the Russian spy agency GRU of hacking into the Ukrainian company Burisma with the aim of uncovering dirt on Joe Biden. Graphika, a firm with extensive ties to the Atlantic Council and the Pentagon, has recently put out reports accusing Russians of impersonating left-wing and right-wing websites to fool hyper-partisan American audiences.

Having generated the seminal Russian hacking allegation, CrowdStrike sits at the top of what has become a booming cottage industry of firms and organizations to help shape the multi-year barrage of Russia fear-mongering and innuendo. And with her new investment in CrowdStrike, Nancy Pelosi -- the highest-ranking elected official of a party that has promoted Russiagate above all else -- is already profiting from its success.

This and all other original articles created by RealClearInvestigations may be republished for free with attribution. (These terms do not apply to outside articles linked on the site, nor to any photos or images that appear with articles.)

[Oct 11, 2020] The firm s multiple conflicts of interest in the Russia investigation coincide with a series of embarrassing disclosures that call into question its technical reliability.

Notable quotes:
"... WikiLeaks released the most damaging disclosure up to that point from what it called "Vault 7" – a treasure trove of CIA cybertools leaked from CIA files. This disclosure featured the tool "Marble Framework," which enabled the CIA to hack into computers, disguise who hacked in, and falsely attribute the hack to someone else by leaving so-called telltale signs – like Cyrillic, for example. The CIA documents also showed that the "Marble" tool had been employed in 2016. This is why the real reason CIA wants Assange. Why didn't Comey ever take the actual servers? Comey explained "A Higher Loyalty." He wrote, "I was making decisions in an environment where Hillary Clinton was sure to be the next president." ..."
"... BREAKING: Crowdstrike Payments Coincide With Deaths Of Seth Rich, Shawn Lucas – Disobedient Media ..."
"... The Pelosi family, like the Feinstein, Obama, Clinton, and Biden families, has grown filthy rich by trading on their political connections and high offices. ..."
"... All of these democrats, are Corrupt Billionaires, that cheat and steal from the American TaxPayers! ..."
Oct 11, 2020 | www.realclearinvestigations.com

Sargon 1 day ago "The firm's multiple conflicts of interest in the Russia investigation coincide with a series of embarrassing disclosures that call into question its technical reliability." Then you read this: "Meanwhile, during the several years that CrowdStrike's own uncertainty about its hacking allegation was kept from the public, the firm has enjoyed a stratospheric rise on Wall Street." Good work, if you can get it. Be incompetent at your job, and get rich.

  • Sargon 13 hours ago One of many reasons we called them demorats. Reply 15
  • cupera1 Sargon 14 hours ago Crowd Strikes claim of DNC/Russia hack was some code that Russia used to hack a Ukrainian Altillary AP. That hack never happened and the company had to walk that accusation back. Reply 10
  • el tejano perdido 21 hours ago Decades ago concern was expressed about the revolving door between people in government and lobbyists. The relationship was too cozy and led to improprieties, and both major political parties were complicit. Nowadays we have an incestuous relationship of collusion between democrat politicians, democrat operatives in the executive branch, and democrat media. A case in point is Shawn Henry, CEO at CrowdStrike, at the center of the DNC data breach attempt and at the core of the democrat conspiracy to attack candidate Trump to skew the results of the 2016 election and when that failed, to overthrow a duly-elected president. Pelosi's conflict of interest aside (which she by law is supposed to report), Henry previously worked as assistant director to Rbt. Mueller at the FBI, and also previously worked for MSNBC. This is as cozy as it gets. DC truly is a swamp, exactly the type of corruption our Founding Fathers were trying to prevent. Reply 36
    • Martyvan90 el tejano perdido 10 hours ago One of the best things about the Trump era is the transparency we've experienced- Trump is pretty much an open book and the press was relentless (as well as deranged, self important and at times delusional) in pursuit of all things Trump. When Trump leaves office we'll go back to secretive politicians and if a democrat, a duplicitous press. Reply 5 1
  • cjones1 1 day ago Nancy Pelosi's Democrats had their emails exfiltrated by the Awan brothers and several national security sensitive email accounts of ranking House Democratic Committee members (Homeland Security, Foreign Affairs, & Intelligence) were accessed illegally. Perhaps CrowdStrike helped Nancy cover up the House Democrats with their email scandal when they muddied the truth concerning the DNC email scandal where the Awan brothers also operated. It could be the Pelosis are paying up. Reply 34
    • JohnGalt cjones1 15 hours ago Yes, and notice how the FBI is covering up the Russiagate hoax, just like the Clinton emails and all of the other DNC crimes. So they are little more than the Deep State coverup agency now. Reply 29 1 Show 2 more replies
  • TGrade1 14 hours ago Adam Schiff has irrefutable proof Trump conspired with Russia to steal the election. Well Adam...we're still waiting. Someone in your position should be impeached for implying this when it isn't true. Reply 32
  • Linda Curran 15 hours ago Crowdstrike aside, Adam Schiff sat on testimony that showed they couldn't prove the Russian's exfiltrated data from the DNC servers and then publicaly pushed the narrative that they did and that they did it to help the Trump campaign. Where were the Republican members of this committee? And this is not a matter of national security? This person is still the chair of the House Intelligence Committee? If this alone doesn't demonstrate how broken and corrupt our government is, I don't know what does. And these clowns are pointing fingers at Donald Trump as the bad guy? Reply 27
  • Jeff Bowman 1 day ago 60 Minutes exposed Pelosi's corruption and conflicting interests over 10 years ago. This story should surprise no one. "All Roads lead to Putin"... Reply 23
  • Lee Donowitz 13 hours ago Nancy Pelosi won't live forever. In the meantime I hear Crowdstrike commercials on Conservative radio almost on a daily basis. Someone should prominent on our side should lead a boycott of anything/everything Crowdstrike. Let's get that stock price down WAY below corrupt Pelosi and her husband bought it at. Reply 9
  • CJT 1 day ago When asked for comment, Nancy put down her Vodka Bottle and said, well as usual she said a bunch of stuff that made absolutely no sense... Reply 41 1
  • OtherWay 1 day ago Welcome to the swamp. Reply 25
    • houmaindian OtherWay 16 hours ago As much as I do not like DJT, I must admit he taught me the swamp was huge and well oiled. Reply 27 Show 1 more replies
  • norgan 1 day ago I think that anyone who thinks that Pelosi doesn't know what her husband's doing, is FULLA 💩. And A LIAR. Just like her, and her husband.
  • TGrade1 14 hours ago Dems wouldn't let the FBI examine the DNC server--only Crowdstrike, a company whose founder and CTO is Russian! Reply 9
    • nealmcelroy TGrade1 10 hours ago Transcript of Donald Trump's Ukraine phone call shows he pushed for investigation. Trump wants to know about CrowdStrike. Trump wants to fully expose what happened in 2016. He wants to drain the swamp. He wants to expose all of the corruption and the shenanigans that have been going on in this country, in the deep state for decades. He doesn't care who he runs against in 2020. He isn't trying to eliminate Biden from the race as much as he wants to expose the corruption surrounding the Obama administration! Reply 5
    • nealmcelroy TGrade1 10 hours ago When it was learned that somebody had hacked the DNC computers, Comey's boys from the FBI showed up and asked to see and investigate and inspect the servers. And Debbie "Blabbermouth" Schultz told 'em to go pound sand. "We're not letting you look at our servers! We've been breaking the law left and right. We got a scheme going here to deny Bernie Sanders the nomination. We've rigged this for Hillary Clinton. I'll be damned if we're gonna let you and the FBI in here to find it." Comey said, "Oh, okay," and the FBI slinks away. I mean, Debbie "Blabbermouth" Schultz does scare me too. Can you imagine being married to that? Anyway So the DNC turned They turned to a third-party forensic unit, an outfit called CrowdStrike. Now, CrowdStrike is a domestic computer forensics firm, private sector. The FBI's got all these forensics investigators, they've got these massive hackers themselves, and they've got massive tools, and the DNC and Debbie "Blabbermouth" told 'em to pound sand. CrowdStrike comes in there, and the FBI just accepted what CrowdStrike said. They just accepted it -- and, of course, nothing to see here. What they were looking for is evidence that the Trump team had hacked in, but Trump didn't have anybody who knew how to do this. The founder's actually Russian, but he's worked with the Ukrainians. CrowdStrike - sound familiar? Reply 3 1
  • ppalmerj38 14 hours ago Only God knows what Pelosi/Satan are doing! We can not do anything against such evil as humans but one day Pelosi and the Dems will answer to a Righteous Judge for their evil! Don't think the outcome will be pretty! Reply 9
    • TGrade1 ppalmerj38 14 hours ago But you can do something. Vote a straight Republican ticket. Reply 21 Show 1 more replies
  • CrazyLady 11 hours ago On March 31, 2017 WikiLeaks released the most damaging disclosure up to that point from what it called "Vault 7" – a treasure trove of CIA cybertools leaked from CIA files. This disclosure featured the tool "Marble Framework," which enabled the CIA to hack into computers, disguise who hacked in, and falsely attribute the hack to someone else by leaving so-called telltale signs – like Cyrillic, for example. The CIA documents also showed that the "Marble" tool had been employed in 2016. This is why the real reason CIA wants Assange. Why didn't Comey ever take the actual servers? Comey explained "A Higher Loyalty." He wrote, "I was making decisions in an environment where Hillary Clinton was sure to be the next president." Reply 3
  • merkinmuffy 16 hours ago "The Pig" may not have been aware of her husband's investments, but she and her Party sure benefitted from them. And don't think her husband didn't know it, either! And notice she's still plugging the Russia hoax! Reply 5
  • Popeye2 14 hours ago Our leaders and all of Congress benefiting from a commie country? Cmon man Reply 5
  • TheMule999 13 hours ago Crowdstrike isn't a "cybersecurity" firm. They're a criminal services agency for when dirty members of government want evidence destroyed and witnesses murdered. Reply 2
  • Serialist 7 hours ago Huge investments in salesforce too. There was huge money thrown in minutes before the last earnings call. Definitely some insider trading. Reply
  • Right Not Wrong 4 hours ago The whole point of these financial disclosure form requirements is so that public "servants" WILL know what they and their families are investing in, and act properly about it (avoid conflict of interest, insider trading, etc.). Instead, they just go with the weak, slimy, supposedly-plausible deniability -- "I don't know what my husband does. I just report it to the public every year as required by law." (Never mind it was required by law to prevent the exact sort of corruption of which you claim ignorance.) You don't know what your husband does? Then GO FIND OUT! BE INFORMED! BE ON THE UP AND UP! Surely you've never "just happened to" share important information with your husband, who "unbeknownst" to you, goes and makes a pretty profit of of it... surely. Trump didn't become president because he's a friendly, pious, classy guy. He became president because the D.C. swamp is full of hypocritical fakes, who are at least as bad as Trump but put on a "presidential" or "professional" or "sophisticated" facade - and people are fed up with it. Reply 1
  • Jonathan Galt 13 hours ago Well, it's good that Nancy is putting the noose around her own neck. Reply 4
  • sueg213 7 hours ago Let's not forget this as well, should be part of the record. BREAKING: Crowdstrike Payments Coincide With Deaths Of Seth Rich, Shawn Lucas – Disobedient Media
  • amathonn 4 hours ago So are you saying the democrats are crooked? Reply 2
  • larrydoyle 1 day ago This is a ridiculous story. Sound and fury, etc. (Though I'm guessing it's mostly boilerplate). The supposed news is that the Paul Pelosi bought stock in Crowdstrike (NASDAQ: CRWD), and then the insinuation is... what? That he's somehow paying them back? Well, the company gets nothing when its stock is traded, except perhaps a boost if people are buying it. ... See more Reply 2 26 Show 2 previous replies
    • Htos 1 larrydoyle 13 hours ago You can tell it's a progtarded pajeet, yoshi, or achmed posting when it's a "white" southern "profile' begging for billary.... Reply 2
    • Thinkitthrough larrydoyle 15 hours ago When you buy a companies stock you are effectively making a loan to the company with the expectation of gaining a return on your investment. Stock purchase price $129.25 Stock value now $142.97 gain on investment $13.72 per share $1,000,000 divided by the stock purchase price of $129.25 equals 7,737 shares. 7,737 multiplied by $13.72 equals a profit of $106,151.64 gained in only two months. Smells highly of insider trading. Somehow, you can tell us that this article is " Just sound and fury". Is the article "Just sound and fury" or is your comment "Just sound and fury" Reply 5
  • olderwiser 10 hours ago The Pelosi family, like the Feinstein, Obama, Clinton, and Biden families, has grown filthy rich by trading on their political connections and high offices. We'll never know the depths of their treason. Swamp creatures cover up for one another.
  • namut 9 hours ago All of these democrats, are Corrupt Billionaires, that cheat and steal from the American TaxPayers! Look at them, Biden, Harris, Pelosi, Schumer, Schiff, Warren, and Clyburn! They should all be arrested, and thrown in Jail, for Treason! American. Patriots, Stand Up and Vote For President Trump!

[Oct 05, 2020] How The DNC Hired CrowdStrike To Frame Russia For The Hack- Excerpt -

Oct 05, 2020 | www.zerohedge.com

How The DNC Hired CrowdStrike To Frame Russia For The Hack: Excerpt

by Tyler Durden Sun, 10/04/2020 - 20:50 Twitter Facebook Reddit Email Print

Submitted by Thomas Farnan, originally published in The National Pulse

U.S. Director of National Intelligence John Ratcliffe recently declassified information indicating the CIA obtained intelligence in 2016 that the Russians believed the Clinton campaign was trying to falsely associate Russia with the so-called hack of DNC computers. CIA Director John Brennan shared the intelligence with President Obama. They knew, in other words, that the DNC was conducting false Russian flag operation against the Trump campaign . The following is an exclusive excerpt from The Russia Lie that tells the amazing story in detail:

On March 19, 2016, Hillary Clinton's campaign chairman, John Podesta, surrendered his emails to an unknown entity in a "spear phishing" scam. This has been called a "hack," but it was not. Instead, it was the sort of flim-flam hustle that happens to gullible dupes on the internet.

The content of the emails was beyond embarrassing. They showed election fraud and coordination with the media against the candidacy of Bernie Sanders. The DNC and the Clinton campaign needed a cover story.

Blaming Russia would be a handy way to deal with the Podesta emails. There was already an existing Russia operation that could easily be retrofitted to this purpose. The problem was that it was nearly impossible to identify the perpetrator in a phishing scheme using computer forensic tools.

The only way to associate Putin with the emails was circumstantially.

The DNC retained a company that called itself "CrowdStrike" to provide assistance. CrowdStrike's chief technology officer and co-founder, Dmitri Alperovitch, is an anti-Putin, Russian expat and a senior fellow at the Atlantic Council .

With the Atlantic Council in 2016, all roads led to Ukraine. The Atlantic Council's list of significant contributors includes Ukrainian billionaire Victor Pinchuk.

The Ukrainian energy company that was paying millions to an entity that was funneling large amounts to Hunter Biden months after he was discharged from the US Navy for drug use, Burisma, also appears prominently on the Atlantic Council's donor list.

https://lockerdome.com/lad/13084989113709670?pubid=ld-dfp-ad-13084989113709670-0&pubo=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.zerohedge.com&rid=www.zerohedge.com&width=890

Arseniy Yatsenyuk, the Western puppet installed in Ukraine, visited the Atlantic Council's Washington offices to make a speech weeks after the coup.

Pinchuk was also a big donor (between $10 million and $20 million) to the Clinton Foundation. Back in '15, the Wall Street Journal published an investigative piece , " Clinton Charity Tapped Foreign Friends ." The piece was about how Ukraine was attempting to influence Clinton by making huge donations through Pinchuk. Foreign interference, anyone?

On June 12, 2016, WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange announced : "We have upcoming leaks in relation to Hillary Clinton . . . We have emails pending publication."

Two days later, CrowdStrike fed the Washington Post a story , headlined, "Russian government hackers penetrated DNC, stole opposition research on Trump." The improbable tale was that the Russians had hacked the DNC computer servers and got away with some opposition research on Trump. The article quoted Alperovitch of CrowdStrike and the Atlantic Council.

The next day, a new blog – Guccifer 2.0 – appeared on the internet and announced:

Worldwide known cyber security company CrowdStrike announced that the Democratic National Committee (DNC) servers had been hacked by "sophisticated" hacker groups.

I'm very pleased the company appreciated my skills so highly))) But in fact, it was easy, very easy.

Guccifer may have been the first one who penetrated Hillary Clinton's and other Democrats' mail servers. But he certainly wasn't the last. No wonder any other hacker could easily get access to the DNC's servers.

Shame on CrowdStrike: Do you think I've been in the DNC's networks for almost a year and saved only 2 documents? Do you really believe it?

Here are just a few docs from many thousands I extracted when hacking into DNC's network.

Guccifer 2.0 posted hundreds of pages of Trump opposition research allegedly hacked from the DNC and emailed copies to Gawker and The Smoking Gun . In raw form, the opposition research was one of the documents obtained in the Podesta emails, with a notable difference: It was widely reported the document now contained " Russian fingerprints ."

The document had been cut and pasted into a separate Russian Word template that yielded an abundance of Russian "error "messages . In the document's metadata was the name of the Russian secret police founder, Felix Dzerzhinsky, written in the Russian language.

The three-parenthesis formulation from the original post ")))" is the Russian version of a smiley face used commonly on social media. In addition, the blog's author deliberately used a Russian VPN service visible in its emails even though there would have been many options to hide any national affiliation.

Under the circumstances, the FBI should have analyzed the DNC computers to confirm the Guccifer hack. Incredibly, though, the inspection was done by CrowdStrike, the same Atlantic Council-connected private contractor paid by the DNC that had already concluded in The Washington Post that there was a hack and Putin was behind it.

CrowdStrike would declare the "hack" to be the work of sophisticated Russian spies. Alperovitch described it as, " skilled operational tradecraft ."

There is nothing skilled, though, in ham-handedly disclosing a Russian identity when trying to hide it. The more reasonable inference is that this was a set-up. It certainly looks like Guccifer 2.0 suddenly appeared in coordination with the Washington Post 's article that appeared the previous day.

FBI Director James Comey confirmed in testimony to the Senate Intelligence Committee in January 2017 that the FBI's failure to inspect the computers was unusual to say the least. "We'd always prefer to have access hands-on ourselves if that's possible," he said.

But the DNC rebuffed the FBI's request to inspect the hardware. Comey added that the DNC's hand-picked investigator, CrowdStrike, is "a highly respected private company."

What he did not reveal was that CrowdStrike never corroborated a hack by forensic analysis. In testimony released in 2020, it was revealed that CrowdStrike admitted to Congressional investigators as early as 2017 that it had no direct evidence of Russian hacking.

CrowdStrike's president Shawn Henry testified, "There's not evidence that [documents and emails] were actually exfiltrated [from the DNC servers]. There's circumstantial evidence but no evidence that they were actually exfiltrated."

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The circumstantial evidence was Guccifer 2.0.

This was a crucial revelation because the thousand ships of Russiagate launched upon the positive assertion that CrowdStrike had definitely proven a Russian hack. Yet this fact was kept from the American public for more than three years.

The reasonable inference is that the DNC was trying to frame Russia and the FBI and intelligence agencies were going along with the scheme because of political pressure.

Those who assert that it is a "conspiracy theory" to say that CrowdStrike would fabricate the results of computer forensic testing to create a false Russian flag should know that it was caught doing exactly that around the time it was inspecting the DNC computers.

On Dec. 22, 2016, CrowdStrike caused an international stir when it claimed to have uncovered evidence that Russians hacked into a Ukrainian artillery computer app to help pro-Russian separatists. Voice of America later determined the claim was false , and CrowdStrike retracted its finding.

Ukraine's Ministry of Defense was forced to eat crow and admit that the hacking never happened.

If you wanted a computer testing firm to fabricate a Russian hack for political reasons in 2016, CrowdStrike was who you went out and hired.

To read the rest of the story, click The Russia Lie: How the Military Industrial Complex Targeted Trump and buy the ebook for just $5.
play_arrow LEEPERMAX , 4 minutes ago

Nobody faces consequences

No one is gonna go ta jail

And everyone walks

[Sep 24, 2020] Why Crowdstrike's Russian Hacking Story Fell Apart- Say Hello to Fancy Bear Washington's Blog

Sep 24, 2020 | washingtonsblog.com

  • Carl_Herman 2 years ago ,

    Thank you, George, for demonstrating the need for professional standards to discern objective facts from bullshit.

    This case study reveals what "We the People" constantly endure of bullshit from our .01% "leaders" to hide a rogue state empire, and God knows what else. Until we reach critical mass to recognize criminal bullshit lies connected to Wars of Aggression, looting, and Orwellian "leadership", this "fake news" is all we'll receive.

    It's up to us to provide real leadership for Truth. We'll see what develops.

    George Eliason Carl_Herman 2 years ago ,

    Thank you.

    Guy W Jordan George Eliason a month ago ,

    Crowdstrike waited 36 days to do anything about the alleged "Russian Hack." During that time, most of the damaging emails were sent and received, which means came into existence. The Best Practices of Incident Response require rapid containment of any hack in order to protect client private data, particularly the Donor Information that was also stolen along with the emails and VoiP telephone conversations. Now, just how can this kind of work product be either justified, or be given any credibility is beyond my understanding.

    The DNC didn't have to lose ONE EMAIL. The fact that t hey did was entirely the doing of Crowdstrike. All they had to do is disconnect the DNC network from the Internet for 12-to-36 hours, and the hack is over. There was no excuse for this, and WHY are these Crowdstrike characters getting off from answering questions for what they did, and did NOT do, during their alleged Incident Response engagement at the DNC.

    "Did Crowdstrike wait 36 days to do anything about the alleged "Russian hack" so that the damaging emails could all be created so that they could be stolen and given to Wikileaks?" This is a legitimate and reasonable question. After all, it is a principle of law that: "It is reasonable to conclude that a person intends the natural consequences of their actions."

[Aug 19, 2020] The Committee Intelligence Committee relied on the same intelligence sources that fabricated the Russiagate scenario in the first place

Aug 19, 2020 | www.moonofalabama.org

Rob , Aug 19 2020 19:19 utc | 53

Actually, after only a quick review of some of the news reports, it appears that the Senate Committee placed great importance on the "fact" that Russia was involved in the "hacking" of emails from the DNC. This suggests that the Committee relied on the same intelligence sources that fabricated the Russiagate scenario in the first place. I guess that the Republicans on the Committee have not kept up with revelations that there is no evidence of any such hacking. Hence, the Committee's conclusions are likely based on the same old disinformation and can be readily dismissed.

[Aug 19, 2020] The Republican led Senate Select Committee on Intelligence repeats the lies about Guccifer 2.0

Highly recommended!
Looks like RussiaGate was a bipartisan affair. After all Parteigenosse Mueller was a Republican
Aug 19, 2020 | www.zerohedge.com
play_arrow

amnesia , 5 minutes ago

Very telling that ZH editors don't consider this newsworthy: key findings of the Republican led Senate Select Committee on Intelligence regarding Russia's 2016 election interference.

Manafort and Kilimnik talked almost daily during the campaign. They communicated through encrypted technologies set to automatically erase their correspondence; they spoke using code words and shared access to an email account. It's worth pausing on these facts: The chairman of the Trump campaign was in daily contact with a Russian agent, constantly sharing confidential information with him.

It did not find evidence that the Ukrainian government meddled in the 2016 election, as Trump alleged. "The Committee's efforts focused on investigating Russian interference in the 2016 election. However, during the course of the investigation, the Committee identified no reliable evidence that the Ukrainian government interfered in the 2016 U.S. election."

"Taken as a whole, Manafort's high-level access and willingness to share information with individuals closely affiliated with the Russian intelligence services, particularly [Konstantin] Kilimnik and associates of Oleg Deripaska, represented a grave counterintelligence threat," the report said.

Kilimnik "almost certainly helped arrange some of the first public messaging that Ukraine had interfered in the U.S. election."

Roger Stone was in communications with both WikiLeaks and the Russian hacker Guccifer 2.0 during the election; according to the Mueller report, Guccifer 2.0 was a conduit set up by Russian military intelligence to anonymously funnel stolen information to WikiLeaks.

The Senate Intelligence Committee's investigation found "significant evidence to suggest that, in the summer of 2016, WikiLeaks was knowingly collaborating with Russian government officials," the report said.

The FBI gave "unjustified credence" to the so-called Steele dossier, an explosive collections of uncorroborated memos alleging collusion between the Trump campaign and Russian government officials, the report said. The FBI did not take the "necessary steps to validate assumptions about Steele's credibility" before relying on the dossier to seek renewals of a surveillance warrant targeting the former Trump campaign aide, the report said.

Demeter55 , 47 minutes ago

It's the latest in 5 years of "Get Trump!", a sitcom featuring the Roadrunner (Trump) and the Wiley Coyote (Deep State/Never Trumpers / etc, etc.)

This classic scenario never fails to please those who realize that the roadrunner rules, and the coyote invariably ends up destroyed.

gene5722 , 2 hours ago

The lie msm won't let die.

[Aug 16, 2020] CIA Behind Guccifer Russiagate A Plausible Scenario

Highly recommended!
Aug 16, 2020 | www.zerohedge.com

If Zerohedge comment reflect general population sentiments this is clear sign of the crisis of legitimacy of neoliberal élite.

Via The Strategic Culture Foundation,

William Binney is the former technical director of the U.S. National Security Agency who worked at the agency for 30 years. He is a respected independent critic of how American intelligence services abuse their powers to illegally spy on private communications of U.S. citizens and around the globe.

Given his expert inside knowledge, it is worth paying attention to what Binney says.

In a media interview this week, he dismissed the so-called Russiagate scandal as a "fabrication" orchestrated by the American Central Intelligence Agency. Many other observers have come to the same conclusion about allegations that Russia interfered in the 2016 U.S. elections with the objective of helping Donald Trump get elected.

But what is particularly valuable about Binney's judgment is that he cites technical analysis disproving the Russiagate narrative. That narrative remains dominant among U.S. intelligence officials, politicians and pundits, especially those affiliated with the Democrat party, as well as large sections of Western media. The premise of the narrative is the allegation that a Russian state-backed cyber operation hacked into the database and emails of the Democrat party back in 2016. The information perceived as damaging to presidential candidate Hillary Clinton was subsequently disseminated to the Wikileaks whistleblower site and other U.S. media outlets.

A mysterious cyber persona known as "Guccifer 2.0" claimed to be the alleged hacker. U.S. intelligence and news media have attributed Guccifer as a front for Russian cyber operations.

Notably, however, the Russian government has always categorically denied any involvement in alleged hacking or other interference in the 2016 U.S. election, or elections thereafter.

William Binney and other independent former U.S. intelligence experts say they can prove the Russiagate narrative is bogus. The proof relies on their forensic analysis of the data released by Guccifer. The analysis of timestamps demonstrates that the download of voluminous data could not have been physically possible based on known standard internet speeds. These independent experts conclude that the data from the Democrat party could not have been hacked, as Guccifer and Russiagaters claim. It could only have been obtained by a leak from inside the party, perhaps by a disgruntled staffer who downloaded the information on to a disc. That is the only feasible way such a huge amount of data could have been released. That means the "Russian hacker" claims are baseless.

Wikileaks, whose founder Julian Assange is currently imprisoned in Britain pending an extradition trial to the U.S. to face espionage charges, has consistently maintained that their source of files was not a hacker, nor did they collude with Russian intelligence. As a matter of principle, Wikileaks does not disclose the identity of its sources, but the organization has indicated it was an insider leak which provided the information on senior Democrat party corruption.

about:blank

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William Binney says forensic analysis of the files released by Guccifer shows that the mystery hacker deliberately inserted digital "fingerprints" in order to give the impression that the files came from Russian sources. It is known from information later disclosed by former NSA whistleblower Edward Snowden that the CIA has a secretive program – Vault 7 – which is dedicated to false incrimination of cyber attacks to other actors. It seems that the purpose of Guccifer was to create the perception of a connection between Wikileaks and Russian intelligence in order to beef up the Russiagate narrative.

"So that suggested [to] us all the evidence was pointing back to CIA as the originator [of] Guccifer 2.0. And that Guccifer 2.0 was inside CIA I'm pointing to that group as the group that was probably the originator of Guccifer 2.0 and also this fabrication of the entire story of Russiagate," concludes Binney in his interview with Sputnik news outlet.

This is not the first time that the Russiagate yarn has been debunked . But it is crucially important to make Binney's expert views more widely appreciated especially as the U.S. presidential election looms on November 3. As that date approaches, U.S. intelligence and media seem to be intensifying claims about Russian interference and cyber operations. Such wild and unsubstantiated "reports" always refer to the alleged 2016 "hack" of the Democrat party by "Guccifer 2.0" as if it were indisputable evidence of Russian interference and the "original sin" of supposed Kremlin malign activity. The unsubstantiated 2016 "hack" is continually cited as the "precedent" and "provenance" of more recent "reports" that purport to claim Russian interference.

Given the torrent of Russiagate derivatives expected in this U.S. election cycle, which is damaging U.S.-Russia bilateral relations and recklessly winding up geopolitical tensions, it is thus of paramount importance to listen to the conclusions of honorable experts like William Binney.

The American public are being played by their own intelligence agencies and corporate media with covert agendas that are deeply anti-democratic.


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lay_arrow desertboy , 13 hours ago

Well - who set up them up, converted from the OSS? The banksters.

"Wild Bill" Donovan worked for JP Morgan immediately after WWII.

"our" US intelligence agencies were set up by, and serve, the masters of high finance. Is this in dispute?

meditate_vigorously , 11 hours ago

They have seeded enough misinformation that apparently it is. But, you are correct. It is the Banksters.

Isisraelquaeda , 2 hours ago

Israel. The CIA was infiltrated by the Mossad long ago.

SurfingUSA , 15 hours ago

JFK was on to that truth, and would have been wise to mini-nuke Langley before his ill-fated journey to Dallas.

Andrew G , 11 hours ago

Except when there's something exceptionally evil (like pedo/blackmail rings such as Epstein), in which case it's Mossad / Aman

vova.2018 , 7 hours ago

Except when there's something exceptionally evil (like pedo/blackmail rings such as Epstein), in which case it's Mossad / Aman

The CIA & MOSSAD work hand in hand in all their clandestine operations. There is not doubt the CIA/MOSSAD are behind the creation, evolution, training, supplying weapons, logistic-planning & financing of the terrorists & the destruction of the Middle East. Anybody that believes the contrary has brain problems & need to have his head examined.

CIA/MOSAD has been running illegal activities in Colombia: drug, arms, organs & human (child-sex) trafficking. CIA/MOSAD is also giving training, logistic & arms to Colombia paramilitary for clandestine operation against Venezuela. After Bolsonaro became president, MOSSAD started running similar operation in Brazil. Israel & Brazil also recognizes Guaido as the legit president of Venezuela.

​​​​​​CIA/MOSSAD have a long time policy of assassinating & taking out pep who are a problem to the revisionist-zionist agenda, not just in the M-East but in the world. The CIA/MOSSAD organizations have many connections in other countries like the M-East, Saudi Arabia, UAE, et al but also to the UK-MI5.

The Israelis infiltrated the US to the highest levels a long time ago - Proof

  • Israel has & collects information (a database) of US citizens in coordination with the CIA & the 5 eyes.
  • Israel works with the NSA in the liaison-loophole operations
  • Mossad undercover operations in WDC & all over the world
  • The American Israel Public Affairs Committee – AIPAC
  • People with 2 citizenships (US/Israel) in WDC/NYC (the real Power)
  • From Steve Bannon a christian-zionist: Collusion between the Trump administration and Israel .
  • D-Trump, Ivanka Trump & husband Kushner (orthodox Juus)
  • Epstein & Ghislaine Maxwell, members of the MOSSAD ran their entire pedo-honey-pot operation for the CIA/Mossad
  • CIA/MOSSA want to punish Iran for its role in Syria's victory over ISIS (created by CIA/Mossad) - PROOF: McCain Armed ISIS https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ziNlUuc167E

New book details Israel's secret history of assassinations
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ge-mnC2wGss

CIA Assassination Manual Revealed (CIA = Cover action agency)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=s3gQfoFCpPs

GreatUncle , 6 hours ago

Well I never expected anything different.

They have a hand in everything and probably the murder of JFK.

Hell the CIA have even had their own president.

They are supposed to be commanded by the president but personally I think they are a rogue operation controlled by somebody else.

Lyman54 , 16 hours ago

Millie Weavers documentary explains everything quite well. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9HFxVvrXjCg

sborovay07 , 15 hours ago

Funny how a number of the right wing conspiracy stories according to the MSM from a couple years back were true from the get go. 1 indictment over 4 years in the greatest attempted coup in this country's history. So sad that Binney and Assange were never listened to. They can try to silence us who know of the truth, but as Winston Churchill once said, 'Truth is incontrovertible. Panic may resent it. Ignorance may deride it. Malice may distort it. But there it is.' KDP still censors my book on their advertising platform as it promotes conspiratorial theories (about the Obama led coup) and calls out BLM and Antifa for what they are (marxists) . Yet the same platform still recommends BLM books stating there is a pandemic of cops killing innocent blacks. F them!!!! #RIPSeth #FreeJulian #FreeMillie

smacker , 11 hours ago

Yes, and we all know the name of the DNC leaker who downloaded and provided WikiLeaks
with evidence of CIA and DNC corruption.
He was assassinated to prevent him from naming who Guccifer 2.0 was and where he is located.

The Russia-gate farce itself provides solid evidence that the CIA and others are in bed with DNC
and went to extraordinary lengths to prevent Trump being elected. When that failed, they instigated
a program of x-gates to get him out of office any way they could. This continues to this day.

This is treason at the highest level.

ACMeCorporations , 12 hours ago

Hacking? What Russian hacking?

In recently released testimony, the CEO of CrowdStrike admitted in congressional testimony, under oath, that it actually has no direct evidence Russia stole the DNC emails.

Nelbev , 9 hours ago

"The proof relies on their forensic analysis of the data released by Guccifer. The analysis of timestamps demonstrates that the download of voluminous data could not have been physically possible based on known standard internet speeds. ... a disgruntled staffer who downloaded the information on to a disc. That is the only feasible way such a huge amount of data could have been released. ... William Binney says forensic analysis of the files released by Guccifer shows that the mystery hacker deliberately inserted digital "fingerprints" in order to give the impression that the files came from Russian sources. ... "

Any computer file is a bunch of 1s and 0s. Anyone can change anything with a hex editor. E.g. I had wrong dates on some photographs once, downloaded as opposed to when taken, just edited the time stamp. You cannot claim any time stamp is original. If true time stamps, then the DNC files were downloaded to a thumb drive at a computer on location and not to the internet via a phone line. However anyone can change the time stamps. Stating a "mystery hacker deliberately inserted digital [Russian] 'fingerprints' " is a joke if denying the file time stamps were not tampered with. The real thing is where the narrative came from, political spin doctors, Perkins Coie law firm hired by DNC and Hillary campaign who hired Crowdstrike [and also hired Fusion GPS before for pissgate dossier propaganda and FISC warrants to spy on political opponents] and Perkins Coie edited Crowdstrike report with Russian narrative. FBI never looked at DNC servers. This is like your house was broken into. You deny police the ability to enter and look at evidence like DNC computers. You hire a private investigator to say your neighbor you do not like did it and publicise accusations. Take word of political consultants hired, spin doctor propaganda, Crowdstrike narrative , no police investigation. Atlantic Council?

Vivekwhu , 8 hours ago

The Atlantic Council is another NATO fart. Nuff said!

The_American , 15 hours ago

God Damn traitor Obama!

Yen Cross , 14 hours ago

TOTUS

For the youngsters.

Teleprompter Of The United States.

Leguran , 6 hours ago

The CIA has gotten away with so much criminal behavior and crimes against the American public that this is totally believable. Congress just lets this stuff happen and does nothing. Which is worse - Congress or the CIA?

Congress set up the system. It is mandated to perform oversight. And it just sits on its thumbs and wallows in it privileges.

This time Congress went further than ever before. It was behind and engaged in an attempted coup d'état.

Know thy enemy , 10 hours ago

Link to ShadowGate (ShadowNet) documentary - which answers the question, what is the keystone,,,,,

https://www.pscp.tv/Tore_says/1RDGlrYynRgxL

"Comey here, and Holder, while I get a rope for Lynch, and don't forget Brennan."

Kudo's to Millie

DontHateMeBecauseImABureaucrat , 9 hours ago

Neither google nor Apple will open the link. Or it's not there.

bringonthebigone , 8 hours ago

currently it is up here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9HFxVvrXjCg

I Claudius , 5 hours ago

It's time for Assange and Wikileaks to name the person who they rec'd the info from. By hiding behind the "we don't name names" Mantra they are helping destroy America by polarizing its citizens. Name the damn person, get it all out there so the left can see that they've been played by their leaders. Let's cut this crap.

freedommusic , 7 hours ago

...all the evidence was pointing back to CIA as the originator [of] Guccifer 2.0.

Yep, I knew since day one. I remember seeing Hillary Clinton talking about Guccifer . As soon as uttered the name, I KNEW she with the CIA were the brainchild of this bogus decoy.

They copy. They mimic. These are NOT creative individuals.

Perhaps hell is too good a place for them.

on target , 4 hours ago

This is old news but worth bringing up again. The CIA never wanted Trump in, and of course, they want him out. Their fingerprints were all over Russiagate, The Kavanaugh hearings, Ukrainegate, and on and on. They are just trying to cover their asses for a string of illegal "irregularities" in their operations for years. Trump should never have tried to be a get along type of guy. He should have purged the entire leadership of the CIA on day one and the FBI on day 2. They can not be trusted with an "America First" agenda. They are all New World Order types who know whats best for everyone.

fersur , 7 hours ago

Boom, Boom, Boom !

Three Reseachable Tweets thru Facebook, I cut all at once, Unedited !

"#SusanRice has as much trouble with her memory as #HillaryClinton. Rice testified in writing that she 'does not recall' who gave her key #Benghazi talking points she used on TV, 'does not recall' being in any meetings regarding Benghazi in five days following the attack, and 'does not recall' communicating with anyone in Clinton's office about Benghazi," Tom Fitton in Breitbart.

"Adam Schiff secretly subpoenaed, without court authorization, the phone records of Rudy Giuliani and then published the phone records of innocent Americans, including @realDonaldTrump 's lawyers, a member of Congress, and a journalist," @TomFitton .

BREAKING: Judicial Watch announced today that former #Obama National Security Advisor and U.S. Ambassador to the United Nations, Susan Rice, admitted in written responses given under oath that she emailed with former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton on Clinton's non-government email account and that she received emails related to government business on her own personal email account.

STONEHILLADY , 7 hours ago

It's not just the Democrats, the warmongering neocons of the Republican party are also in on it, the Bush/Romney McCain/McConnell/Cheney and many more. It's called "Kick Backs" Ever notice these so called retired Generals all end up working for all these spying companies that span the 5eyes to Israel. It seems our POTUS has got his hands full swimming up stream to get this stopped and actually get rid of the CIA. It's the number 1 reason he doesn't trust these people, they all try to tell him stuff that is mis-directed.

Liars, leakers, and thieves are running not only our nation but the world, as George Carlin said, "It's a Big Club, and we ain't in it." If you fall for this false narrative of mail in voting and not actually go and vote on election day, you better start learning Chinese for surely Peelosi and Schumer will have their way and mess up this election so they can drag Trump out of office and possible do him and his family some serious harm, all because so many of you listen to the MSM and don't research their phony claims.

Max21c , 7 hours ago

It's called "Kick Backs" Ever notice these so called retired Generals all end up working for all these spying companies that span the 5eyes to Israel.

American Generals & Admirals are a lot more corrupt today than they were a few generations back. Many of them are outright evil people in today's times. Many of these people are just criminals that will steal anything they can get their banana republic klepto-paws on. They're nothing but common criminals and thieves. No different than the Waffen SS or any other group of brigands, bandits, and criminal gangsters.

Max21c , 7 hours ago

The CIA, FBI, NSA, Military Intelligence, Pentagon Gestapo, defense contractors are mixed up in a lot of crimes and criminal activities on American soil against American citizens and American civilians. They do not recognize borders or laws or rights of liberty or property rights or ownership or intellectual property. They're all thieves and criminals in the military secret police and secret police gangsters cabal.

BandGap , 7 hours ago

I have seen Binney's input. He is correct in my view because he scientifically/mathematically proves his point.

The blinded masses do not care about this approach, just like wearing masks.

The truth is too difficult for many to fit into their understanding of the world.

So they repeat what they have been told, never stopping to consider the facts or how circumstances have been manipulated.

It is frustrating to watch, difficult to navigate at times for me. Good people who will not stop and think of what the facts show them.

otschelnik , 8 hours ago

It could have been the CIA or it could have been one of the cut-outs for plausible deniability, and of all the usual suspects it was probably CrowdStrike.

- CGI / Global Strategy Group / Analysis Corp. - John Brennan (former CEO)

- Dynology, Wikistrat - General James L. Jones (former chairman of Atlantic Council, NSA under Obama)

- CrowdStrike - Dmitri Alperovich and Shawn Henry (former chief of cyber forensics FBI)

- Clearforce - Michael Hayden (former dir. NSA under Clinton, CIA under Bush) and Jim Jones Jr. (son Gnrl James Jones)

- McChrystal Group - Stanley McChrystal (former chief of special operations DOD)

fersur , 8 hours ago

Unedited !

The Brookings Institute – a Deep State Hub Connected to the Fake Russia Collusion and Ukraine Scandals Is Now Also Connected to China Spying In the US

The Brookings Institute was heavily involved in the Democrat and Deep State Russia collusion hoax and Ukraine impeachment fraud. These actions against President Trump were criminal.

This institute is influenced from foreign donations from entities who don't have an America first agenda. New reports connect the Institute to Chinese spying.

As we reported previously, Julie Kelly at American Greatness released a report where she addresses the connections between the Brookings Institute, Democrats and foreign entities. She summarized her report as follows: Accepting millions from a state sponsor of terrorism, foisting one of the biggest frauds in history on the American people, and acting as a laundering agent of sorts for Democratic political contributions disguised as policy grants isn't a good look for such an esteemed institution. One would be hard-pressed to name a more influential think tank than the Brookings Institution. The Washington, D.C.-based nonprofit routinely ranks at the top of the list of the best think tanks in the world; Brookings scholars produce a steady flow of reports, symposiums, and news releases that sway the conversation on any number of issues ranging from domestic and economic policy to foreign affairs.

​​ Brookings is home to lots of Beltway power players: Ben Bernanke and Janet Yellen, former chairmen of the Federal Reserve, are Brookings fellows. Top officials from both Republican and Democrat presidential administrations lend political heft to the organization. From 2002 until 2017, the organization's president was Strobe Talbott. He's a longtime BFF of Bill Clinton; they met in the 1970s at Oxford University and have been tight ever since. Talbott was a top aide to both President Bill Clinton and Secretary of State Hillary Clinton.

Kelly continued:

Brookings-based fellows working at Lawfare were the media's go-to legal "experts" to legitimize the concocted crime; the outlet manipulated much of the news coverage on collusion by pumping out primers and guidance on how to report collusion events from Special Counsel Robert Mueller's appointment to his final report.

Now, testimony related to a defamation lawsuit against Christopher Steele, the author of the infamous "dossier" on Donald Trump, has exposed his direct ties to Talbott in 2016 when he was still head of Brookings. Talbott and Steele were in communication before and after the presidential election; Steele wanted Talbott to circulate the dossier to his pals in John Kerry's State Department, which reportedly is what Talbott did . Steele also briefed top state department officials in October 2016 about his work.

But this isn't the only connection between the Brookings Institute and the Russia collusion and Ukrainian scandals. We were the first to report that the Primary Sub-Source (PSS) in the Steele report, the main individual who supplied Steele with bogus information in his report was Igor Danchenko.

In November 2019, the star witness for the Democrat Representative Adam Schiff's impeachment show trial was announced. Her name was Fiona Hill.

Today we've uncovered that Hill is a close associate of the Primary Sub-Source (PSS) for the Steele dossier – Igor Danchenko – the individual behind most all the lies in the Steele dossier. No wonder Hill saw the Steele dossier before it was released. Her associate created it.

Both Fiona Hill and Igor Danchenko are connected to the Brookings Institute.

They gave a presentation together as Brookings Institute representatives:

Kelly writes about the foreign funding the Brookings Institute partakes:

So who and what have been funding the anti-Trump political operation at Brookings over the past few years? The think tank's top benefactors are a predictable mix of family foundations, Fortune 100 corporations, and Big Tech billionaires. But one of the biggest contributors to Brookings' $100 million-plus annual budget is the Embassy of Qatar. According to financial reports, Qatar has donated more than $22 million to the think tank since 2004. In fact, Brookings operates a satellite center in Doha, the capital of Qatar. The wealthy Middle Eastern oil producer spends billions on American institutions such as universities and other think tanks.

Qatar also is a top state sponsor of terrorism, pouring billions into Hamas, al-Qaeda, and the Muslim Brotherhood, to name a few. "The nation of Qatar, unfortunately, has historically been a funder of terrorism at a very high level," President Trump said in 2017. "We have to stop the funding of terrorism."

An email from a Qatari official, obtained by WikiLeaks, said the Brookings Institution was as important to the country as "an aircraft carrier."

Yesterday the Brookings Institute was connected to spying by Communist China in a post at the Washington Free Beacon :

Part 1 of 2

fersur , 8 hours ago

Part 2 of 2 !

The Brookings Institution, a prominent Washington, D.C., think tank, partnered with a Shanghai policy center that the FBI has described as a front for China's intelligence and spy recruitment operations, according to public records and federal court documents.

The Brookings Doha Center, the think tank's hub in Qatar, signed a memorandum of understanding with the Shanghai Academy of Social Sciences in January 2018, the institution said . The academy is a policy center funded by the Shanghai municipal government that has raised flags within the FBI.

The partnership raises questions about potential Chinese espionage activities at the think tank, which employs numerous former government officials and nearly two dozen current foreign policy advisers to Joe Biden's presidential campaign.

It is really frightening that one of two major political parties in the US is tied so closely with the Brookings Institute. It is even more frightening that foreign enemies of the United States are connected to this entity as well.

Let it Go , 8 hours ago

One thing for sure is these guys have far to much of our money to spend promoting their own good.

fersur , 7 hours ago

Unedited !

Mueller Indictments Tied To "ShadowNet," Former Obama National Security Advisor and Obama's CIA Director – Not Trump

By Patrick Bergy, Cyber-Security, Veteran & Former DoD Contractor

December 18th, 2018

According to a report in the Daily Beast, which cited the Wall Street Journal's reporting of Special Counsel Robert Mueller's investigation into two companies, Wikistrat and Psy Group, "The firm's advisory council lists former CIA and National Security Agency director Michael Hayden, former national security adviser James L. Jones."

According to numerous reporting from major news outlets like the Wall Street Journal and Daily Beast, both Wikistrat and Psy Group represent themselves as being social media analysts and black PSYOP organizations. Both Wikistrat and Psy Group have foreign ownership mixed between Israeli, Saudi (Middle East) and Russian. Here is what the Wall Street Journal, The Daily Beast and pretty much everyone else out there doesn't know (or won't tell you).

The fact Obama's former National Security Advisor, General James Jones, and former Obama CIA director, Gen. Michael Hayden, are both on Wikistrat's advisory board may not seem suspicious, but both of these general's have another thing in common, and that is the ShadowNet. The ShadowNet, and its optional companion relational database, iPsy, were both originally developed by the small, family owned defense contracting company, Dynology. The family that owns Dynology; Gen. James Jones. I would add Paul Manafort and Rick Davis was Dynology's partner at the time we were making the ShadowNet and iPsy commercially available.

After obtaining the contract in Iraq to develop social media psychological warfare capabilities, known in military nomenclature as Interactive Internet Activities, or IIA, Gen. Jones kept the taxpayer funded application we developed in Iraq for the 4th Psychological Operation Group, and made it commercially available under the trademark of the "ShadowNet" and the optional black PSYOP component, "iPsy." If you think it is interesting that one of the companies under Mueller's indictment is named, "Psy" Group, I did as well. In fact, literally everything both publicly described in news reports, and even their websites, are exactly the same as the ShadowNet and iPsy I helped build, and literally named.

The only thing different I saw as far as services offered by Wikistrat, and that of Dynology and the ShadowNet, was described by The Daily Beast as, "It also engaged in intelligence collection." Although iPsy was a relational database that allowed for the dissemination of whatever the required narrative was, "intelligence collection" struck another bell with me, and that's a company named ClearForce.

ClearForce was developed as a solution to stopping classified leaks following the Edward Snowden debacle in 2013. Changes in NISPOM compliance requirements forced companies and government agencies that had employees with government clearances to take preventive measure to mitigate the potential of leaking. Although the NISPOM compliance requirement almost certainly would have been influenced by either Hayden, Jones or both, they once again sought to profit from it.

Using components of the ShadowNet and iPsy, the ClearForce application (which the company, ClearForce, was named after,) was developed to provide compliance to a regulation I strongly suspect you will find Jones and Hayden had a hand in creating. In fact, I strongly suspect you will find General Jones had some influence in the original requirement for our Iraq contract Dynology won to build the ShadowNet – at taxpayer expense! Dynology worked for several years incorporating other collection sources, such as financial, law enforcement and foreign travel, and ties them all into your social media activity. Their relationship with Facebook and other social media giants would have been nice questions for congress to have asked them when they testified.

Part 1 of 2 !

fersur , 7 hours ago

Part 2 of 2 !

The ClearForce application combines all of these sources together in real-time and uses artificial intelligence to predictively determine if you are likely to steal or leak based on the behavioral profile ClearForce creates of you. It can be used to determine if you get a job, and even if you lose a job because a computer read your social media, credit and other sources to determine you were likely to commit a crime. It's important for you to stop for a moment and think about the fact it is privately controlled by the former CIA director and Obama's National Security Advisor/NATO Supreme Allied Commander, should scare the heck out of you.

When the ClearForce application was complete, Dynology handed it off to ClearForce, the new company, and Michael Hayden joined the board of directors along with Gen. Jones and his son, Jim, as the president of ClearForce. Doesn't that kind of sound like "intelligence collection" described by the Daily Beast in Wikistrat's services?

To wrap this all up, Paul Manafort, Rick Davis, George Nader, Wikistrat and Psy Group are all directly connected to Mueller's social media influence and election interreference in the 2016 presidential election. In fact, I believe all are under indictment, computers seized, some already sentenced. All of these people under indictment by Mueller have one key thing in common, General James Jones's and Michael Hayden's social media black PSYOP tools; the ShadowNet, iPsy and ClearForce.

A recent meeting I had with Congressman Gus Bilirakis' chief of staff, Elizabeth Hittos, is confirmation that they are reviewing my DoD memorandum stating the work I did on the IIA information operation in Iraq, the Dynology marketing slicks for the ShadowNet and iPsy, along with a screenshot of Goggle's Way-Back Machine showing Paul Manafort's partnership with Dynology in 2007 and later. After presenting to her these facts and making clear I have much more information that requires the highest classification SCIF to discuss and requires being read-on to the program, Elizabeth contacted the office of Congressman Devin Nunez to request that I brief the intelligence committee on this critical information pertaining directly to the 2010 Ukrainian elections, Michael Brown riots, 2016 election interference and the "Russia collusion" hoax. All of that is on top of numerous questionable ethical and potentially illegal profits from DoD contracts while servings as NATO Commander and Obama's National Security Advisor.

We also need to know if the ShadowNet and iPsy were allowed to fall into foreign hands, including Russia, Saudi Arabia and Israel. I'm pretty sure South America is going to have a few questions for Jones and Obama as well? Stay tuned!

Balance-Sheet , 4 hours ago

Intelligence Agencies of all countries endlessly wage war at all times especially 'Information Warfare' (propaganda/disinformation) and the primary target has always and will always be the domestic population of the Intelligence Agency's country.

Yes, of course the CIA does target ALL other countries but the primary target will always be the Americans themselves.

Balance-Sheet , 4 hours ago

Intelligence Agencies of all countries endlessly wage war at all times especially 'Information Warfare' (propaganda/disinformation) and the primary target has always and will always be the domestic population of the Intelligence Agency's country.

Yes, of course the CIA does target ALL other countries but the primary target will always be the Americans themselves.

Paralentor , 5 hours ago

A lot more detail can be found here:

https://banned.video/watch?id=5f37fcc2df77c4044ee2eb03

SHADOW GATE – FULL FILM

462,864 views

yerfej , 8 hours ago

The neoliberals own the media, courts, academia, and BUREAUCRACY (including CIA) and they will do anything to make sure they retain power over everyone. These control freaks work hard to create all sorts of enemies to justify their existence.

LaugherNYC , 15 hours ago

It is sad that this information has to be repeatedly published, over and over and over, by SCI and other Russian. outlets.

Because no legit AMERICAN news outlet will give Binney or Assange the time of day or any credence, this all becomes Kremlin-sponsored disinformation and denials. People roll their eyes and say "Oh God, not the whole 'Seth Rich was murdered by the CIA' crap again!! You know, his FAMILY has asked that people stop spreading these conspiracy theories and lies."

SCI is a garbage bin, nothing more than a dizinformatz machine for Putin, but in this case, they are likely right. It seems preposterous that the "best hackers in the world" would forget to use a VPN or leave a signature behind, and it makes far more sense that the emails were leaked by someone irate at the abuses of the DNC - the squashing of Bernie, the cheating for Hillary in the debates - behavior we saw repeated in 2020 with Bernie shoved aside again for the pathetic Biden.

Would that SOMEONE in the US who is not on the Kremlin payroll would pick up this thread. But all the "investigative journalists" now work indirectly for the DNC, and those that don't are cancelled by the left.

Stone_d_agehurler , 15 hours ago

I am Guccifer and I approve this message.

Sarc/

But i do share your opinion. They are likely right this time and most of the pundits and media in the U. S. know it. That's what makes this a sad story about how rotten the U. S. system has become.

Democrats will sacrifice the Union for getting Trump out of office.

If elections in Nov won't go their way, Civil War II might become a real thing in 2021.

PeterLong , 4 hours ago

If " digital "fingerprints" in order to give the impression that the files came from Russian sources" were inserted in the leak by "Guccifer", and if the leak to wikileaks came from Seth Rich, via whatever avenue, then the "Guccifer" release came after the wikileaks release, or after wikileaks had the files, and was a reaction to same attempting to diminish their importance/accuracy and cast doubt on Trump. Could CIA and/or DNC have known the files were obtained by wikileaks before wikileaks actually released them? In any case collusion of CIA with DNC seems to be a given.

RightlyIndignent , 4 hours ago

Because Seth had already given it to Wikileaks. There is no 'Fancy Bear'. There is no 'Cozy Bear'. Those were made up by CrowdStrike, and they tried the same crap on Ukraine, and Ukraine told them to pound sand. When push came to shove, and CrowdStrike was forced to say what they really had under oath, they said: "We have nothing."

novictim , 4 hours ago

You are leaving out Crowd Strike. Seth Rich was tasked by people at the DNC to copy data off the servers. He made a backup copy and gave a copy to people who then got it to Wiki leaks. He used highspeed file transfers to local drives to do his task.

Meanwhile, it was the Ukrainian company Crowd Strike that claimed the data was stolen over the internet and that the thieves were in Russia. That 'proof" was never verified by US Intelligence but was taken on its word as being true despite crowd strike falsifying Russian hacks and being caught for it in the past.

Joebloinvestor , 5 hours ago

The "five eyes" are convinced they run the world and try to.

That is what Brennan counted on for these agencies to help get President Trump.

As I said, it is time for the UK and the US to have a serious conversation about their current and ex-spies being involved in US elections.

Southern_Boy , 5 hours ago

It wasn't the CIA. It was John Brennan and Clapper. The CIA, NSA FBI, DOJ and the Ukrainian Intelligence Service just went along working together and followed orders from Brennan who got them from Hillary and Obama.

Oh, and don't forget the GOP Globalist RINOs who also participated in the coup attempt: McCain, Romney, Kasich, Boehner, Lee and Richard Burr.

With Kasich now performing as a puppy dog for Biden at the Democrat Convention as a Democrat DNC executive, the re-alignment is almost complete: Globalist Nationalist Socialist Bolshevism versus American Populism, i.e. Elites versus Deplorables or Academics versus Smelly Wal-Mart people.

on target , 5 hours ago

No way. CIA up to their eyeballs in this as well as the State Department. Impossible for Russiagate or Ukrainegate without direct CIA and State involvement.

RightlyIndignent , 4 hours ago

Following Orders? How did that argument go at Nuremberg? (hint: not very well)

LeadPipeDreams , 6 hours ago

LOL - the CIA's main mission - despite their "official" charter, has always been to destabilize the US and its citizens via psyops, false flags, etc.

Covid-1984 is their latest and it appears most successful project yet.

Iconoclast27 , 5 hours ago

The CIA received a $200 million initial investment from the Rockefeller and Carnegie foundations when it was first established, that should tell you everything you need to know how who they truly work for.

A_Huxley , 6 hours ago

CIA, MI6, 5 eye nations.

All wanted to sway the USA their own way.

Let it Go , 8 hours ago

Almost as frightening as the concentrated power held by companies such as Facebook and Google is the fact Jeff Bezos, CEO of Amazon and the world's richest man, is the person who owns and controls the Washington Post. It is silly to think Jeff Bezos purchased the Washington Post in 2013 because he expected newspapers to make a lucrative resurgence.

It is more likely he purchased the long-trusted U.S. newspaper for the power it would ensure him in Washington when wielded as a propaganda mouthpiece to extend his ability to both shape and control public opinion. More on this subject in the article below.

https://Amazon, Jeff Bezos, And The Influential Washington Post_31.html

avoiceofliberty , 16 hours ago

The amazing thing about Binney's forensic analysis is that it has been around since 2018 .

It's also been clear since 2017 the hack of the DNC computers didn't hold up under scrutiny .

How it is the Democrats, the Deep State, and the legacy media are still able to cling to the remnants of these long discredited narratives is a mystery.

avoiceofliberty , 6 hours ago

At the official level, you have a point.

However, even before Mueller was appointed, a review of the materials in the extant public record of both the DNC "hack" and the history of Crowdstrike showed the narrative simply did not make sense. A detailed investigation of materials not made public was not necessary to shoot down the entire narrative.

Indeed, one of the great scandals of the Mueller probe is the way it did not bring prudential skepticism to the question of the DNC "hack". When building a case, either for public debate or for public trial, a dose of skepticism is healthy; it leads to a careful vetting of facts and reasoning.

Alice-the-dog , 6 hours ago

The CIA has been an agency wholly independent of the US government almost since its inception. It is not under any significant control by the government, and has its own agenda which may occasionally coincide with that of the government, but only coincidentally. It has its own view of how the world should look, and will not balk at any means necessary to achieve such. Including the murder of dis-favorable members of government.

snodgrass , 6 hours ago

It's the CIA and the FBI, Obama and people in his administration who cooked up Russiagate.

Floki_Ragnarsson , 7 hours ago

The CIA whacked JFK because he was going to slow the roll to Vietnam AND disband the CIA and reform it.

It is broken and needs to be disbanded and reformed along lines that actually WORK! The CIA missed the fall of the USSR, 9/11, etc. HTF does THAT happen?

DeportThemAll , 6 hours ago

The CIA didn't "miss" 9/11... they participated in it.

Let it Go , 8 hours ago

The CIA is a tool that when improperly used can do great damage.

Anyone who doesn't believe that countries use psychological warfare and propaganda to sway the opinions of people both in and outside of their country should be considered naive. Too many people America is more than a little hypocritical when they criticize other countries for trying to gain influence considering our history of meddling in the affairs of other countries.

Americans have every reason to be concerned and worried considering revelations of just how big the government intelligence agencies have grown since 9-11 and how unlimited their spying and surveillance operations have become. The article below explores this growth and questions whether we have lost control.

http://Psychological Warfare And Propaganda Out Of Control.html

tion , 16 hours ago

The idea of Binney and Jason Sullivan privately working to 'secure the vote' is something that I actually consider to be very eyebrow raising and alarming.

Son of Captain Nemo , 8 hours ago

Bill Binney under "B" in the only "yellow pages" that show a conscience and a soul!...

https://www.ae911truth.org/signatures/#/General/B/williambinneysevernMDUS

fliebinite , 9 hours ago

This is the dumbest article ever. Russiagate is a total fabrication of the FBI as per Clinesmith, CIA provided information that would have nipped it at the bud. Read the real news.

bringonthebigone , 9 hours ago

Wrong. this article is one small piece of the puzzle. Clinesmith is one small piece of the puzzle. The Flynn entrapment is one small piece of the puzzle. The Halper entrapment was one small piece of the puzzle.

Because Clinesmith at the FBI covered up the information saying Page was a CIA source does not mean it was a total FBI fabrication and does not mean the CIA was not involved and does not mean the DNC server hack is irrelevant.

Milley Weaver gets close in her recent video. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9HFxVvrXjCg

Sundance does a better job pulling it all together.

PKKA , 14 hours ago

Relations have already soured between Russia and the United States, and sanctions have been announced. Tensions have grown on the NATO-Russia border. The meat has already been rolled into the minced meat and it will not be possible to roll the minced meat back into the meat. The CIA got it. But the Russian people now absolutely understand that the United States will always be the enemy of Russia, no matter whether socialist or capitalist. But I like it even more than the feigned hypocritical "friendship". Russia has never reached such heights as during the good old Cold War. All Russians have a huge incentive, long live the new Cold War!

smacker , 12 hours ago

More and more people have worked out that the fabricated tensions between the US and Russia
and US and China have little to do with those two countries posing any sort of threat to world peace.

It is all about the US trying to remain in No.1 position as uni-polar top dog via the Anglo American Empire.
We see examples of this every day in the M/E, South China Sea, Taiwan, Libya all over Eastern Europe,
Ukraine, Iran and now Belaruse. HK was added along the way.

Both Russia and China openly want a multi-polar world order. But the US will never accept that.

Hence the prospect of war. The only unknown today is what and where the trigger will be.

smacker , 12 hours ago

More and more people have worked out that the fabricated tensions between the US and Russia
and US and China have little to do with those two countries posing any sort of threat to world peace.

It is all about the US trying to remain in No.1 position as uni-polar top dog via the Anglo American Empire.
We see examples of this every day in the M/E, South China Sea, Taiwan, Libya all over Eastern Europe,
Ukraine, Iran and now Belaruse. HK was added along the way.

Both Russia and China openly want a multi-polar world order. But the US will never accept that.

Hence the prospect of war. The only unknown today is what and where the trigger will be.

hang_the_banksters , 31 minutes ago

the best proof thAt Guccifer 2 was CIA hacking themselves to frame Wikileaks is this:

Guccifer has not yet been identified, indicted and arrested.

you'd think CIAFBINSA would be turning over every stone to the ends of the earth to bust Guccifer. we just had to endure 4 years of hysterical propaganda that Russia had hacked our election and that Trump was their secret agent. so Guccifer should be the Most Wanted Man on the planet. meanwhile, it's crickets from FBI. they arent even looking for him. because Guccifer is over at Langley. maybe someone outta ask Brennan where G2 is now.

remember when DOJ indicted all those GRU cybersoldiers? the evidence listed in the indictment was so stunning that i dont believe it. NSA so thoroughly hacked back into GRU that NSA was watching GRU through their own webcams and recording them doing Google searches to translate words which were written in Guccifer's blog posts about the DNC email leaks. NSA and DOJ must think we are all stupid, that we will believe NSA is so powerful to do that, yet they cant identify Guccifer.

i say i dont believe that for a second because no way Russian GRU are so stupid to even have webcams on the computers they use to hack, and it is absurd to think GRU soldiers on a Russian military base would be using Google instead of Yandex to translate words into English.

lay_arrow
ConanTheContrarian1 , 1 hour ago

As a confirmed conspiracy theorist since I came back from 'Nam, here's mine: The European nobility recognized with the American and French revolutions that they needed a better approach. They borrowed from the Tudors (who had to deal with Parliament) and began to rule by controlling the facade of representative government. This was enhanced by funding banks to control through currency, as well as blackmail and murder, and morphed into a complete propaganda machine like no other in history. The CIA, MI6 and Mossad, the mainstream media, deep plants in bureaucracy and "democratic" bodies all obey their dictates to create narratives that control our minds. Trump seems to offer hope, but remember, he could be their latest narrative.

greatdisconformity , 1 hour ago

A Democracy cannot function on a higher level than the general electorate.

The intelligence and education of the general electorate has been sliding for generations, because both political parties can play this to their advantage.

It is no accident that most of the messages coming from politicians are targeted to imbeciles.

[Jun 23, 2020] CIA's massive 'Vault 7' leak resulted from 'woefully lax' security protocols within the agency's own network by Sonam Sheth

Highly recommended!
Notable quotes:
"... Editor's Note: This article originally appeared on ..."
"... most of the CIA's sensitive cyberweapons "were not compartmented, users shared systems administrator-level passwords, there were no effective removable media [thumb drive] controls, and historical data was available to users indefinitely," the report said ..."
"... The Center for Cyber Intelligence also did not monitor who used its network, so the task force could not determine the size of the breach. However, it determined that the employee who accessed the intelligence stole about 2.2 billion pages -- or 34 terabytes -- of information, the Post reported. ..."
Jun 20, 2020 | taskandpurpose.com

Editor's Note: This article originally appeared on Business Insider .

The Central Intelligence Agency's elite hacking team "prioritized building cyber weapons at the expense of securing their own systems," according to an internal agency report prepared for then-CIA director Mike Pompeo and his deputy, Gina Haspel, who is now the agency's director.

The Washington Post first reported on the document , which said the hacking unit's failure to secure the CIA's systems resulted in the theft of highly classified cyberweapons in 2016.

In March 2017, US officials discovered the breach when the radical pro-transparency group WikiLeaks published troves of documents detailing the CIA's electronic surveillance and cyberwarfare capabilities. WikiLeaks dubbed the series of documents "Vault 7," and officials say it was the biggest unauthorized disclosure of classified information in the agency's history.

The internal report was introduced in criminal proceedings against former CIA employee Joshua Schulte, who was charged with swiping the hacking tools and handing them over to WikiLeaks.

The government brought in witnesses who prosecutors said showed, through forensic analysis, that Schulte's work computer accessed an old file that matched some of the documents WikiLeaks posted.

Schulte's lawyers, meanwhile, pointed to the internal report as proof that the CIA's internal network was so insecure that any employee or contractor could have accessed the information Schulte is accused of stealing.

A New York jury failed to reach a verdict in the case in March after the jurors told Judge Paul Crotty that they were "extremely deadlocked" on many of the most serious charges, though he was convicted on two counts of contempt of court and making false statements to the FBI.

Crotty subsequently declared a mistrial, and prosecutors said they intended to try Schulte again later this year.

The report was compiled in October 2017 by the CIA's WikiLeaks Task Force, and it found that security protocol within the hacking unit that developed the cyberweapons, housed within the CIA's Center for Cyber Intelligence, was "woefully lax," according to the Post.

The outlet reported that the CIA may never have discovered the breach in the first place if WikiLeaks hadn't published the documents or if a hostile foreign power had gotten a hold of the information first.

"Had the data been stolen for the benefit of a state adversary and not published, we might still be unaware of the loss," the internal report said.

It also faulted the CIA for moving "too slowly" to implement safety measures "that we knew were necessary given successive breaches to other U.S. Government agencies." Moreover, most of the CIA's sensitive cyberweapons "were not compartmented, users shared systems administrator-level passwords, there were no effective removable media [thumb drive] controls, and historical data was available to users indefinitely," the report said .

The Center for Cyber Intelligence also did not monitor who used its network, so the task force could not determine the size of the breach. However, it determined that the employee who accessed the intelligence stole about 2.2 billion pages -- or 34 terabytes -- of information, the Post reported.

More from Business Insider:

[Jun 16, 2020] Veteran CIA Analyst- How An Internet 'Persona' Helped Birth Russiagate -

Jun 16, 2020 | www.zerohedge.com

Veteran CIA Analyst: How An Internet 'Persona' Helped Birth Russiagate


by Tyler Durden Tue, 06/16/2020 - 19:25 Twitter Facebook Reddit Email Print

Authored by Ray McGovern via ConsortiumNews.com,

Four years ago on June 15, 2016, a shadowy Internet persona calling itself "Guccifer 2.0" appeared out of nowhere to claim credit for hacking emails from the Democratic National Committee on behalf of WikiLeaks and implicate Russia by dropping "telltale" but synthetically produced Russian "breadcrumbs" in his metadata.

Thanks largely to the corporate media, the highly damaging story actually found in those DNC emails – namely, that the DNC had stacked the cards against Bernie Sanders in the party's 2016 primary – was successfully obscured .

The media was the message; and the message was that Russia had used G-2.0 to hack into the DNC, interfering in the November 2016 election to help Donald Trump win.

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Almost everybody still "knows" that – from the man or woman in the street to the forlorn super sleuth, Special Counsel Robert Swan Mueller III, who actually based indictments of Russian intelligence officers on Guccifer 2.0.

Blaming Russia was a magnificent distraction from the start and quickly became the vogue.

The soil had already been cultivated for "Russiagate" by Democratic PR gems like Donald Trump "kissing up" to former KGB officer Vladimir Putin and their "bromance" (bromides that former President Barack Obama is still using). Four years ago today, "Russian meddling" was off and running – on steroids – acquiring far more faux-reality than the evanescent Guccifer 2.0 persona is likely to get.

Here's how it went down :

  • June 12: WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange announced he had "emails related to Hillary Clinton which are pending publication."
  • June 14: DNC contractor CrowdStrike tells the media that malware has been found on the DNC server and claims there is evidence it was injected by Russians.
  • June 15: Guccifer 2.0 arises from nowhere; affirms the DNC/CrowdStrike allegations of the day before; claims responsibility for hacking the DNC; claims to be a WikiLeaks source; and posts a document that forensic examination shows was deliberately tainted with "Russian fingerprints." This to "corroborate" claims made by CrowdStrike executives the day before.

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Adding to other signs of fakery, there is hard evidence that G-2.0 was operating mostly in U.S. time zones and with local settings peculiar to a device configured for use within the US , as Tim Leonard reports here and here .)

Leonard is a software developer who started to catalog and archive evidence related to Guccifer 2.0 in 2017 and has issued detailed reports on digital forensic discoveries made by various independent researchers – as well as his own – over the past three years. Leonard points out that WikiLeaks said it did not use any of the emails G2.0 sent it, though it later published similar emails, opening the possibility that whoever created G2.0 knew what WikiLeaks had and sent it duplicates with the Russian fingerprints .

As Veteran Intelligence Professionals for Sanity (VIPS) told President Trump in a memorandum of July 24, 2017, titled "Was the 'Russian Hack' an Inside Job?":

"We do not think that the June 12, 14, & 15 timing was pure coincidence. Rather, it suggests the start of a pre-emptive move to associate Russia with anything WikiLeaks might have been ready to publish and to 'show' that it came from a Russian hack."

We added this about Guccifer 2.0 at the time:

"The recent forensic studies fill in a critical gap. Why the FBI neglected to perform any independent forensics on the original 'Guccifer 2.0' material remains a mystery – as does the lack of any sign that the 'hand-picked analysts' from the FBI, CIA, and NSA, who wrote the misnomered 'Intelligence Community' Assessment dated January 6, 2017, gave any attention to forensics."

Guccifer 2.0 Seen As a Fraud

In our July 24, 2017 memorandum we also told President Trump that independent cyber investigators and VIPs had determined "that the purported 'hack' of the DNC by Guccifer 2.0 was not a hack, by Russia or anyone else. Rather it originated with a copy (onto an external storage device – a thumb drive, for example) by an insider. Information was leaked to implicate Russia. We do not know who or what the murky Guccifer 2.0 is. You may wish to ask the FBI. " [Emphasis added.].

Right. Ask the FBI. At this stage, President Trump might have better luck asking Attorney General William Barr, to whom the FBI is accountable – at least in theory. As for Barr, VIPs informed him in a June 5, 2020 memorandum that the head of CrowdStrike had admitted under oath on Dec. 5, 2017 that CrowdStrike has no concrete evidence that the DNC emails published by WikiLeaks on July 22, 2016 were hacked – by Russia or by anyone else. [Emphasis added.] This important revelation has so far escaped attention in the Russia-Russia-Russia "mainstream" media (surprise, surprise, surprise!).

Back to the Birth of G-2

It boggles the mind that so few Americans could see Russiagate for the farce it was. Most of the blame, I suppose, rests on a thoroughly complicit Establishment media. Recall: Assange's announcement on June 12, 2016 that he had Hillary Clinton-related emails came just six weeks before the Democratic convention. I could almost hear the cry go up from the DNC: Houston, We Have a Problem!

Here's how bad the problem for the Democrats was. The DNC emails eventually published by WikiLeaks on July 22, 2016, just three days before the Democratic convention, had been stolen on May 23 and 25. This would have given the DNC time to learn that the stolen material included documents showing how the DNC and Clinton campaign had manipulated the primaries and created a host of other indignities, such that Sanders' chances of winning the nomination amounted to those of a snowball's chance in the netherworld.

Clinton at the 2016 convention, via Wikimedia Commons.

To say this was an embarrassment would be the understatement of 2016. Worse still, given the documentary nature of the emails and WikiLeaks' enviable track record for accuracy, there would be no way to challenge their authenticity. Nevertheless, with the media in full support of the DNC and Clinton, however, it turned out to be a piece of cake to divert attention from the content of the emails to the "act of war" (per John McCain) that the Russian "cyber attack" was said to represent .

The outcome speaks as much to the lack of sophistication on the part of American TV watchers, as it does to the sophistication of the Democrats-media complicity and cover-up. How come so few could figure out what was going down?

It was not hard for some experienced observers to sniff a rat. Among the first to speak out was fellow Consortium News columnist Patrick Lawrence, who immediately saw through the Magnificent Diversion. I do not know if he fancies duck hunting, but he shot the Russiagate canard quite dead – well before the Democratic convention was over.

Magnificent Diversion

In late July 2016, Lawrence was sickened, as he watched what he immediately recognized as a well planned, highly significant deflection. The Clinton-friendly media was excoriating Russia for "hacking" DNC emails and was glossing over what the emails showed ; namely, that the Clinton Dems had pretty much stolen the nomination from Sanders.

It was already clear even then that the Democrats, with invaluable help from intelligence leaks and other prepping to the media, had made good use of those six weeks between Assange's announcement that he had emails "related to Hillary Clinton" and the opening of the convention.

The media was primed to castigate the Russians for "hacking," while taking a prime role in the deflection. It was a liminal event of historic significance, as we now know. The "Magnificent Diversion" worked like a charm – and then it grew like Topsy.

Lawrence said he had "fire in the belly" on the morning of July 25 as the Democratic convention began and wrote what follows pretty much "in one long, furious exhale" within 12 hours of when the media started really pushing the "the Russians-did-it" narrative.

Patrick Lawrence

Below is a slightly shortened text of his article :

"Now wait a minute, all you upper-case "D" Democrats. A flood light suddenly shines on your party apparatus, revealing its grossly corrupt machinations to fix the primary process and sink the Sanders campaign, and within a day you are on about the evil Russians having hacked into your computers to sabotage our elections

Is this a joke? Are you kidding? Is nothing beneath your dignity? Is this how lowly you rate the intelligence of American voters?

Clowns. Subversives. Do you know who you remind me of? I will tell you: Nixon, in his famously red-baiting campaign – a disgusting episode – during his first run for the Senate, in 1950. Your political tricks are as transparent and anti-democratic as his, it is perfectly fair to say.

I confess to a heated reaction to events since last Friday [July 22] among the Democrats, specifically in the Democratic National Committee. I should briefly explain

The Sanders people have long charged that the DNC has had its fingers on the scale, as one of them put it the other day, in favor of Hillary Clinton's nomination. The prints were everywhere – many those of Debbie Wasserman Schultz, who has repeatedly been accused of anti-Sanders bias. Schultz, do not forget, co-chaired Clinton's 2008 campaign against Barack Obama. That would be enough to disqualify her as the DNC's chair in any society that takes ethics seriously, but it is not enough in our great country. Chairwoman she has been for the past five years.

Last Friday WikiLeaks published nearly 20,000 DNC email messages providing abundant proof that Sanders and his staff were right all along. The worst of these, involving senior DNC officers, proposed Nixon-esque smears having to do with everything from ineptitude within the Sanders campaign to Sanders as a Jew in name only and an atheist by conviction.

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Wasserman fell from grace on Monday. Other than this, Democrats from President Obama to Clinton and numerous others atop the party's power structure have had nothing to say, as in nothing, about this unforgivable breach. They have, rather, been full of praise for Wasserman Schultz. Brad Marshall, the D.N.C.'s chief financial officer, now tries to deny that his Jew-baiting remark referred to Sanders. Good luck, Brad: Bernie is the only Jew in the room.

The caker came on Sunday, when Robby Mook, Clinton's campaign manager, appeared on ABC's "This Week" and CNN's "State of the Union" to assert that the D.N.C.'s mail was hacked "by the Russians for the purpose of helping Donald Trump." He knows this – knows it in a matter of 24 hours – because "experts" – experts he will never name – have told him so.

What's disturbing to us is that experts are telling us that Russian state actors broke into the DNC, stole these emails, and other experts are now saying that Russians are releasing these emails for the purpose of helping Donald Trump.

Is that what disturbs you, Robby? Interesting. Unsubstantiated hocus-pocus, not the implications of these events for the integrity of Democratic nominations and the American political process? The latter is the more pressing topic, Robby. You are far too long on anonymous experts for my taste, Robby. And what kind of expert, now that I think of it, is able to report to you as to the intentions of Russian hackers – assuming for a sec that this concocted narrative has substance?

Making lemonade out of a lemon, the Clinton campaign now goes for a twofer. Watch as it advances the Russians-did-it thesis on the basis of nothing, then shoots the messenger, then associates Trump with its own mess – and, finally, gets to ignore the nature of its transgression (which any paying-attention person must consider grave).

Preposterous, readers. Join me, please, in having absolutely none of it. There is no "Russian actor" at the bottom of this swamp, to put my position bluntly. You will never, ever be offered persuasive evidence otherwise.

Reluctantly, I credit the Clinton campaign and the DNC with reading American paranoia well enough such that they may make this junk stick. In a clear sign the entire crowd-control machine is up and running, The New York Times had a long, unprofessional piece about Russian culprits in its Monday editions. It followed Mook's lead faithfully: not one properly supported fact, not one identified "expert," and more conditional verbs than you've had hot dinners – everything cast as "could," "might," "appears," "would," "seems," "may." Nothing, once again, as to the very serious implications of this affair for the American political process.

Now comes the law. The FBI just announced that it will investigate – no, not the DNC's fraudulent practices (which surely breach statutes), but "those who pose a threat in cyberspace." it is the invocation of the Russians that sends me over the edge. My bones grow weary

We must take the last few days' events as a signal of what Clinton's policy toward Russia will look like should she prevail in November. Turning her party's latest disgrace into an occasion for another round of Russophobia is mere preface, but in it you can read her commitment to the new crusade.

Trump, to make this work, must be blamed for his willingness to negotiate with Moscow. This is now among his sins. Got that? Anyone who says he will talk to the Russians has transgressed the American code. Does this not make Hillary Clinton more than a touch Nixonian?

I am developing nitrogen bends from watching the American political spectacle. One can hardly tell up from down. Which way for a breath of air?"

A year later Lawrence interviewed several of us VIPs, including our two former NSA technical directors and on Aug. 9, 2017 published an article for The Nation titled, "A New Report Raises Big Questions About Last Year's DNC Hack."

Lawrence wrote, "Former NSA experts, now members of Veteran Intelligence Professionals for Sanity (VIPs), say it wasn't a hack at all, but a leak – an inside job by someone with access to the DNC's system."

And so it was. But, sadly, that cut across the grain of the acceptable Russia-gate narrative at The Nation at the time. Its staff, seriously struck by the HWHW (Hillary Would Have Won) virus, rose up in rebellion. A short time later, there was no more room at The Nation for his independent-minded writing.


Drop-Hammer , 2 hours ago

His name was (((Seth Rich))).

zoomie92 , 1 hour ago

Direct USB download to chip or portable HD was the only way to get those download speed shown on the file metadata. This has been proven in multiple independent ways. But the press is filled with ******* retards - and so is the country.

Franko , 1 hour ago

Rest in Peace Mr Seth.

I believe many US officials have enough and want to tell the others about this.

Question:were they should be go to spread the news?To which country before been assasinated?

To end like Julian Assange or like Snowden?

belogical , 2 hours ago

...Gucifer had much less to do with this than the Obama admin. They were using the intelligence community for no good and as their crimes became visible they had to commit bigger and bigger crimes to cover them up. In the end a large part of the DOJ, FBI and Obama admin should be held accountable for this, but when you get this high they likely won't. You can already see Lindsey Graham of the deep state finally holding hearing to spin the narrative before the Durham probe becomes public. Unfortunate but only a few will get their hands slapped and the true person, Obama who deserve to be prosecuted will likely skate.

PedroS , 2 hours ago

Crowdstrike. The owners should be in jail for their role.

Slaytheist , 2 hours ago

Crowdstrike IS Guccifer.

They were ordered by the criminal DNC org to cover the fact that the data was downloaded internally, in order to hide the connection to the Podesta/Clinton ordered hit on person who did it - Seth Rich.

Weedlord Bonerhitler , 3 hours ago

The computer of a DNC operative named Warren Flood was used to disseminate the Guccifer 2.0 disinfo tranche. Adam Carter had the analysis IIRC.

Giant Meteor , 3 hours ago

Always good to hear from Ray!

philipat , 39 minutes ago

Tick tock, still no indictments and soon the campaign will be in full swing so that everything will be attacked as "political". Is Durham done?

[Jun 03, 2020] Rule of law in Murrika is kaput

Highly recommended!
Jun 16, 2019 | www.zerohedge.com

freedommusic , 23 minutes ago link

DEFENSE ATTORNEY: Agent Smith, you testified that the Russians hacked the DNC computers, is that correct?

FBI AGENT JOHN SMITH: That is correct.

DEF ATT: Upon what information did you base your testimony?

AGENT: Information found in reports analyzing the breach of the computers.

DEF ATT: So, the FBI prepared these reports?

AGENT: (cough) . (shift in seat) No, a cyber security contractor with the FBI.

DEF ATT: Pardon me, why would a contractor be preparing these reports? Do these contractors run the FBI laboratories where the server was examined?

AGENT: No.

DEF ATT: No? No what? These contractors don't run the FBI Laboratories?

AGENT: No. The laboratories are staffed by FBI personnel.

DEF ATT: Well I don't understand. Why would contractors be writing reports about computers that are forensically examined in FBI laboratories?

AGENT: Well, the servers were not examined in the FBI laboratory.

(silence)

DEF ATT: Oh, so the FBI examined the servers on site to determine who had hacked them and what was taken?

AGENT: Uh .. no.

DEF ATT: They didn't examine them on site?

AGENT: No.

DEF ATT: Well, where did they examine them?

AGENT: Well, uh .. the FBI did not examine them.

DEF ATT: What?

AGENT: The FBI did not directly examine the servers.

DEF ATT: Agent Smith, the FBI has presented to the Grand Jury and to this court and SWORN AS FACT that the Russians hacked the DNC computers. You are basing your SWORN testimony on a report given to you by a contractor, while the FBI has NEVER actually examined the computer hardware?

AGENT: That is correct.

DEF ATT: Agent Smith, who prepared the analysis reports that the FBI relied on to give this sworn testimony?

AGENT: Crowdstrike, Inc.

DEF ATT: So, which Crowdstrike employee gave you the report?

AGENT: We didn't receive the report directly from Crowdstrike.

DEF ATT: What?

AGENT: We did not receive the report directly from Crowdstrike.

DEF ATT: Well, where did you find this report?

AGENT: It was given to us by the people who hired Crowdstrike to examine and secure their computer network and hardware.

DEF ATT: Oh, so the report was given to you by the technical employees for the company that hired Crowdstrike to examine their servers?

AGENT: No.

DEF ATT: Well, who gave you the report?

AGENT: Legal counsel for the company that hired Crowdstrike.

DEF ATT: Why would legal counsel be the ones giving you the report?

AGENT: I don't know.

DEF ATT: Well, what company hired Crowdstrike?

AGENT: The Democratic National Committee.

DEF ATT: Wait a minute. Let me get this straight. You are giving SWORN testimony to this court that Russia hacked the servers of the Democratic National Committee. And you are basing that testimony on a report given to you by the LAWYERS for the Democratic National Committee. And you, the FBI, never actually saw or examined the computer servers?

AGENT: That is correct.

DEF ATT: Well, can you provide a copy of the technical report produced by Crowdstrike for the Democratic National Committee?

AGENT: No, I cannot.

DEF ATT: Well, can you go back to your office and get a copy of the report?

AGENT: No.

DEF ATT: Why? Are you locked out of your office?

AGENT: No.

DEF ATT: I don't understand. Why can you not provide a copy of this report?

AGENT: Because I do not have a copy of the report.

DEF ATT: Did you lose it?

AGENT: No.

DEF ATT: Why do you not have a copy of the report?

AGENT: Because we were never given a final copy of the report.

DEF ATT: Agent Smith, if you didn't get a copy of the report, upon what information are you basing your testimony?

AGENT: On a draft copy of the report.

DEF ATT: A draft copy?

AGENT: Yes.

DEF ATT: Was a final report ever delivered to the FBI?

AGENT: No.

DEF ATT: Agent Smith, did you get to read the entire report?

AGENT: No.

DEF ATT: Why not?

AGENT: Because large portions were redacted.

DEF ATT: Agent Smith, let me get this straight. The FBI is claiming that the Russians hacked the DNC servers. But the FBI never actually saw the computer hardware, nor examined it? Is that correct?

AGENT: That is correct.

DEF ATT: And the FBI never actually examined the log files or computer email or any aspect of the data from the servers? Is that correct?

AGENT: That is correct.

DEF ATT: And you are basing your testimony on the word of Counsel for the Democratic National Committee, the people who provided you with a REDACTED copy of a DRAFT report, not on the actual technical personnel who supposedly examined the servers?

AGENT: That is correct.

DEF ATT: Your honor, I have a few motions I would like to make at this time.

PRESIDING JUDGE: I'm sure you do, Counselor. (as he turns toward the prosecutors) And I feel like I am in a mood to grant them.

( source )

hooligan2009 , 14 minutes ago link

Brilliant! that sums it up nicely. of course, if the servers were not hacked and were instead "thumbnailed" that leads to a whole pile of other questions (including asking wiileaks for their source and about the murder of seth rich).

[May 27, 2020] Brennan ears over Guccifer 2.0 mask -- CIA is the most probable origin of Gussifer 2.0

If DNC was hack not a leak, then NSA would have all information about the hack.
May 27, 2020 | consortiumnews.com

www.youtube.com/watch?v=_j1qOs0dE4I


P. Michael Garber , May 26, 2020 at 22:21

I'm afraid it won't matter how thorough the alternative media debunking of Russiagate becomes – as long as mainstream media sticks to the story, the neoliberal majority will too, because it is like catnip to them, absolving responsibility for the defeat, casting Clinton as the victim of an evil foreign despot, and delegitimizing Trump. Truth is tossed to the wind by this freight train of powerful interests.

I have little hope Barr and Durham will indict anyone high level.

Ray twice mentioned something about Sanders getting hosed again in the 2020 primary. I thought it seemed weird how suddenly the primary was declared "over." If there is evidence of DNC shenanigans in 2020, that would be a very interesting and timely topic.

Mark McCarty , May 25, 2020 at 21:25

On June 12, Assange announces Wikileaks will soon be releasing "emails pertinent to Hillary". On June 14th, Crowdstrike announces: someone, probably the Russians, has hacked the DNC and taken a Trump opposition research document; the very next day, G2.0 makes his first public appearance and posts the DNC's Trump oppo research document, with "Russian fingerprints" intentionally implanted in its metadata. (We now know that he had actually acquired this from PODESTA's emails, where it appears as an attachment – oops!) Moreover, G2.0 announces that he was the source of the "emails pertinent to Hillary" – DNC emails – that Assange was planning to release.

This strongly suggests that the G2.0 persona was working in collusion with Crowdstrike to perpetrate the hoax that the GRU had hacked the DNC to provide their emails to Wikileaks. Consistent with this, multiple cyberanalyses point to G2.0 working at various points In the Eastern, Central, and Western US time zones. (A mere coincidence that the DNC is in the eastern zone, and that Crowdstrike has offices in the central and western zones?)

If Crowdstrike honestly believed that the DNC had been hacked by the GRU, would there have been any need for them to perpetrate this fraud?

It is therefore reasonable to suspect, as Ray McGovern has long postulated, that Crowdstrike may have FAKED a GRU hack, to slander Russia and Assange, while distracting attention from the content of the released emails.

As far as we know, the only "evidence" that Crowdstrike has for GRU being the perpetrator of the alleged hack is the presence of "Fancy Bear" malware on the DNC server. But as cyberanalysts Jeffrey Carr and George Eliason have pointed out, this software is also possessed by Ukrainian hackers working in concert with Russian traitors and the Atlantic Council – with which the founders of Crowdstrike are allied.

Here's a key question: When Assange announced the impending release of "emails pertinent to Hillary" on June 12, how did Crowdstrike and G2.0 immediately know he was referring to DNC emails? Many people – I, for example – suspected he was referring to her deleted Secretary of State emails.

Here's a reasonable hypothesis – Our intelligence agencies were monitoring all communications with Wikileaks. If so, they could have picked up the communications between SR and Wikileaks that Sy Hersh's FBI source described. They then alerted the DNC that their emails were about to leaked to Wikileaks. The DNC then contacted Crowdstrike, which arranged for a "Fancy Bear hack" of the DNC servers. Notably, cyberanalysts have determined that about 2/3 of the Fancy Bear malware found on the DNC servers had been compiled AFTER the date that Crowdstrike was brought in to "roust the hackers".

Of course, this elaborate hoax would have come to grief if the actual leaker had come forward. Which might have had something to do with the subsequent "botched robbery" in which SR was slain.

Tim , May 25, 2020 at 20:33

How does the murder of the DNC staffer fit in?

Linda Wood , May 26, 2020 at 23:00

DNC staffer Seth Rich was murdered on July 10, 2016, amid contoversy over who provided DNC emails to Wikileaks and over a pending lawsuit concerning voter suppression during the 2016 primaries. Wikileaks offered a $20,000 reward for information about his murder, leading some to believe he was their source for the DNC emails. He was reported to have been a potential witness in the voter suppression lawsuit filed the day after his death.

mockingbirdpaper (dot) com/content/local-activist-files-suit-access-exit-polling-data-dead-witness-blocks-path-truth

[May 24, 2020] Guccifer 2.0 was always John Brennan 1.0

Highly recommended!
Images deleted.
False flag operation by CIA or CrowdStrike as CIA constructor: CIA ears protrude above Gussifer 2.0 hat.
Notable quotes:
"... Guccifer 2.0 fabricated evidence to claim credit for hacking the DNC (using files that were really Podesta attachments) . ..."
"... Guccifer 2.0’s Russian breadcrumbs mostly came from deliberate processes & needless editing of documents . ..."
"... Guccifer 2.0’s Russian communications signals came from the persona choosing to use a proxy server in Moscow and choosing to use a Russian VPN service as end-points (and they used an email service that forwards the sender’s IP address, which made identifying that signal a relatively trivial task.) ..."
"... A considerable volume of evidence pointed at Guccifer 2.0’s activities being in American timezones (twice as many types of indicators were found pointing at Guccifer 2.0’s activities being in American timezones than anywhere else). ..."
"... The American timezones were incidental to other activities (eg. blogging , social media , emailing a journalist , archiving files , etc) and some of these were recorded independently by service providers. ..."
"... A couple of pieces of evidence with Russian indicators present had accompanying locale indicators that contradicted this which suggested the devices used hadn’t been properly set up for use in Russia (or Romania) but may have been suitable for other countries (including America) . ..."
"... On the same day that Guccifer 2.0 was plastering Russian breadcrumbs on documents through a deliberate process, choosing to use Russian-themed end-points and fabricating evidence to claim credit for hacking the DNC, the operation attributed itself to WikiLeaks. ..."
"... Guccifer 2.0 chose to use insecure communications to ask WikiLeaks to confirm receipt of “DNC emails” on July 6, 2016. Confirmation of this was not provided at that time but WikiLeaks did confirm receipt of a “1gb or so” archive on July 18, 2016. ..."
"... The alleged GRU officer we are told was part of an operation to deflect from Russian culpability suggested that Assange “may be connected with Russians”. ..."
"... Guccifer 2.0 fabricated evidence to claim credit for hacking the DNC, covered itself (and its files) in what were essentially a collection of “Made In Russia” labels through deliberate processes and decisions made by the persona, and, then, it attributed itself to WikiLeaks with a claim that was contradicted by subsequent communications between both parties. ..."
"... While we are expected to accept that Guccifer 2.0’s efforts between July 6 and July 18 were a sincere effort to get leaks to WikiLeaks, considering everything we now know about the persona, it seems fair to question whether Guccifer 2.0’s intentions towards WikiLeaks may have instead been malicious. ..."
"... Guccifer 2.0 was always John Brennan 1.0 ..."
"... Was Guccifer II part of the Stefan Halper organization that lured Papadopoulos and maliciously maligned others? ..."
"... I believe Guccifer 2.0 was created by the CIA to falsely pin blame on the Russians for info that Seth Rich gave to WikiLeaks. Read for yourself: http://g-2.space/ ..."
May 24, 2020 | www.zerohedge.com

Authored by Tim Leonard via ConsortiumNews.com,

Why would an alleged GRU officer - supposedly part of an operation to deflect Russian culpability - suggest that Assange “may be connected with Russians?”

In December, I reported on digital forensics evidence relating to Guccifer 2.0 and highlighted several key points about the mysterious persona that Special Counsel Robert Mueller claims was a front for Russian intelligence to leak Democratic Party emails to WikiLeaks:

On the same day that Guccifer 2.0 was plastering Russian breadcrumbs on documents through a deliberate process, choosing to use Russian-themed end-points and fabricating evidence to claim credit for hacking the DNC, the operation attributed itself to WikiLeaks.

This article questions what Guccifer 2.0’s intentions were in relation to WikiLeaks in the context of what has been discovered by independent researchers during the past three years.

Timing

On June 12, 2016, in an interview with ITV’s Robert Peston, Julian Assange confirmed that WikiLeaks had emails relating to Hillary Clinton that the organization intended to publish. This announcement was prior to any reported contact with Guccifer 2.0 (or with DCLeaks).

On June 14, 2016, an article was published in The Washington Post citing statements from two CrowdStrike executives alleging that Russian intelligence hacked the DNC and stole opposition research on Trump. It was apparent that the statements had been made in the 48 hours prior to publication as they referenced claims of kicking hackers off the DNC network on the weekend just passed (June 11-12, 2016).

On that same date, June 14, DCLeaks contacted WikiLeaks via Twitter DM and for some reason suggested that both parties coordinate their releases of leaks. (It doesn’t appear that WikiLeaks responded until September 2016).

On June 15, 2016, Guccifer 2.0 appeared for the first time. He fabricated evidence to claim credit for hacking the DNC (using material that wasn’t from the DNC), used a proxy in Moscow to carry out searches (for mostly English language terms including a grammatically incorrect and uncommon phrase that the persona would use in its first blog post) and used a Russian VPN service to share the fabricated evidence with reporters. All of this combined conveniently to provide false corroboration for several claims made by CrowdStrike executives that were published just one day earlier in The Washington Post.

[CrowdStrike President Shawn Henry testified under oath behind closed doors on Dec. 5, 2017 to the U.S. House intelligence committee that his company had no evidence that Russian actors removed anything from the DNC servers. This testimony was only released earlier this month.]

First Claim Versus First Contact

On the day it emerged, the Guccifer 2.0 operation stated that it had given material to WikiLeaks and asserted that the organization would publish that material soon:

By stating that WikiLeaks would “publish them soon” the Guccifer 2.0 operation implied that it had received confirmation of intent to publish.

However, the earliest recorded communication between Guccifer 2.0 and WikiLeaks didn’t occur until a week later (June 22, 2016) when WikiLeaks reached out to Guccifer 2.0 and suggested that the persona send any new material to them rather than doing what it was doing:

[Excerpt from Special Counsel Mueller’s report. Note: “stolen from the DNC” is an editorial insert by the special counsel.]

If WikiLeaks had already received material and confirmed intent to publish prior to this direct message, why would they then suggest what they did when they did? WikiLeaks says it had no prior contact with Guccifer 2.0 despite what Guccifer 2.0 had claimed.

Needing To Know What WikiLeaks Had

Fortunately, information that gives more insight into communications on June 22, 2016 was made available on April 29, 2020 via a release of the Roger Stone arrest warrant application.

Here is the full conversation on that date (according to the application):

@WikiLeaks: Do you have secure communications?

@WikiLeaks: Send any new material here for us to review and it will have a much higher impact than what you are doing. No other media will release the full material.

@GUCCIFER_2: what can u suggest for a secure connection? Soft, keys, etc? I’m ready to cooperate with you, but I need to know what’s in your archive 80gb? Are there only HRC emails? Or some other docs? Are there any DNC docs? If it’s not secret when you are going to release it?

@WikiLeaks: You can send us a message in a .txt file here [link redacted]

@GUCCIFER_2: do you have GPG?

Why would Guccifer 2.0 need to know what material WikiLeaks already had? Certainly, if it were anything Guccifer 2.0 had sent (or the GRU had sent) he wouldn’t have had reason to inquire.

The more complete DM details provided here also suggest that both parties had not yet established secure communications.

Further communications were reported to have taken place on June 24, 2016:

@GUCCIFER_2: How can we chat? Do u have jabber or something like that?

@WikiLeaks: Yes, we have everything. We’ve been busy celebrating Brexit. You can also email an encrypted message to [email protected]. They key is here.

and June 27, 2016:

@GUCCIFER_2: Hi, i’ve just sent you an email with a text message encrypted and an open key.

@WikiLeaks: Thanks.

@GUCCIFER_2: waiting for ur response. I send u some interesting piece.

Guccifer 2.0 said he needed to know what was in the 88GB ‘insurance’ archive that WikiLeaks had posted on June 16, 2016 and it’s clear that, at this stage, secure communications had not been established between both parties (which would seem to rule out the possibility of encrypted communications prior to June 15, 2016, making Guccifer 2.0’s initial claims about WikiLeaks even more doubtful).

Claims DCLeaks Is A Sub-Project Of WikiLeaks

On June 27, 2016, in an email chain to the Smoking Gun (exposing Guccifer 2.0 apparently being in the Central US timezone), Guccifer 2.0 claimed that DCLeaks was a “sub-project” of WikiLeaks.

There’s no evidence to support this. “Envoy le” is also a mistake as standard French emails read: “Envoye le.” Claims allegedly made by Guccifer 2.0 in a Twitter DM to DCLeaks on September 15, 2016 suggest that he knew this was nonsense:

There was no evidence of WikiLeaks mentioning this to Guccifer 2.0 nor any reason for why WikiLeaks couldn’t just send a DM to DCLeaks themselves if they had wanted to.

(It should also be noted that this Twitter DM activity between DCLeaks and Guccifer 2.0 is alleged by Mueller to be communications between officers within the same unit of the GRU, who, for some unknown reason, decided to use Twitter DMs to relay such information rather than just communicate face to face or securely via their own local network.)

Guccifer 2.0 lied about DCLeaks being a sub-project of WikiLeaks and then, over two months later, was seen trying to encourage DCLeaks to communicate with WikiLeaks by relaying an alleged request from WikiLeaks that there is no record of WikiLeaks ever making (and which WikiLeaks could have done themselves, directly, if they had wanted to).

The ‘About 1GB’ / ‘1Gb or So’ Archive

On July 4, 2016, Guccifer 2.0 contacted WikiLeaks:

@GUCCIFER_2: hi there, check up r email, waiting for reply.

This was followed up on July 6, 2016 with the following conversation:

@GUCCIFER_2: have you received my parcel?

@WikiLeaks: Not unless it was very recent. [we haven’ t checked in 24h].

@GUCCIFER_2: I sent it yesterday, an archive of about 1 gb. via [website link]. and check your email.

@WikiLeaks: Wil[l] check, thanks.

@GUCCIFER_2: let me know the results.

@WikiLeaks: Please don’t make anything you send to us public. It’s a lot of work to go through it and the impact is severely reduced if we are not the first to publish.

@GUCCIFER_2: agreed. How much time will it take?

@WikiLeaks: likely sometime today.

@GUCCIFER_2: will u announce a publication? and what about 3 docs sent u earlier?

@WikiLeaks: I don’t believe we received them. Nothing on ‘Brexit’ for example.

@GUCCIFER_2: wow. have you checked ur mail?

@WikiLeaks: At least not as of 4 days ago . . . . For security reasons mail cannot be checked for some hours.

@GUCCIFER_2: fuck, sent 4 docs on brexit on jun 29, an archive in gpg ur submission form is too fucking slow, spent the whole day uploading 1 gb.

@WikiLeaks: We can arrange servers 100x as fast. The speed restrictions are to anonymise the path. Just ask for custom fast upload point in an email.

@GUCCIFER_2: will u be able to check ur email?

@WikiLeaks: We’re best with very large data sets. e.g. 200gb. these prove themselves since they’re too big to fake.

@GUCCIFER_2: or shall I send brexit docs via submission once again?

@WikiLeaks: to be safe, send via [web link]

@GUCCIFER_2: can u confirm u received dnc emails?

@WikiLeaks: for security reasons we can’ t confirm what we’ve received here. e.g., in case your account has been taken over by us intelligence and is probing to see what we have.

@GUCCIFER_2: then send me an encrypted email.

@WikiLeaks: we can do that. but the security people are in another time zone so it will need to wait some hours.

@WikiLeaks: what do you think about the FBl’ s failure to charge? To our mind the clinton foundation investigation has always been the more serious. we would be very interested in all the emails/docs from there. She set up quite a lot of front companies. e.g in sweden.

@GUCCIFER_2: ok, i’ll be waiting for confirmation. as for investigation, they have everything settled, or else I don’t know how to explain that they found a hundred classified docs but fail to charge her.

@WikiLeaks: She’s too powerful to charge at least without something stronger. s far as we know, the investigation into the clinton foundation remains open e hear the FBI are unhappy with Loretta Lynch over meeting Bill, because he’s a target in that investigation.

@GUCCIFER_2: do you have any info about marcel lazar? There’ve been a lot of rumors of late.

@WikiLeaks: the death? [A] fake story.

@WikiLeaks: His 2013 screen shots of Max Blumenthal’s inbox prove that Hillary secretly deleted at least one email about Libya that was meant to be handed over to Congress. So we were very interested in his co-operation with the FBI.

@GUCCIFER_2: some dirty games behind the scenes believe Can you send me an email now?

@WikiLeaks: No; we have not been able to activate the people who handle it. Still trying.

@GUCCIFER_2: what about tor submission? [W]ill u receive a doc now?

@WikiLeaks: We will get everything sent on [weblink].” [A]s long as you see \”upload succseful\” at the end. [I]f you have anything hillary related we want it in the next tweo [sic] days prefable [sic] because the DNC is approaching and she will solidify bernie supporters behind her after.

@GUCCIFER_2: ok. I see.

@WikiLeaks: [W]e think the public interest is greatest now and in early october.

@GUCCIFER_2: do u think a lot of people will attend bernie fans rally in philly? Will it affect the dnc anyhow?

@WikiLeaks: bernie is trying to make his own faction leading up to the DNC. [S]o he can push for concessions (positions/policies) or, at the outside, if hillary has a stroke, is arrested etc, he can take over the nomination. [T]he question is this: can bemies supporters+staff keep their coherency until then (and after). [O]r will they dis[s]olve into hillary’ s camp? [P]resently many of them are looking to damage hilary [sic] inorder [sic] to increase their unity and bargaining power at the DNC. Doubt one rally is going to be that significant in the bigger scheme. [I]t seems many of them will vote for hillary just to prevent trump from winning.

@GUCCIFER_2: sent brexit docs successfully.

@WikiLeaks: :))).

@WikiLeaks: we think trump has only about a 25% chance of winning against hillary so conflict between bernie and hillary is interesting.

@GUCCIFER_2: so it is.

@WikiLeaks: also, it’ s important to consider what type of president hillary might be. If bernie and trump retain their groups past 2016 in significant number, then they are a restraining force on hillary.

[Note: This was over a week after the Brexit referendum had taken place, so this will not have had any impact on the results of that. It also doesn’t appear that WikiLeaks released any Brexit content around this time.]

On July 14, 2016, Guccifer 2.0 sent an email to WikiLeaks, this was covered in the Mueller report:

It should be noted that while the attachment sent was encrypted, the email wasn’t and both the email contents and name of the file were readable.

The persona then opted, once again, for insecure communications via Twitter DMs:

@GUCCIFER_2: ping. Check ur email. sent u a link to a big archive and a pass.

@WikiLeaks: great, thanks; can’t check until tomorrow though.

On July 17, 2016, the persona contacted WikiLeaks again:

@GUCCIFER_2: what bout now?

On July 18, 2016, WikiLeaks responded and more was discussed:

@WikiLeaks: have the 1 Gb or so archive.

@GUCCIFER_2: have u managed to extract the files?

@WikiLeaks: yes. turkey coup has delayed us a couple of days. [O]therwise all ready[.]

@GUCCIFER_2: so when r u about to make a release?

@WikiLeaks: this week. [D]o you have any bigger datasets? [D]id you get our fast transfer details?

@GUCCIFER_2: i’ll check it. did u send it via email?

@WikiLeaks: yes.

@GUCCIFER_2: to [web link]. [I] got nothing.

@WikiLeaks: check your other mail? this was over a week ago.

@GUCCIFER_2:oh, that one, yeah, [I] got it.

@WikiLeaks: great. [D]id it work?

@GUCCIFER_2:[I] haven’ t tried yet.

@WikiLeaks: Oh. We arranged that server just for that purpose. Nothing bigger?

@GUCCIFER_2: let’s move step by step, u have released nothing of what [I] sent u yet.

@WikiLeaks: How about you transfer it all to us encrypted. [T]hen when you are happy, you give us the decrypt key. [T]his way we can move much faster. (A]lso it is protective for you if we already have everything because then there is no point in trying to shut you up.

@GUCCIFER_2: ok, i’ll ponder it

Again, we see a reference to the file being approximately one gigabyte in size.

Guccifer 2.0’s “so when r u about to make a release?” seems to be a question about his files. However, it could have been inferred as generally relating to what WikiLeaks had or even material relating to the “Turkey Coup” that WikiLeaks had mentioned in the previous sentence and that were published by the following day (July 19, 2016).

The way this is reported in the Mueller report, though, prevented this potential ambiguity being known (by not citing the exact question that Guccifer 2.0 had asked and the context immediately preceding it.

Four days later, WikiLeaks published the DNC emails.

Later that same day, Guccifer 2.0 tweeted: “@wikileaks published #DNCHack docs I’d given them!!!”.

Guccifer 2.0 chose to use insecure communications to ask WikiLeaks to confirm receipt of “DNC emails” on July 6, 2016. Confirmation of this was not provided at that time but WikiLeaks did confirm receipt of a “1gb or so” archive on July 18, 2016.

Guccifer 2.0’s emails to WikiLeaks were also sent insecurely.

We cannot be certain that WikiLeaks statement about making a release was in relation to Guccifer 2.0’s material and there is even a possibility that this could have been in reference to the Erdogan leaks published by WikiLeaks on July 19, 2016.

Ulterior Motives?

While the above seems troubling there are a few points worth considering:

  • There is a considerable volume of evidence that contradicts the premise of Guccifer 2.0 being a GRU operation.
  • The persona lied about WikiLeaks and even stated that Assange “may be connected with Russians”.
  • Guccifer 2.0’s initial claim about sending WikiLeaks material (and that they would publish it soon) appears to have been made without justification and seems to be contradicted by subsequent communications from WikiLeaks.
  • If the archive was “about 1GB” (as Guccifer 2.0 describes it) then it would be too small to have been all of the DNC’s emails (as these, compressed, came to 1.8GB-2GB depending on compression method used, which, regardless, would be “about 2GB” not “about 1GB”). If we assume that these were DNC emails, where did the rest of them come from?
  • Assange has maintained that WikiLeaks didn’t publish the material that Guccifer 2.0 had sent to them. Of course, Assange could just be lying about that but there are some other possibilities to consider. If true, there is always a possibility that Guccifer 2.0 could have sent them material they had already received from another source or other emails from the DNC that they didn’t release (Guccifer 2.0 had access to a lot of content relating to the DNC and Democratic party and the persona also offered emails of Democratic staffers to Emma Best, a self-described journalist, activist and ex-hacker, the month after WikiLeaks published the DNC emails, which, logically, must have been different emails to still have any value at that point in time).
  • On July 6, 2016, the same day that Guccifer 2.0 was trying to get WikiLeaks to confirm receipt of DNC emails (and on which Guccifer 2.0 agreed not to publish material he had sent them), the persona posted a series of files to his blog that were exclusively DNC email attachments.
  • It doesn’t appear any further communications were reported between the parties following the July 18, 2016 communications despite Guccifer 2.0 tweeting on August 12, 2016: “I’ll send the major trove of the #DCCC materials and emails to #wikileaks keep following…” and, apparently, stating this to The Hill too.
  • As there are no further communications reported beyond this point it’s fair to question whether getting confirmation of receipt of the archive was the primary objective for Guccifer 2.0 here.
  • Even though WikiLeaks offered Guccifer 2.0 a fast server for large uploads, the persona later suggested he needed to find a resource for publishing a large amount of data.
  • Despite later claiming he would send (or had sent) DCCC content to WikiLeaks, WikiLeaks never published such content and there doesn’t appear to be any record of any attempt to send this material to WikiLeaks.
  • Digital forensics evidence places Guccifer 2.0 in the Eastern (US) timezone on July 6, 2016, the day on which he was trying to get WikiLeaks to confirm receipt of DNC emails.

Considering all of this and the fact Guccifer 2.0 effectively covered itself in “Made In Russia” labels (by plastering files in Russian metadata and choosing to use a Russian VPN service and a proxy in Moscow for it’s activities) on the same day it first attributed itself to WikiLeaks, it’s fair to suspect that Guccifer 2.0 had malicious intent towards WikiLeaks from the outset.

If this was the case, Guccifer 2.0 may have known about the DNC emails by June 30, 2016 as this is when the persona first started publishing attachments from those emails.

Seth Rich Mentioned By Both Parties

WikiLeaks Offers Reward

On August 9, 2016, WikiLeaks tweeted:

In an interview with Nieuwsuur that was posted the same day, Julian Assange explained that the reward was for a DNC staffer who he said had been “shot in the back, murdered”. When the interviewer suggested it was a robbery Assange disputed it and stated that there were no findings.

When the interviewer asked if Seth Rich was a source, Assange stated, “We don’t comment on who our sources are”.

When pressed to explain WikiLeaks actions, Assange stated that the reward was being offered because WikiLeaks‘ sources were concerned by the incident. He also stated that WikiLeaks were investigating.

Speculation and theories about Seth Rich being a source for WikiLeaks soon propagated to several sites and across social media.

Guccifer 2.0 Claims Seth Rich As His Source

On August 25, 2016, approximately three weeks after the reward was offered, Julian Assange was due to be interviewed on Fox News on the topic of Seth Rich.

On that same day, in a DM conversation with the actress Robbin Young, Guccifer 2.0 claimed that Seth was his source (despite previously claiming he obtained his material by hacking the DNC).

Why did Guccifer 2.0 feel the need to attribute itself to Seth at this time?

[Note: I am not advocating for any theory and am simply reporting on Guccifer 2.0’s effort to attribute itself to Seth Rich following the propagation of Rich-WikiLeaks association theories online.]

Special Counsel Claims

In Spring, 2019, Special Counsel Robert Mueller, who was named to investigate Russian interference in the 2016 U.S. general election, delivered his final report.

It claimed:

Guccifer 2.0 contradicted his own hacking claims to allege that Seth Rich was his source and did so on the same day that Julian Assange was due to be interviewed by Fox News (in relation to Seth Rich).

No communications between Guccifer 2.0 and Seth Rich have ever been reported.

Suggesting Assange Connected To Russians

In the same conversation Guccifer 2.0 had with Robbin Young where Rich’s name is mentioned (on August 25, 2016), the persona also provided a very interesting response to Young mentioning “Julian” (in reference to Julian Assange):

The alleged GRU officer we are told was part of an operation to deflect from Russian culpability suggested that Assange “may be connected with Russians”.

Guccifer 2.0’s Mentions of WikiLeaks and Assange

Guccifer 2.0 mentioned WikiLeaks or associated himself with their output on several occasions:

  1. June 15, 2016: claiming to have sent WikiLeaks material on his blog.
  2. June 27, 2016: when he claimed DCLeaks was a sub-project of WikiLeaks.
  3. July 13, 2016: Joe Uchill of The Hill reported that Guccifer 2.0 had contacted the publication and stated: “The press gradually forget about me, [W]ikileaks is playing for time and have some more docs.”
  4. July 22nd, 2016: claimed credit when WikiLeaks published the DNC leaks.
  5. August 12, 2016: It was reported in The Hill that Guccifer 2.0 had released material to the publication. They reported: “The documents released to The Hill are only the first section of a much larger cache. The bulk, the hacker said, will be released on WikiLeaks.”
  6. August 12, 2016: Tweeted that he would “send the major trove of the #DCCC materials and emails to #wikileaks“.
  7. September 15, 2016: telling DCLeaks that WikiLeaks wanted to get in contact with them.
  8. October 4, 2016: Congratulating WikiLeaks on their 10th anniversary via its blog. Also states: “Julian, you are really cool! Stay safe and sound!”. (This was the same day on which Guccifer 2.0 published his “Clinton Foundation” files that were clearly not from the Clinton Foundation.)
  9. October 17, 2016: via Twitter, stating “i’m here and ready for new releases. already changed my location thanks @wikileaks for a good job!”

Guccifer 2.0 also made some statements in response to WikiLeaks or Assange being mentioned:

  1. June 17, 2016: in response to The Smoking Gun asking if Assange would publish the same material it was publishing, Guccifer 2.0 stated: “I gave WikiLeaks the greater part of the files, but saved some for myself,”
  2. August 22, 2016: in response to Raphael Satter suggesting that Guccifer 2.0 send leaks to WikiLeaks, the persona stated: “I gave wikileaks a greater part of docs”.
  3. August 25, 2016: in response to Julian Assange’s name being mentioned in a conversation with Robbin Young, Guccifer 2.0 stated: “he may be connected with Russians”.
  4. October 18, 2016: a BBC reported asked Guccifer 2.0 if he was upset that WikiLeaks had “stole his thunder” and “do you still support Assange?”. Guccifer 2.0 responded: “i’m glad, together we’ll make America great again.”.

Guccifer 2.0 fabricated evidence to claim credit for hacking the DNC, covered itself (and its files) in what were essentially a collection of “Made In Russia” labels through deliberate processes and decisions made by the persona, and, then, it attributed itself to WikiLeaks with a claim that was contradicted by subsequent communications between both parties.

Guccifer 2.0 then went on to lie about WikiLeaks, contradicted its own hacking claims to attribute itself to Seth Rich and even alleged that Julian Assange “may be connected with Russians”.

While we are expected to accept that Guccifer 2.0’s efforts between July 6 and July 18 were a sincere effort to get leaks to WikiLeaks, considering everything we now know about the persona, it seems fair to question whether Guccifer 2.0’s intentions towards WikiLeaks may have instead been malicious.


xxx 2 minutes ago (Edited)

Everything involving the Russian hoax was set up by the Deep States around the world. Implicate, discredit and destroy all those like Rich, Assange, Flynn and those who knew the truth. Kill the messenger....literally.

xxx 10 minutes ago

here's what really happened:

an American hacker breached Podesta's gmail on March 13 2016 and then uploaded it to Wikileaks via Tor sometime between April and May.

the NSA and CIA have hacked into Wikileaks' Tor file server to watch for new leaks to stay ahead of them to prepare. they saw Podesta's emails leaked and launched a counter infowar operation.

Brennan's CIA created the Guccifer 2.0 persona, with phony Russian metadata artifacts, using digital forgery techniques seen in Vault7. Crowdstrike was already on the premises of DNC since 2015, with their overly expensive security scanner watching the DNC network. Crowdstrike had access to any DNC files they wanted. CIA, FBI and Crowdstrike colluded to create a fake leak of DNC docs through their Guccifer 2.0 cutout. they didn't leak any docs of high importance, which is why we never saw any smoking guns from DNC leaks or DCLeaks.

you have to remember, the whole point of this CIAFBINSA operation has nothing to do with Hillary or Trump or influencing the election. the point was to fabricate criminal evidence to use against Assange to finally arrest him and extradite him as well as smear Wikileaks ahead of the looming leak of Podesta's emails.

if CIAFBINSA can frame Assange and Wikileaks as being criminal hackers and/or Russian assets ahead of the Podesta leaks, then they can craft a narrative for the MSM to ignore or distrust most of the Podesta emails. and that is exactly what happened, such as when Chris Cuomo said on CNN that it was illegal for you to read Wikileaks, but not CNN, so you should let CNN tell you what to think about Wikileaks instead of looking at evidence yourself.

this explains why Guccifer 2.0 was so sloppy leaving a trail of Twitter DMs to incriminate himself and Assange along with him.

if this CIAFBINSA entrapment/frame operation ever leaks, it will guarantee the freedom of Assange.

xxx 11 minutes ago

According to Wikipedia, "Guccifer" is Marcel Lazar Lehel, a Rumanian born in 1972, but "Guccifer 2.0" is someone else entirely.

Is that so?

xxx 20 minutes ago (Edited)

The guy from Cyrptome always asserted Assange was some type of deep state puppet, that he was connected somehow. This wouldn't be news to me and its probably why he was scared as hell. The guy is as good as dead, like S. Hussein. Seth Rich was just a puppet that got caught in the wrong game. He was expendable obviously too because well he had a big mouth, he was expendable from the beginning. Somebody mapped this whole **** out, thats for sure.

xxx 28 minutes ago

I am sick and tired of these Deep State and CIA-linked operations trying to put a wrench in the prosecution of people who were engaged in a coup d'etat.

xxx 29 minutes ago

********

xxx 33 minutes ago

At this point what difference does it make? We are all convinced since 2016. It is not going to convince the TDS cases roaming the wilderness.

No arrests, no subpoenas, no warrants, no barging in at 3 am, no perp walks, no tv glare...

Pres. Trump is playing a very risky game. Arrest now, or regret later. And you won't have much time to regret.

The swamp is dark, smelly and deep,

And it has grudges to keep.

xxx 37 minutes ago

Meanwhile- Guccifer 1.0 is still?

- In prison?

- Released?

- 48 month sentence in 2016. Obv no good behavior.

Nice article. Brennan is the dolt he appears.

xxx 41 minutes ago

+1,000 on the investigative work and analyzing it.

Sadly, none of the guilty are in jail. Instead. Assange sits there rotting away.

xxx 44 minutes ago

Why would an alleged GRU officer - supposedly part of an operation to deflect Russian culpability - suggest that Assange "may be connected with Russians?"

Because the AXIS powers of the CIA, Brit secret police and Israeli secret police pay for the campaign to tie Assange to the Russians...

xxx 45 minutes ago

@realDonaldTrump

A lot of interest in this story about Psycho Joe Scarborough. So a young marathon runner just happened to faint in his office, hit her head on his desk, & die? I would think there is a lot more to this story than that? An affair? What about the so-called investigator? Read story!

xxx 45 minutes ago

Why make it harder than it is? Guccifer II = Crowdstrike

xxx 51 minutes ago

Guccifer 2.0 was always John Brennan 1.0

xxx 58 minutes ago (Edited)

Was Guccifer II part of the Stefan Halper organization that lured Papadopoulos and maliciously maligned others?

xxx 1 hour ago

"His name was Seth Rich." The unofficial motto of ZeroHedge...

xxx 1 hour ago

James Guccifer Clapper.

xxx 1 hour ago

Mossad. And their subsidiary CIA.

xxx 1 hour ago

Crowd Strike CEO'S admission under oath that they had no evidence the DNC was hacked by the Russians should make the Russian Hoax predicate abundantly clear.

Justice for Seth Rich!

xxx 1 hour ago

Any influence Assange had on the election was so small that it wouldn't move the needle either way. The real influence and election tampering in the US has always come from the scores of lobbyists and their massive donations that fund the candidates election runs coupled with the wildly inaccurate and agenda driven collusive effort by the MSM. Anyone pointing fingers at the Russians is beyond blind to the unparalleled influence and power these entities have on swaying American minds.

xxx 1 hour ago

ObamaGate.

xxx 1 hour ago (Edited)

Uugh ONCE AGAIN... 4chan already proved guccifer 2.0 was a larp, and the files were not "hacked", they were leaked by Seth Rich. The metadata from the guccifer files is different from the metadata that came from the seth rich files. The dumb fuckers thought they were smart by modifying the author name of the files to make it look like it came from a russian source. They were so ******* inept, they must have forgot (or not have known) to modify the unique 16 digit hex key assigned to the author of the files when they were created..... The ones that seth rich copied had the system administrators name (Warren Flood) as the author and the 16 digit hex key from both file sources were the same - the one assigned to warren flood.

Really sloppy larp!!!

xxx 1 hour ago

This link has all the detail to show Guccifer 2.0 was not Russia. I believe Guccifer 2.0 was created by the CIA to falsely pin blame on the Russians for info that Seth Rich gave to WikiLeaks. Read for yourself: http://g-2.space/

xxx 1 hour ago

This is what people are. Now the species has more power than it can control and that it knows what to do with.

What do you think the result will be?

As for these games of Secret - it's more game than anything truly significant. The significant exists in the bunkers, with the mobile units, in the submarines. Et. al.

But this is a game in which some of the players die - or wish they were dead.

xxx 1 hour ago

And.....?

Public figures and political parties warrant public scrutiny. And didn't his expose in their own words expose the democrats, the mass media, the bureaucracy to the corrupt frauds that they are?

xxx 1 hour ago

Other than the fact that they didn't steal the emails (unless you believe whistleblowers are thief's, one mans source is another mans thief, it's all about who's ox is being gored and you love "leaks" don't you? As long as they work in your favor. Stop with the piety.

xxx 15 minutes ago

That's not the story at all. Did you just read this article?

The democrats were super duper corrupt (before all of this).

They fucked around to ice Bernie out of the primary.

A young staffer Seth Rich knew it and didn't like it. He made the decision to leak the info to the most reputable org for leaks in the world Wikileaks.

IF the DNC had been playing fair, Seth Rich wouldn't have felt the need to leak.

So, the democrats did it to themselves.

And then they created Russiagate to cover it all up.

And murdered a young brave man ... as we know.

xxx 1 hour ago

Assange, another problem Trump failed to fix.

xxx 1 hour ago

Sounds like it came from the same source as the Trump dossier ... MI5.

[May 24, 2020] Guccifer 2.0's Hidden Agenda : looks like Gussifer 2.0 was a false flag operation designed to smear WikiLeaks and distract from the content of the stolen by Seth Rich or some other insider DNC emails

Highly recommended!
Notable quotes:
"... With the entirety of Russigate finally collapsing under the enormous weight and stench of its own BS, the picture that is beginning to emerge for me is one of an insider deep-state psy-op designed to cover for the crimes committed by the DNC, the Clinton Foundation and the 2016 Hillary campaign; kill for the foreseeable future any progressive threat to the neo-liberal world order; and take down a president that the bipartisan DC and corporate media elite fear and loathe. And why do they fear him? Because he is free to call them out on certain aspects of their criminality and corruption, and has. ..."
"... Hubris, cynicism and a basic belief in the stupidity of the US public all seem to have played a part in all this, enabled by a corporate media with a profit motive and a business model that depends on duping the masses. ..."
"... Anyone who still believes in democracy in the USA has his head in the sand (or someplace a lot smellier). ..."
"... The corruption in the USA is wide and deep and trump is NOT draining the swamp. ..."
"... A further point: the Mueller report insinuates that G2.0 had transferred the DNC emails to Wikileaks as of July 18th, and Wikileaks then published them on July 22nd. This is absurd for two reasons: There is no way in hell that Wikileaks could have processed the entire volume of those emails and attachments to insure their complete authenticity in 4 days. ..."
"... Indeed, when Crowdstrike's Shawn Henry had been chief of counterintelligence under Robert Mueller, he had tried to set Assange up by sending Wikileaks fraudulent material; fortunately, Wikileaks was too careful to take the bait. ..."
May 24, 2020 | consortiumnews.com

Daniel P , May 23, 2020 at 13:34

Fascinating, important and ultimately deeply disturbing. This is why I come to Consortium News.

With the entirety of Russigate finally collapsing under the enormous weight and stench of its own BS, the picture that is beginning to emerge for me is one of an insider deep-state psy-op designed to cover for the crimes committed by the DNC, the Clinton Foundation and the 2016 Hillary campaign; kill for the foreseeable future any progressive threat to the neo-liberal world order; and take down a president that the bipartisan DC and corporate media elite fear and loathe. And why do they fear him? Because he is free to call them out on certain aspects of their criminality and corruption, and has.

Hubris, cynicism and a basic belief in the stupidity of the US public all seem to have played a part in all this, enabled by a corporate media with a profit motive and a business model that depends on duping the masses.

Anonymous , May 22, 2020 at 12:01

These convos alone look like a script kiddie on IRC doing their low functioning version of sock puppetry. Didn't know anyone at all fell for that

Ash , May 22, 2020 at 17:21

Because smooth liars in expensive suits told them it was true in their authoritative TV voices? Sadly they don't even really need to try hard anymore, as people will evidently believe anything they're told.

Bob Herrschaft , May 22, 2020 at 12:00

The article goes a long way toward congealing evidence that Guccifer 2.0 was a shill meant to implicate Wikileaks in a Russian hack. The insinuation about Assange's Russian connection was over the top if Guccifer 2.0 was supposed to be a GRU agent and the mention of Seth Rich only contradicts his claims.

OlyaPola , May 22, 2020 at 10:40

Spectacles are popular.Although less popular, the framing and derivations of plausible belief are of more significance; hence the cloak of plausible denial over under-garments of plausible belief, in facilitation of revolutions of immersion in spectacles facilitating spectacles' popularity.

Some promoters of spectacles believe that the benefits of spectacles accrue solely to themselves, and when expectations appear to vary from outcomes, they resort to one-trick-ponyness illuminated by peering in the mirror.

Skip Scott , May 22, 2020 at 08:35

This is a great article. I think the most obvious conclusion is that Guccifer 2.0 was a creation to smear wikileaks and distract from the CONTENT of the DNC emails. The MSM spent the next 3 years obsessed by RussiaGate, and spent virtually no effort on the DNC and Hillary's collusion in subverting the Sander's campaign, among other crimes.

I think back to how many of my friends were obsessed with Rachel Madcow during this period, and how she and the rest of the MSM served the Empire with their propaganda campaign. Meanwhile, Julian is still in Belmarsh as the head of a "non-state hostile intelligence service," the Hillary camp still runs the DNC and successfully sabotaged Bernie yet again (along with Tulsi), and the public gets to choose between corporate sponsored warmonger from column A or B in 2020.

Anyone who still believes in democracy in the USA has his head in the sand (or someplace a lot smellier).

Guy , May 22, 2020 at 12:19

Totally agree .The corruption in the USA is wide and deep and trump is NOT draining the swamp.

Cal Lash , May 22, 2020 at 01:20

I take it the mentioned time zones are consistent with Langley.

treeinanotherlife , May 22, 2020 at 00:34

"Are there only HRC emails? Or some other docs? Are there any DNC docs?"

G2 is fishing to see if Wiki has DNC docs. Does not say "any DNC docs I sent you". And like most at time thought Assange's "related to hillary" phrase likely (hopefully for some) meant Hillary's missing private server emails. For certain G2 is not an FBI agent>s/he knows difference between HRC and DNC emails.

Thank you for fantastic work.

Mark McCarty , May 21, 2020 at 22:24

A further point: the Mueller report insinuates that G2.0 had transferred the DNC emails to Wikileaks as of July 18th, and Wikileaks then published them on July 22nd. This is absurd for two reasons: There is no way in hell that Wikileaks could have processed the entire volume of those emails and attachments to insure their complete authenticity in 4 days.

Indeed, it is reasonable to expect that Wikileaks had been processing those emails since at least June 12, when Assange announced their impending publication. (I recall waiting expectantly for a number of weeks as Wikileaks processed the Podesta emails.) Wikileaks was well aware that, if a single one of the DNC emails they released had been proved to have been fraudulent, their reputation would have been toast. Indeed, when Crowdstrike's Shawn Henry had been chief of counterintelligence under Robert Mueller, he had tried to set Assange up by sending Wikileaks fraudulent material; fortunately, Wikileaks was too careful to take the bait.

Secondly, it is inconceivable that a journalist as careful as Julian would, on June 12th, have announced the impending publication of documents he hadn't even seen yet. And of course there is no record of G2.0 having had any contact with Wikileaks prior to that date.

It is a great pleasure to see "Adam Carter"'s work at long last appear in such a distinguished venue as Consortium News. It does credit to them both.

Skip Edwards , May 22, 2020 at 12:33

How can we expect justice when there is no justification for what is being done by the US and British governments to Julian Assange!

[May 14, 2020] NYT Falsely Blames Russia For Cyberattack Committed By British Hacker

Chancellor Angela Merkel that stupid? "Chancellor Angela Merkel used strong words on Wednesday condemning an "outrageous" cyberattack by Russia's foreign intelligence service on the German Parliament, her personal email account included. Russia, she said, was pursuing "a strategy of hybrid warfare."
Notable quotes:
"... That alleged attack happened in 2015. The attribution to Russia is as shoddy as all attributions of cyberattacks are. ..."
"... Intelligence officials had long suspected Russian operatives were behind the attack, but they took five years to collect the evidence, which was presented in a report given to Ms. Merkel's office just last week. ..."
"... This is really funny because we recently learned that the company which investigated the alleged DNC intrusion, CrowdStrike, had found no evidence , as in zero, that a Russian hacker group had targeted the DNC or that DNC emails were exfiltrated over the Internet: ..."
"... CrowdStrike, the private cyber-security firm that first accused Russia of hacking Democratic Party emails and served as a critical source for U.S. intelligence officials in the years-long Trump-Russia probe, acknowledged to Congress more than two years ago that it had no concrete evidence that Russian hackers stole emails from the Democratic National Committee's server. ..."
"... The DNC emails were most likely stolen by its local network administrator, Seth Rich , who provided them to Wikileaks before he was killed in a suspicious 'robbery' during which nothing was taken. ..."
"... The whole attribution of case of the stolen DNC emails to Russia is based on exactly nothing but intelligence rumors and CrowdStrike claims for which it had no evidence. As there is no evidence at all that the DNC was attacked by a Russian cybergroup what does that mean for the attribution of the attack on the German Bundestag to the very same group? ..."
May 14, 2020 | www.moonofalabama.org

The New York Times continues its anti-Russia campaign with a report about an old cyberattack on German parliament which also targeted the parliament office of Chancellor Angela Merkel.

Merkel Is 'Outraged' by Russian Hack but Struggling to Respond
Patience with President Vladimir Putin is running thin in Berlin. But Germany needs Russia's help on several geopolitical fronts from Syria to Ukraine.

NYT Berlin correspondent Katrin Bennhold writes:

Chancellor Angela Merkel used strong words on Wednesday condemning an "outrageous" cyberattack by Russia's foreign intelligence service on the German Parliament, her personal email account included. Russia, she said, was pursuing "a strategy of hybrid warfare."

But asked how Berlin intended to deal with recent revelations implicating the Russians, Ms. Merkel was less forthcoming.

"We always reserve the right to take measures," she said in Parliament, then immediately added, "Nevertheless, I will continue to strive for a good relationship with Russia, because I believe that there is every reason to always continue these diplomatic efforts."

That alleged attack happened in 2015. The attribution to Russia is as shoddy as all attributions of cyberattacks are.

Intelligence officials had long suspected Russian operatives were behind the attack, but they took five years to collect the evidence, which was presented in a report given to Ms. Merkel's office just last week.

Officials say the report traced the attack to the same Russian hacker group that targeted the Democratic Party during the U.S. presidential election campaign in 2016.

This is really funny because we recently learned that the company which investigated the alleged DNC intrusion, CrowdStrike, had found no evidence , as in zero, that a Russian hacker group had targeted the DNC or that DNC emails were exfiltrated over the Internet:

CrowdStrike, the private cyber-security firm that first accused Russia of hacking Democratic Party emails and served as a critical source for U.S. intelligence officials in the years-long Trump-Russia probe, acknowledged to Congress more than two years ago that it had no concrete evidence that Russian hackers stole emails from the Democratic National Committee's server.
...
[CrowdStrike President Shawn] Henry personally led the remediation and forensics analysis of the DNC server after being warned of a breach in late April 2016; his work was paid for by the DNC, which refused to turn over its server to the FBI. Asked for the date when alleged Russian hackers stole data from the DNC server, Henry testified that CrowdStrike did not in fact know if such a theft occurred at all : "We did not have concrete evidence that the data was exfiltrated [moved electronically] from the DNC, but we have indicators that it was exfiltrated," Henry said.

The DNC emails were most likely stolen by its local network administrator, Seth Rich , who provided them to Wikileaks before he was killed in a suspicious 'robbery' during which nothing was taken.

The whole attribution of case of the stolen DNC emails to Russia is based on exactly nothing but intelligence rumors and CrowdStrike claims for which it had no evidence. As there is no evidence at all that the DNC was attacked by a Russian cybergroup what does that mean for the attribution of the attack on the German Bundestag to the very same group?

While the NYT also mentions that NSA actually snooped on Merkel's private phonecalls it tries to keep the spotlight on Russia:

As such, Germany's democracy has been a target of very different kinds of Russian intelligence operations, officials say. In December 2016, 900,000 Germans lost access to internet and telephone services following a cyberattack traced to Russia.

bigger

Ahem. No!

That mass attack on internet home routers, which by the way happened in November 2016 not in December, was done with the Mirai worm :

More than 900,000 customers of German ISP Deutsche Telekom (DT) were knocked offline this week after their Internet routers got infected by a new variant of a computer worm known as Mirai. The malware wriggled inside the routers via a newly discovered vulnerability in a feature that allows ISPs to remotely upgrade the firmware on the devices. But the new Mirai malware turns that feature off once it infests a device, complicating DT's cleanup and restoration efforts.
...
This new variant of Mirai builds on malware source code released at the end of September . That leak came a little more a week after a botnet based on Mirai was used in a record-sized attack that caused KrebsOnSecurity to go offline for several days . Since then, dozens of new Mirai botnets have emerged , all competing for a finite pool of vulnerable IoT systems that can be infected.

The attack has not been attributed to Russia but to a British man who offered attacks as a service. He was arrested in February 2017:

A 29-year-old man has been arrested at Luton airport by the UK's National Crime Agency (NCA) in connection with a massive internet attack that disrupted telephone, television and internet services in Germany last November. As regular readers of We Live Security will recall, over 900,000 Deutsche Telekom broadband customers were knocked offline last November as an alleged attempt was made to hijack their routers into a destructive botnet.
...
The NCA arrested the British man under a European Arrest Warrant issued by Germany's Federal Criminal Police Office (BKA) who have described the attack as a threat to Germany's national communication infrastructure.

According to German prosecutors, the British man allegedly offered to sell access to the botnet on the computer underground. Agencies are planning to extradite the man to Germany, where – if convicted – he could face up to ten years imprisonment.

The British man, one Daniel Kaye, plead guilty in court and was sentenced to 18 month imprisonment :

During the trial, Daniel admitted that he never intended for the routers to cease functioning. He only wanted to silently control them so he can use them as part of a DDoS botnet to increase his botnet firepower. As discussed earlier he also confessed being paid by competitors to takedown Lonestar.

In Aug 2017 Daniel was extradited back to the UK to face extortion charges after attempting to blackmail Lloyds and Barclays banks. According to press reports, he asked the Lloyds to pay about £75,000 in bitcoins for the attack to be called off.

The Mirai attack is widely known to have been attributed to Kaye. The case has been discussed at length . IT security journalist Brian Krebs, who's site was also attacked by a Mirai bot net, has written several stories about it. It was never 'traced to Russia' or attributed it to anyone else but Daniel Kaye.

Besides that Kennhold writes of "Russia's foreign intelligence service, known as the G.R.U.". The real Russian foreign intelligence services is the SVR. The military intelligence agency of Russia was once called GRU but has been renamed to GU.

The New York Times just made up the claim about Russia hacking in Germany from absolutely nothing. The whole piece was published without even the most basic research and fact checking.

It seems that for the Times anything can be blamed on Russia completely independent of what the actually facts say.

Posted by b on May 14, 2020 at 14:38 UTC | Permalink


J Swift , May 14 2020 15:05 utc | 1

Good article!

Along the same lines, it always bothered me that among all the (mostly contrived) arguments about who might have been responsible for the alleged "hacking" of DNC as well as Clinton's emails, we never heard mentioned one single time the one third party that we absolutely KNOW had intercepted and collected all of those emails--the NSA! Never a peep about how US intelligence services could be tempted to mischief when in possession of everyone's sensitive, personal information.

Petri Krohn , May 14 2020 15:26 utc | 2
The "Fancy Bear" group (also knowns as advanced persistent threat 28) that is claimed to be behind the hacks is likely little more than the collection of hacking tools shared on the open and hidden parts of RuNet or Russian-speaking Internet. Many of these Russian-speaking hackers are actually Ukrainians .

Some of the Russian hackers also worked for the FSB, like the members of Shaltai Boltai group that were later arrested for treason. George Eliason claims Shaltai Boltai actually worked for Ukrainians. For a short version of the story read this:

Cyberanalyst George Eliason Claims that the "Fancy Bear" Who Hacked the DNC Server is Ukrainian Intelligence – In League with the Atlantic Council and Crowdstrike

Cyberanalyst George Eliason has written some intriguing blogs recently claiming that the "Fancy Bear" which hacked the DNC server in mid-2016 was in fact a branch of Ukrainian intelligence linked to the Atlantic Council and Crowdstrike. I invite you to have a go at one of his recent essays...

Patrick Armstrong , May 14 2020 15:27 utc | 3 Wow! You've done it again. I was just writing my Sitrep and thinking what an amazing coincidence it is that, just as the Russian pipelaying ship arrived to finish Nord Stream, Merkel is told that them nasty Russkies are doing nasty things. I come here and you've already solved it. Yet another scoop. Congratulations.
Brendan , May 14 2020 15:41 utc | 4
The NYT has removed that sentence about the attack on internet/phone access:

"Correction: May 14, 2020

An earlier version of this article incorrectly attributed responsibility for a 2016 cyberattack in which 900,000 Germans lost access to internet and telephone services. The attack was carried out by a British citizen, not Russia. The article also misstated when the attack took place. It was in November, not December. The sentence has been removed from the article. "

That was there for at least 13 hours from yesterday evening onwards. The page was archived this morning though before that edit:
https://web.archive.org/web/20200513221700/https://www.nytimes.com/2020/05/13/world/europe/merkel-russia-cyberattack.html

Norwegian , May 14 2020 15:45 utc | 5
From this we can learn that anything can be blamed by MSM, completely independent of what the facts are. It is not limited to allegations related to Russia or China, but any and all claims by MSM that have no direct reference to provable fact.
james , May 14 2020 15:45 utc | 6
great coverage b... thank you... facts don't matter.. what matters is taking down any positive image of russia, or better - putting up a constantly negative one... of this the intel and usa msm are consistent... the sad reality is a lot of people will believe this bullshit too...

i was just reading paul robinsons blog last night - #DEMOCRACY RIP AND THE NARCISSISM OF RUSSIAGATE .. even paul is starting to getting pissed off on the insanity of the media towards russia which is rare from what i have read from him!

@ 3 patrick armstrong.. keep up the good work!! thanks for your work..

Brendan , May 14 2020 15:48 utc | 7
OK I don't know how to fix the formatting in my last link but you can look up https://www.nytimes.com/2020/05/13/world/europe/merkel-russia-cyberattack.html on https://web.archive.org for 10:46 May 14 2020
m droy , May 14 2020 15:51 utc | 8
There is already a correction made to the DT attack - someone reads MofA! Shame they don't get more of their new interpretation form here.

Whole piece reads here like it started as a Merkel gets close to Russia piece, shown around to colleagues and politicians for feedback, and a ton of fake "why Merkel actually hates the Russians" nonsense was added in.

After all pretty much everyone has tapped Merkel's phone by now.

tucenz , May 14 2020 16:22 utc | 9
Fairy tales told by Danny Kaye....

[May 11, 2020] Tucker: Adam Schiff should resign

This is nationwide gaslighting by Clinton gang of neoliberals who attempted coup d'état, and Adam Schiff was just one of the key figures in this coupe d'état, king of modern Joe McCarthy able and willing to destroy a person using false evidence
What is interesting is that Tucker attacked Republicans for aiding and abetting the coup d'état against Trump
May 11, 2020 | www.youtube.com

RionE23 , 2 days ago

I'm sick of politicians getting a free pass by "resigning" no, they break the law they go to jail.. just like the rest of us.

shannon11590 , 1 day ago

Adam Schiff simply needs to be criminally prosecuted and imprisoned for the countless number of criminal acts that he committed while in Congress.

[Mar 21, 2020] Why Is CrowdStrike Confused On 11 Key Details About The DNC 'Hack'

Mar 21, 2020 | www.zerohedge.com

Why Is CrowdStrike Confused On 11 Key Details About The DNC 'Hack'? by Tyler Durden Sat, 03/21/2020 - 21:20 Authored by Larry Johnson via Sic Semper Tyrannis blog,

Here is the bottom-line - despite being hired in late April (or early May) of 2016 to stop an unauthorized intrusion into the DNC, CrowdStrike, the cyber firm hired by the DNC's law firm to solve the problem, failed abysmally. More than 30,000 emails were taken from the DNC server between 22 and 25 May 2016 and given to Wikileaks. Crowdstrike blamed Russia for the intrusion but claimed that only two files were taken. A nd CrowdStrike inexplicably waited until 10 June 2016 to reboot the DNC network.

CrowdStrike, a cyber-security company hired by a Perkins Coie lawyer retained by the DNC, provided the narrative to the American public of the alledged hack of the DNC, But the Crowdstrike explanation is inconsistent, contradictory and implausible. Despite glaring oddities in the CrowdStrike account of that event, CrowdStrike subsequently traded on its fame in the investigation of the so-called Russian hack of the DNC and became a publicly traded company. Was CrowdStrike's fame for "discovering" the alleged Russian hack of the DNC a critical factor in its subsequent launch as a publicly traded company?

The Crowdstrike account of the hack is very flawed. There are 11 contradictions, inconsistencies or oddities in the public narrative about CrowdStrike's role in uncovering and allegedly mitigating a Russian intrusion (note--the underlying facts for these conclusions are found in Ellen Nakashima's Washington Post story , Vicki Ward's Esquire story , the Mueller Report and the blog of Crowdstrike founder Dmitri Alperovitch):

  1. Two different dates -- 30 April or 6 May -- are reported by Nakashima and Ward respectively as the date CrowdStrike was hired to investigate an intrusion into the DNC computer network.
  2. There are on the record contradictions about who hired Crowdstrike. Nakashima reports that the DNC called Michael Sussman of the law firm, Perkins Coie, who in turn contacted Crowdtrike's CEO Shawn Henry. Crowdstrike founder Dmitri Alperovitch tells Nakashima a different story, stating our "Incident Response group, was called by the Democratic National Committee (DNC).
  3. CrowdStrike claims it discovered within 24 hours the "Russians" were responsible for the "intrusion" into the DNC network.
  4. CrowdStrike's installation of Falcon (its proprietary software to stop breaches) on the DNC on the 1st of May or the 6th of May would have alerted to intruders that they had been detected.
  5. CrowdStrike officials told the Washington Post's Ellen Nakashima that they were, "not sure how the hackers got in" and didn't "have hard evidence."
  6. In a blog posting by CrowdStrike's founder, Dmitri Alperovitch, on the same day that Nakashima's article was published in the Washington Post, wrote that the intrusion into the DNC was done by two separate Russian intelligence organizations using malware identified as Fancy Bear (APT28) and Cozy Bear (APT29).
  7. But, Alperovitch admits his team found no evidence the two Russian organizations were coordinating their "attack" or even knew of each other's presence on the DNC network.
  8. There is great confusion over what the "hackers" obtained. DNC sources claim the hackers gained access to the entire database of opposition research on GOP presidential candidate Donald Trump. DNC sources and CrowdStrike claimed the intruders, "read all email and chat traffic." Yet, DNC officials insisted, "that no financial, donor or personal information appears to have been accessed or taken." However, CrowdStrike states, "The hackers stole two files."
  9. Crowdstrike's Alperovitch, in his blog posting, does not specify whether it was Cozy Bear or Fancy Bear that took the files.
  10. Wikileaks published DNC emails in July 2016 that show the last message taken from the DNC was dated 25 May 2016. This was much more than "two files."
  11. CrowdStrike, in complete disregard to basic security practice when confronted with an intrusion, waited five weeks to disconnect the DNC computers from the network and sanitize them.

Let us start with the very contradictory public accounts attributed to Crowdstrke's founder, Dmitri Alperovitch. The 14 June 2016 story by Ellen Nakashima of the Washington Post and the October 2016 piece by Vicki Ward in Esquire magazine offer two different dates for the start of the investigation:

When did the DNC learn of the "intrusion"?

Ellen Nakashima claims it was the end of April:

"DNC leaders were tipped to the hack in late April . Chief executive Amy Dacey got a call from her operations chief saying that their information technology team had noticed some unusual network activity... That evening, she spoke with Michael Sussmann, a DNC lawyer who is a partner with Perkins Coie in Washington. Soon after, Sussmann, a former federal prosecutor who handled computer crime cases, called Henry, whom he has known for many years. Within 24 hours, CrowdStrike had installed software on the DNC's computers so that it could analyze data that could indicate who had gained access, when and how.

Ward's timeline, citing Alperovitch, reports the alert came later, on 6 May 2016:

At six o'clock on the morning of May 6, Dmitri Alperovitch woke up in a Los Angeles hotel to an alarming email. . . . late the previous night, his company had been asked by the Democratic National Committee to investigate a possible breach of its network. A CrowdStrike security expert had sent the DNC a proprietary software package, called Falcon, that monitors the networks of its clients in real time. Falcon "lit up," the email said, within ten seconds of being installed at the DNC: Russia was in the network.

This is a significant and troubling discrepancy because it marks the point in time when CrowdStrike installed its Falcon software on the DNC server. It is one thing to confuse the 30th of April with the 1st of May. But Alperovitch gave two different reporters two different dates.

What did the "hackers" take from the DNC?

Ellen Nakashima's reporting is contradictory and wrong. Initially, she is told that the hackers got access to the entire Donald Trump database and that all emails and chats could be read. But then she is assured that only two files were taken. This was based on Crowdstrike's CEO's assurance, which was proven subsequently to be spectacularly wrong when Wikileaks published 35,813 DNC emails. How did Crowdstrike miss that critical detail? Here is Nakashima's reporting:

Russian government hackers penetrated the computer network of the Democratic National Committee and gained access to the entire database of opposition research on GOP presidential candidate Donald Trump, according to committee officials and security experts who responded to the breach.

The intruders so thoroughly compromised the DNC's system that they also were able to read all email and chat traffic, said DNC officials and the security experts. . . .

The DNC said that no financial, donor or personal information appears to have been accessed or taken, suggesting that the breach was traditional espionage, not the work of criminal hackers.

One group, which CrowdStrike had dubbed Cozy Bear, had gained access last summer (2015) and was monitoring the DNC's email and chat communications, Alperovitch said.

The other, which the firm had named Fancy Bear, broke into the network in late April and targeted the opposition research files. It was this breach that set off the alarm. The hackers stole two files, Henry said. And they had access to the computers of the entire research staff -- an average of about several dozen on any given day. . . .

CrowdStrike is continuing the forensic investigation, said Sussmann, the DNC lawyer. "But at this time, it appears that no financial information or sensitive employee, donor or voter information was accessed by the Russian attackers," he said.

The DNC emails that are posted on the Wikileaks website and the metadata shows that these emails were removed from the DNC server starting the late on the 22nd of May and continuing thru the 23rd of May. The last tranche occurred late in the morning (Washington, DC time) of the 25th of May 2016. Crowdstrike's CEO, Shawn Henry, insisted on the 14th of June 2016 that "ONLY TWO FILES" had been taken. This is demonstrably not true. Besides the failure of Crowdstrike to detect the removal of more than 35,000 emails, there is another important and unanswered question -- why did Crowdstrike wait until the 10th of June 2016 to start disconnecting the DNC server when they allegedly knew on the 6th of May that the Russians had entered the DNC network?

Crowdstrike accused Russia of the DNC breach but lacked concrete proof.

Ellen Nakashima's report reveals that Crowdstrike relied exclusively on circumstantial evidence for its claim that the Russian Government hacked the DNC server. According to Nakashima:

CrowdStrike is not sure how the hackers got in. The firm suspects they may have targeted DNC employees with "spearphishing" emails. These are communications that appear legitimate -- often made to look like they came from a colleague or someone trusted -- but that contain links or attachments that when clicked on deploy malicious software that enables a hacker to gain access to a computer. " But we don't have hard evidence, " Alperovitch said.

There is a word in English for the phrases, "Not sure" and "No hard evidence"--that word is, "assumption." Assuming that the Russians did it is not the same as proving, based on evidence, that the Russians were culpable. But that is exactly what CrowdStrike did.

The so-called "proof" of the Russian intrusions is the presence of Fancy Bear and Cozy Bear?

At first glance, Dmitri Alperovitch's blog postin g describing the Fancy Bear and Cozy Bear "intrusions" appears quite substantive. But cyber security professionals quickly identified a variety of shortcomings with the Alperovitch account. For example, this malware is not unique nor proprietary to Russia. Other countries and hackers have access to APT28 and have used it.

Skip Folden offers one of the best comprehensive analyses of the problems with the Alperovitch explanation :

No basis whatsoever :

APT28, aka Fancy Bear, Sofacy, Strontium, Pawn Storm, Sednit, etc., and APT29, aka Cozy Bear, Cozy Duke, Monkeys, CozyCar,The Dukes, etc., are used as 'proof' of Russia 'hacking' by Russian Intelligence agencies GRU and FSB respectively.

There is no basis whatsoever to attribute the use of known intrusion elements to Russia, not even if they were once reverse routed to Russia, which claim has never been made by NSA or any other of our IC.

On June 15, 2016 Dmitri Alperovitch himself, in an Atlantic Council article, gave only "medium-level of confidence that Fancy Bear is GRU" and "low-level of confidence that Cozy Bear is FSB." These assessments, from the main source himself, that either APT is Russian intelligence, averages 37%-38% [(50 + 25) / 2].

Exclusivity :

None of the technical indicators, e.g., intrusion tools (such as X-Agent, X-Tunnel), facilities, tactics, techniques, or procedures, etc., of the 28 and 29 APTs can be uniquely attributed to Russia, even if one or more had ever been trace routed to Russia. Once an element of a set of intrusion tools is used in the public domain it can be reverse-engineered and used by other groups which precludes the assumption of exclusivity in future use. The proof that any of these tools have never been reverse engineered and used by others is left to the student - or prosecutor.

Using targets :

Also, targets have been used as basis for attributing intrusions to Russia, and that is pure nonsense. Both many state and non-state players have deep interests in the same targets and have the technical expertise to launch intrusions. In Grizzly Steppe, page 2, second paragraph, beginning with, "Both groups have historically targeted ...," is there anything in that paragraph which can be claimed as unique to Russia or which excludes all other major state players in the world or any of the non-state organizations? No.

Key-Logger Consideration :

On the subject of naming specific GRU officers initiating specific actions on GRU Russian facilities on certain dates / times, other than via implanted ID chips under the finger tips of these named GRU officers, the logical assumption would be by installed key logger capabilities, physical or malware, on one or more GRU Russian computers.

The GRU is a highly advanced Russian intelligence unit. It would be very surprising were the GRU open to any method used to install key logger capabilities. It would be even more surprising, if not beyond comprehension that the GRU did not scan all systems upon start-up and in real time, including key logger protection and anomalies of performance degradation and data transmissions.

Foreign intelligence source :

Other option would be via a foreign intelligence unit source with local GRU access. Any such would be quite anti-Russian and be another nail in the coffin of any chain of evidence / custody validity at Russian site.

Stated simply, Dmitri Alperovitch's conclusion that "the Russians did it" are not supported by the forensic evidence. Instead, he relies on the assumption that the presence of APT28 and APT29 prove Moscow's covert hand. What is even more striking is that the FBI accepted this explanation without demanding forensic evidence.

Former FBI Director James Comey and former NSA Director Mike Rogers testified under oath before Congress that neither agency ever received access to the DNC server. All information the FBI used in its investigation was supplied by CrowdStrike. The Hill reported :

The FBI requested direct access to the Democratic National Committee's (DNC) hacked computer servers but was denied, Director James Comey told lawmakers on Tuesday.

The bureau made "multiple requests at different levels," according to Comey, but ultimately struck an agreement with the DNC that a "highly respected private company" would get access and share what it found with investigators.

The foregoing facts raise major questions about the validity of the Crowdstrike methodology and conclusions with respect to what happened on the DNC network. This is not a conspiracy theory. It is a set of facts that, as of today, have no satisfactory explanation. The American public deserve answers.

[Mar 12, 2020] Did Joe Biden's Former IT Guy Masquerade as Guccifer 2.0 by Larry C Johnson

Highly recommended!
Notable quotes:
"... The computer used to create the original Warren Document (dated 2008) was a US Government computer issued to the Obama Presidential Transition Team by the General Services Administration. ..."
"... The Warren Document and the 1.DOC were created in the United States using Microsoft Word software (2007) that is registered to the GSA. ..."
"... The author of both 1.doc and the PDF version is identified as "WARREN FLOOD." ..."
"... "Russian" fingerprints were deliberately inserted into the text and the meta data of "1.doc." ..."
"... This begs a very important question. Did Warren Flood actually create these documents or was someone masquerading as Warren Flood? Unfortunately, neither the Intelligence Community nor the Mueller Special Counsel investigators provided any evidence to show they examined this forensic data. More troubling is the fact that the Microsoft Word processing software being used is listed as a GSA product. ..."
"... If this was truly a Russian GRU operation (as claimed by Mueller), why was the cyber spy tradecraft so sloppy? ..."
"... The name of Warren Flood, an Obama Democrat activist and Joe Biden's former Director of Information Technology, appears in at least three iterations of these documents. Did he actually masquerade as Guccifer 2.0? If so, did he do it on his own or was he hired by someone else? These remain open questions that deserve to be investigated by John Durham, the prosecutor investigating the attempted coup against Donald Trump, and/or relevant committees of the Congress. ..."
"... There are other critical unanswered questions. Obama's Attorney General, Loretta Lynch, sent a letter to James come on July 26, 2016 about the the DNC hack. Lynch wrote concerning press reports that Russia attacked the DNC: ..."
"... A genuine investigation of the DNC hack/leak should have included interviews with all DNC staff, John Podesta, Warren Flood and Ellen Nakashima, The Washington Post reporter who broke the story of the DNC hack. Based on what is now in the public record, the FBI failed to do a proper investigation. ..."
"... Resolving who was behind Guccifer 2.0 and DCLeaks seems to me to be a rather simple investigative exercise. That is, somebody registered and bought the names of G2 and DCL. One can't have a Wordpress blog without purchasing a url. So, there is a record of this registration, right? Simply subpoena the company who sold/rented the url. ..."
"... It's now obvious that we don't have a functioning intel/justice apparatus in the U.S. This is the message sent and received by the intel/justice shops over and again. They no longer work for Americans rather they work against us. ..."
Mar 12, 2020 | turcopolier.typepad.com

Why does the name of Joe Biden's former Internet Technology guru, Warren Flood, appear in the meta data of documents posted on the internet by Guccifer 2.0? In case you do not recall, Guccifer 2.0 was identified as someone tied to Russian intelligence who played a direct role in stealing emails from John Podesta. The meta data in question indicates the name of the person who actually copied the original document. We have this irrefutable fact in the documents unveiled by Guccifer 2.0--Warren Flood's name appears prominently in the meta data of several documents attributed to "Guccifer 2.0." When this transpired, Flood was working as the CEO of his own company, BRIGHT BLUE DATA. (brightbluedata.com). Was Flood tasked to masquerade as a Russian operative?

Give Flood some props if that is true--he fooled our Intelligence Community and the entire team of Mueller prosecutors into believing that Guccifer was part of a Russian military intelligence cyber attack. But a careful examination of the documents shows that it is highly unlikely that this was an official Russian cyber operation. Here's what the U.S. Intelligence Community wrote about Guccifer 2.0 in their very flawed January 2017 Intelligence Community Assessment:

We assess with high confidence that the GRU used the Guccifer 2.0 persona, DCLeaks.com, and WikiLeaks to release US victim data obtained in cyber operations publicly and in exclusives to media outlets.

  • Guccifer 2.0, who claimed to be an independent Romanian hacker, made multiple contradictory statements and false claims about his likely Russian identity throughout the election. Press reporting suggests more than one person claiming to be Guccifer 2.0 interacted with journalists.
  • Content that we assess was taken from e-mail accounts targeted by the GRU in March 2016 appeared on DCLeaks.com starting in June.

The laxity of the Intelligence Community in dealing with empirical evidence was matched by a disturbing lack of curiosity on the part of the Mueller investigators and prosecutors. Here's the tall tale they spun about Guccifer 2.0:

On June 14, 2016, the DNC and its cyber-response team announced the breach of the DNC network and suspected theft of DNC documents. In the statements, the cyber-response team alleged that Russian state-sponsored actors (which they referred to as "Fancy Bear") were responsible for the breach. Apparently in response to that announcement, on June 15, 2016, GRU officers using the persona Guccifer 2.0 created a WordPress blog. In the hours leading up to the launch of that WordPress blog, GRU officers logged into a Moscow-based server used and managed by Unit 74455 and searched for a number of specific words and phrases in English, including "some hundred sheets," "illuminati," and "worldwide known." Approximately two hours after the last of those searches, Guccifer 2.0 published its first post, attributing the DNC server hack to a lone Romanian hacker and using several of the unique English words and phrases that the GRU officers had searched for that day.

[Apelbaum note--According to Crowdstrike and Special Counsel Mueller, both were present, APT28 AKA "Fancy Bear" and APT29 AKA "Cozy Bear".]

The claims by both the Intelligence Community and the Mueller team about Guccifer 2.0 are an astounding, incredible denial of critical evidence pointing to a U.S. actor, not a Russian or Romanian. No one in this "august" group took the time to examine the metadata on the documents posted by "Guccifer 2.0" to his website on June 15, 2016.

I wish I could claim credit for the following forensic analysis, but the honors are due to Yaacov Apelbaum. While there are many documents in the Podesta haul that match the following pattern, this analysis focuses only on a document originally created by the DNC's Director of Research, Lauren Dillon. This document is the Trump Opposition Report document.

According to Apelbaum , the Trump Opposition Report document, which was "published" by Guccifer 2.0, shows clear evidence of digital manipulation:

  1. A US based user (hereafter referred to as G2 ) operating initially from the West coast and then, subsequently, from the East coast, changes the MS Word 2007 and Operating System language settings to Russian.
  2. G2 opens and saves a document with the file name, "12192015 Trump Report - for dist-4.docx". The document bears the title, "Donald Trump Report" (which was originally composed by Lauren Dillon aka DILLON REPORT) as an RTF file and opens it again.
  3. G2 opens a second document that was attached to an email sent on December 21, 2008 to John Podesta from [email protected]. This WORD document lists prospective nominees for posts in the Department of Agriculture for the upcoming Obama Administration. It was generated by User--Warren Flood--on a computer registered to the General Services Administration (aka GSA) named "Slate_-_Domestic_-_USDA_-_2008-12-20-3.doc", which was kept by Podesta on his private Gmail account. (I refer to this as the "WARREN DOCUMENT" in this analysis.)
  4. G2 deletes the content of the 2008 Warren Document and saves the empty file as a RTF, and opens it again.
  5. G2 copies the content of the 'Dillon Report' (which is an RTF document) and pastes it into the 2008 Warren Document template, i.e. the empty RTF document.
  6. G2 user makes several modifications to the content of this document. For example, the Warren Document contained the watermark--"CONFIDENTIAL DRAFT". G2 deleted the word "DRAFT" but kept the "CONFIDENTIAL" watermark.
  7. G2 saves this document into a file called "1.doc". This document now contains the text of the original Lauren Dillon "Donald Trump Report" document, but also contains Russian language URL links that generate error messages.
  8. G2's 1.DOC (the Word version of the document) shows the following meta data authors:
    • Created at 6/15/2016 at 1:38pm by "WARREN FLOOD"
    • Last Modified at 6/15/2016 at 1:45pm by "Феликс Эдмундович" (Felix Edmundovich, the first and middle name of Dzerzhinsky, the creator of the predecessor of the KGB. It is assumed the Felix Edmundovich refers to Dzerzhinsky.)
  9. G2 also produces a pdf version of this document almost four hours later. It is created at 6/15/201`6 at 5:54:15pm by "WARREN FLOOD."
  10. G2 first publishes "1.doc" to various media outlets and then uploads a copy to the Guccifer 2.0 WordPress website (which is hosted in the United States).

There are several critical facts from the metadata that destroy the claim that Guccifer 2.0 was a Romanian or a Russian.

  • The computer used to create the original Warren Document (dated 2008) was a US Government computer issued to the Obama Presidential Transition Team by the General Services Administration.
  • The Warren Document and the 1.DOC were created in the United States using Microsoft Word software (2007) that is registered to the GSA.
  • The author of both 1.doc and the PDF version is identified as "WARREN FLOOD."
  • The copy of "1.doc" was uploaded to a server hosted in the United States.
  • "Russian" fingerprints were deliberately inserted into the text and the meta data of "1.doc."

This begs a very important question. Did Warren Flood actually create these documents or was someone masquerading as Warren Flood? Unfortunately, neither the Intelligence Community nor the Mueller Special Counsel investigators provided any evidence to show they examined this forensic data. More troubling is the fact that the Microsoft Word processing software being used is listed as a GSA product.

If this was truly a Russian GRU operation (as claimed by Mueller), why was the cyber spy tradecraft so sloppy? A covert cyber operation is no different from a conventional human covert operation, which means the first and guiding principle is to not leave any fingerprints that would point to the origin of the operation. In other words, you do not mistakenly leave flagrant Russian fingerprints in the document text or metadata. A good cyber spy also will not use computers and servers based in the United States and then claim it is the work of a hacker ostensibly in Romania.

None of the Russians indicted by Mueller in his case stand accused of doing the Russian hacking while physically in the United States. No intelligence or evidence has been cited to indicate that the Russians stole a U.S. Government computer or used a GSA supplied copy of Microsoft Word to produce the G2 documents.

The name of Warren Flood, an Obama Democrat activist and Joe Biden's former Director of Information Technology, appears in at least three iterations of these documents. Did he actually masquerade as Guccifer 2.0? If so, did he do it on his own or was he hired by someone else? These remain open questions that deserve to be investigated by John Durham, the prosecutor investigating the attempted coup against Donald Trump, and/or relevant committees of the Congress.

There are other critical unanswered questions. Obama's Attorney General, Loretta Lynch, sent a letter to James come on July 26, 2016 about the the DNC hack. Lynch wrote concerning press reports that Russia attacked the DNC:

If foreign intelligence agencies are attempting to undermine that process, the U.S. government should treat such efforts even more seriously than standard espionage. These types ofcyberattacks are significant and pernicious crimes. Our government must do all that it can to stop such attacks and to seek justice for the attacks that have already occurred.

We are writing to request more information on this cyberattack in particular and more information in general on how the Justice Department, FBI, and NCIJTF attempt to prevent and punish these types ofcyberattacks. Accordingly, please respond to the following by August 9, 2016:

  1. When did the Department of Justice, FBI, and NCIJTF first learn of the DNC hack? Was the government aware ofthe intrusion prior to the media reporting it?
  2. Has the FBI deployed its Cyber Action Team to determine who hacked the DNC?
  3. Has the FBI determined whether the Russian government, or any other foreign
    government, was involved in the hack?
  4. In general, what actions, if any, do the Justice Department, FBI, and NCIJTF take to prevent cyberattacks on non-governmental political organizations in the U.S., such as campaigns and political parties? Does the government consult or otherwise communicate with the organizations to inform them ofpotential threats, relay best practices, or inform them ofdetected cyber intrusions.
  5. Does the Justice Department believe that existing statutes provide an adequate basis for addressing hacking crimes of this nature, in which foreign governments hack seemingly in order to affect our electoral processes?

So far no document from Comey to Lynch has been made available to the public detailing the FBI's response to Lynch's questions. Why was the Cyber Action Team not deployed to determine who hacked the DNC? A genuine investigation of the DNC hack/leak should have included interviews with all DNC staff, John Podesta, Warren Flood and Ellen Nakashima, The Washington Post reporter who broke the story of the DNC hack. Based on what is now in the public record, the FBI failed to do a proper investigation.

Recent Comments

h | 12 March 2020 at 12:08 PM

Of course sleepy Joe was in on the overall RussiaGate operation. And now another reasonable question by sleuth extraordinaire will fall into the memory hole b/c no one who has the authority and the power in DC is ever going to address, let alone, clean up and hold accountable any who created this awful mess.

Resolving who was behind Guccifer 2.0 and DCLeaks seems to me to be a rather simple investigative exercise. That is, somebody registered and bought the names of G2 and DCL. One can't have a Wordpress blog without purchasing a url. So, there is a record of this registration, right? Simply subpoena the company who sold/rented the url.

What's troubling to me is that even the most simplest investigative acts to find answers never seems to happen. Instead, more than three years later we're playing 'Whodunit.'

It's been over 3 years now and if we had a truly functioning intel/justice apparatus this simple act would have been done long ago and then made public. Yet, here we are more than three years later trying to unravel, figure out or resolve the trail of clues via metadata the pranksters left behind.

It's now obvious that we don't have a functioning intel/justice apparatus in the U.S. This is the message sent and received by the intel/justice shops over and again. They no longer work for Americans rather they work against us.

[Feb 29, 2020] CrowdStrike s Dmitri Alperovitch by William F. Jasper

Highly recommended!
Notable quotes:
"... Clinton and her Democratic National Committee allies — which appear to have included virtually all the top-tier DNC officials — decided the best defense would be an aggressive offense. They would make a pre-emptive damage-control strike to shift media and public attention away from the content of the e-mails (which they knew would be damning) to the provenance of the e-mails. They would divert the focus away from the embarrassing, unethical, and illegal actions revealed in the e-mails to how they were obtained and by whom. ..."
"... The following day, on June 15, the “Russian hacking” narrative was reinforced by “Guccifer 2.0,” an anonymous Internet persona, who claimed that the forensics of the DNC server showed it had been tainted with “Russian fingerprints.” ..."
"... All of the above organizations — most especially the CFR — have longstanding, troubling ties to the Deep State intelligence services . Notwithstanding Alperovitch’s many elitist ties listed above, it is his connections to the Atlantic Council that are especially noteworthy, as they illustrate the extensive and dangerous interconnectedness of these private globalist organizations with think tanks, major corporations, intelligence agencies, national governments, the United Nations, and other intergovernmental organizations. These private globalist organizations form the top level of the pyramid of power of the state-within-the-state — the Deep State — and they consider themselves above the rule of law and all that stuff meant for lower mortals. ..."
"... The Atlantic Council is a staunch opponent of the Brexit, President Donald Trump, nationalist-populist movements, and the burgeoning independent media. ..."
"... The Ukrainian civil war was well orchestrated by Obama and Hillary's Deep State along with Russian Mafioso and Ukrainian neo-Nazi Stefano Bandera operatives, a dubious mercurial cult from WWII who operated for both Hitler and Stalin's armies, being responsible for the penetration of the OPC's (precursor to the CIA) early Cold War operations behind the Iron Curtain. Every freedom fighter we trained behind the Iron Curtain was immediately identified and assassinated by the KGB because of Belorussian and Ukrainian double agents trained by the OPC-CIA: ..."
"... Crowdstrike is just another US based start-up getting high on the hog of government contracts, and was keen to be there at the beginning of the Clinton presidency. The evidence from "Adam Carter" shows that Guccifer 2.0 was almost certainly a creation of Crowdstrike, in order to manufacture the story that it was a Russian hacker and not a disgruntled DNC leaker. ..."
"... The setup was in the media. On June 15 2016, Crowdstrike announced that the DNC had been hacked by the two "bears", but the only thing missing was opposition research on Donald Trump. The next day, G2 appears, "leaking" the very boring "Trump research". The problem is, that that document didn't come from the DNC leak, it came from the Podesta email leak, yet that was never revealed at the time. How did Crowdstrike know on the 15th, to say that the DNC hackers took the Trump research, and G2 appears the next day claiming to release the document, when in actuality, G2 got the "Trump" file off Podesta's machine? ..."
www.theamericanconservative.com

Dmitri Alperovitch has played a key role in diverting attention from Hillary Clinton's documented unethical, illegal, and treasonous activities with Putin to allegations of ties between Donald Trump and Putin, for which no evidence has been forthcoming. Is Alperovitch, in reality, one of Putin's best deep-cover agents?

Before the WikiLeaks announcement in 2016 that it would be releasing thousands of e-mails from the Democratic National Committee, few Americans had heard of the cybersecurity firm CrowdStrike or Dmitri Alperovitch (shown), its Russian-Ukranian cofounder and chief technology officer. He is still far from being a household name, but he remains a central figure in the ongoing “Trump-Russia collusion” investigations by Senate and House committees and Special Counsel Robert Mueller.

That WikiLeaks announcement, by the whistleblowing organization’s spokesman Julian Assange, came on June 12, a little over a month before the 2016 Democratic National Convention in Philadelphia. The Hillary Clinton campaign, still facing an insurgency from staunch Bernie Sanders supporters, was thrown into a panic. The WikiLeaks release was seen as something that could seriously sabotage her march to the White House. Clinton and her Democratic National Committee allies — which appear to have included virtually all the top-tier DNC officials — decided the best defense would be an aggressive offense. They would make a pre-emptive damage-control strike to shift media and public attention away from the content of the e-mails (which they knew would be damning) to the provenance of the e-mails. They would divert the focus away from the embarrassing, unethical, and illegal actions revealed in the e-mails to how they were obtained and by whom.

As mentioned above, the WikiLeaks announcement came on June 12. Two days later, on June 14, DNC contractor CrowdStrike announced (via the Washington Post) that its forensic analysis of the DNC server had determined malware had been injected into the server — and it had been done by Russians. Not just any Russians, mind you, but agents of Vladimir Putin. Alperovitch and CrowdStrike’s Shawn Henry (a former FBI executive under Director Robert Mueller and President Obama) told the Post that their investigation revealed the DNC server had been hacked by the cyber-espionage groups known as “Fancy Bear,” allegedly associated with the Russian GRU (military intelligence) and “Cozy Bear,” allegedly associated with the FSB (the successor to the infamous Soviet KGB).

The following day, on June 15, the “Russian hacking” narrative was reinforced by “Guccifer 2.0,” an anonymous Internet persona, who claimed that the forensics of the DNC server showed it had been tainted with “Russian fingerprints.”

Hillary Clinton and her campaign chairman John Podesta, along with their DNC auxiliaries, immediately launched their brazen Russia-bashing program, claiming that Putin was interfering in our presidential election to keep her out of the White House and put his “puppet,” Donald Trump, into the Oval Office. It was precisely the kind of audacious response one would expect from Podesta, who earned notoriety as a shrewd and ruthless political operative while serving as chief of staff to President Bill Clinton. In that post, he proved his worth as the master of damage control, handling Bill Clinton’s scandals du jour cavalcade: Chinagate, Troopergate, Coffeegate, Bimbogate, etc. Besides diverting attention from the e-mails released by WikiLeaks, the Russia-Trump collusion accusations served other purposes as well. Certainly among the foremost of those purposes was that accusing Trump of colluding with Russia would bolster Hillary’s image as an anti-Putin hardliner. This was not only a move calculated to counter Hillary’s and the Democrats’ images as historically “soft on communism” and “soft on national security/national defense,” but calculated also to serve as a sort of immunity against investigation and prosecution of Bill and Hillary Clinton, John Podesta, and many others in their circle for their own well-documented corrupt, illegal, and treasonous dealings with Putin and Russia, which we have reported on extensively over many years (see here, here, and here, for example).

However, the “Trump-Russia collusion” meme would not have taken hold and could not have continued causing the political distraction and upheaval more than a year into the Trump administration simply on the strength of Clinton, Podesta, and the DNC. The ongoing campaign against President Trump has only remained viable because of the continuous support and connivance of Deep State operatives in the intelligence community and the major media.

This connivance was apparent from the start, when the DNC and CrowdStrike refused to allow official analysts from the FBI, CIA, NSA, and other agencies to examine the DNC server that was supposedly hacked by the Russians. One might expect that, in response, the “rebuffed” intelligence and law-enforcement agencies would refrain from endorsing the conclusions of a report that was obviously serving a partisan political purpose and that was based on evidence that they had not seen, because it had been purposely withheld from them. But no, the politically appointed intel chiefs lined up to parrot the Clinton/DNC/CrowdStrike line that Putin had interfered in the U.S. presidential election to torpedo Hillary Clinton and aid Donald Trump.

Phony “Fingerprints,” Phony “Hack”

Like the phony “Russia dossier” on Trump produced by Christopher Steele and Fusion GPS for Hillary Clinton and the DNC, the CrowdStrike “analysis” quickly came unraveled under expert examination. Among the many authoritative refutations of CrowdStrike’s claims are an early analysis by former top IBM executive Skip Folden, entitled “Non-Existent Foundation for Russian Hacking Charge” and “Intel Vets Challenge ‘Russia Hack’ Evidence" by Veteran Intelligence Professionals for Sanity (VIPS). The VIPS study, led by the legendary Dr. William Binney, a former technical director at the NSA, also benefitted from the input of VIPS members who were cybersecurity experts with the NSA, CIA, DIA, FBI, and military intelligence.

Among their most important finds are these two critical points:

1) The claimed “Russian fingerprints” provide no trace routing to prove that any “hacking” was done by Russian intelligence operatives. The software and methods allegedly used are commonly available and commonly used by many private individuals, criminal syndicates, and state actors. Moreover, the “Russian” traces are so crude as to be obvious plants pointing to the Russians, whereas, if Putin’s cyberspooks had actually done it, they would have done a more professional job of covering their tracks, the experts say, and;

2) The “hack” of the DNC was actually a leak, not a hack. The technical analysis of the security breach shows that the DNC e-mails were copied onto a USB device, such as a thumb drive, by someone physically at the DNC headquarters, not downloaded via a remote connection on the Internet. Thus it was a leak by someone at the DNC, not Russian hackers, who provided the data to WikiLeaks. That’s not an insignificant distinction!

In addition to the Folden and VIPS reports, other top-grade technical experts who have challenged and discredited the faux “intelligence community consensus” on the DNC hacking include:

  • Mark Maunder, CEO of cybersecurity firm Wordfence;
  • Rob Graham, CEO of Errata Security;
  • Robert M. Lee, CEO of the security company Dragos;
  • Gregory Copley, president of the International Strategic Studies Association (ISSA); and
  • Jeffrey Carr, principal consultant for 20KLeague.com, founder of Suits and Spooks, author of Inside Cyber Warfare, and a lecturer at the Army War College and the Defense Intelligence Agency.

In short, what we have is very credible technical analysis that challenges the claim of “Russian hacking” vs. a Clinton-DNC contractor who has a motive to produce a scenario that his employer is demanding. We also have the unexplained refusal of the Clinton-DNC “victims” to provide the evidence of the supposed crime to law-enforcement and intelligence authorities. Finally, and most suspiciously, we have the intelligence community (IC) that fails to demand seeing the evidence before endorsing the DNC/CrowdStrike verdict — a verdict that is obviously politically expedient.

In addition to the technical forensic analysis that discredits the “Russian hacking” charges, we also have the claims of two WikiLeaks principals involved in the DNC e-mail breach who insist that the data was obtained via an inside leak, not a Russian Hack. WikiLeaks spokesman Julian Assange has repeatedly and emphatically stated that neither Russia nor anyone associated with Russia had anything to do with providing WikiLeaks with the DNC e-mails. For many people, however, Assange’s denials are barely more credible than those of Vladimir Putin himself, even though Assange and WikiLeaks have — time after time — reliably delivered precisely what they promised and have been non-partisan, exposing wrongdoing regardless of the wrongdoers’ political affiliations. Assange is not alone, though, in denying a Russian source connection.

Craig Murray, the human-rights whistleblower and former British ambassador to Uzbekistan, has said in interviews with two British newspapers, The Guardian and Daily Mail Online, that he personally flew to Washington, D.C., and met with the DNC employee who provided him with the DNC e-mails to give to WikiLeaks. “I’ve met the person who leaked them,” Murray told The Guardian, “and they are certainly not Russian and it’s an insider. It’s a leak, not a hack.” Ambassador Murray’s career has shown him to be a credible witness, as well as heroically courageous. In exposing the brutal communist dictatorship of Uzbek President Islam Karimov, he also stood up to the British Foreign Office, which was covering for Karimov, and in so doing, sacrificed his diplomatic career and drew down on himself a vicious campaign of character assassination aimed at destroying his reputation.

Thus, we have highly credible technical analysis that asserts the DNC e-mails were obtained by leak, not hack, and we have a credible witness/participant who testifies that he received the DNC data from a DNC “insider” and delivered them to WikiLeaks.

Who is Dmitri Alperovitch?

Who is Dmitri Alperovitch, and why is his highly suspect CrowdStrike analysis accepted as gospel by the DNC, Hillary Clinton, Barack Obama, the IC, and the IC-tainted Big Media “Mockingbirds”? Dmitri Alperovitch was born in Moscow in 1980, which is to say, during the latter years of the Soviet Union. There seem to be large gaps in his curriculum vitae concerning his life before emigrating to the U.S., making his background somewhat mysterious, which, some might think, would be problematical for someone who is reputed to be a top go-to guy on cyber security. But it certainly doesn’t seem to be problematic for major investors such as CapitalG (formerly Google Capital), which led a $100 million capital drive for CrowdStrike in 2015. By May of 2017, Business Insider reported, Alperovitch’s startup had attracted over $256 million and its stock was valued at just under $1 billion.

Billionaire Eric Schmidt, the longtime CEO of Google (and its parent company, Alphabet, Inc.) is, of course, a big-time DNC donor, and was a major supporter of both Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton, as were many other Google executives. Schmidt was a principal investor in The Groundwork, a start-up tech company formed to assist Hillary Clinton’s presidential campaign. Besides Google, CrowdStrike has benefitted from cash infusions from Warburg Pincus, Accel Partners, Telstra, and March Capital Partners.

Just as interesting as Alperovitch’s apparent Midas touch is his cachet with the elite media and the great and the good of the globalist one-world set. He has been the subject of flattering profiles at Esquire, Fortune, Politico, the Washington Post, NPR, CNBC, and many other media herd venues. He is also featured as an anointed expert at such exclusive insider assemblages as the Council on Foreign Relations (CFR), the World Economic Forum, the Aspen Institute, the Brookings Institution, the Center for Strategic and International Studies, the Atlantic Council (where he is a senior fellow), and the Belfer Center for Science and International Affairs at Harvard University (where he is also a senior fellow).

All of the above organizations — most especially the CFR — have longstanding, troubling ties to the Deep State intelligence services. Notwithstanding Alperovitch’s many elitist ties listed above, it is his connections to the Atlantic Council that are especially noteworthy, as they illustrate the extensive and dangerous interconnectedness of these private globalist organizations with think tanks, major corporations, intelligence agencies, national governments, the United Nations, and other intergovernmental organizations. These private globalist organizations form the top level of the pyramid of power of the state-within-the-state — the Deep State — and they consider themselves above the rule of law and all that stuff meant for lower mortals.

The Atlantic Council is subsidized by taxpayers through its government-related funding partners, which include the U.S. State Department; the European Union; the European Investment Bank; NATO; and the governments of Norway, Sweden, Japan, Finland, Lithuania, South Korea, Cyprus, Latvia, and Slovakia; among others. The Atlantic Council’s corporate sponsors include JPMorgan Chase, the Blackstone Group, Bank of America, Airbus, Chevron, ExxonMobil, Ford, Saab, Zurich, Walmart Stores, Inc., Lockheed Martin, 21st Century Fox, Arab Bank, Boeing, CIGNA Corporation, Coca-Cola Company, Raytheon, Pfizer, and many others. Besides the Rockefeller and Soros foundations, the Atlantic Council also receives generous handouts from the usual establishment tax-exempt foundations that fund globalist and leftwing causes.

The Atlantic Council’s website tells us, “In 1961, former Secretaries of State Dean Acheson and Christian Herter, with Will Clayton, William Foster, Theodore Achilles and other distinguished Americans, recommended the consolidation of the U.S. citizens groups supporting the Atlantic Alliance into the Atlantic Council of the United States.”

What the Atlantic Council’s website doesn’t mention is that all of these founders were also leading members of the CFR, the principal organization pushing for world government and the annihilation of national sovereignty for most of the past century. Virtually all of the individuals populating the Atlantic Council’s historical roster of its current and past chairmen, presidents, and directors are/were also prominent CFR members. The Atlantic Council represents and projects the CFR globalist agenda on a multitude of political and economic issues, as, for instance, in its support for the TTIP (Transatlantic Trade and Investment Partnersip), the UN Climate treaty, increased Muslim migration into Europe, expanded EU control over its member states, expanded funding and powers for the United Nations and NATO, and much more. The Atlantic Council is a staunch opponent of the Brexit, President Donald Trump, nationalist-populist movements, and the burgeoning independent media.

It is the Atlantic Council’s involvement in launching an insidious campaign to stamp out the growing Internet-based independent media that is our main concern here, and the area where Dmitri Alperovitch appears to be a central character. A key instrument in that effort is a group of anonymous national security and cybersecurity “experts” who claim to be fighting Russian propaganda in the alternative media.

The group, which goes by the name “Is It Propaganda Or Not?” or "PropOrNot" (www.propornot.com), joined up with Snopes, Politifact, Fake News Watch, Fort Liberty Hoax Sites, and other left-leaning groups to attack conservative and libertarian news sites. It has been boosted in this treacherous attack on the First Amendment by the Washington Post, the New Republic, and other members of the Fourth Estate with deep ties to the Deep State.

This danger has been amplified by the efforts of Google, Facebook, Twitter, and other tech giants to censor politically incorrect speech on the Internet. We first wrote about PropOrNot in a December 2016 article, “FAKE NEWS: Media Hysteria Over Irrelevant Fake Websites Masks More Sinister Agenda.”

In a forthcoming article, we will be examining the threat to our freedom of speech posed by the PropOrNot-Deep State complex and the roles of Alperovitch, CrowdStrike, Google, CFR-Atlantic Council, and the “intelligence community” in that ongoing dangerous attack on liberty.

Image: screenshot from YouTube video of CBS News interview with Dmitri Alperovitch

Related articles:

Rachel Verdon 2 years ago • edited ,

William Jasper, asking "Is Alperovitch, in reality, one of Putin's best deep-cover agents," has every right to be suspicious about Dmitri Alperovitch and his ties to the Atlantic Council of the Ukraine. Alperovitch hates President Putin and the new Russian Federation. Alperovitch was involved in toppling the legitimate Ukrainian presidency of Viktor Yanukovych who favored aligning with Russia instead of the European Union, according to an article in CounterPunch on March 23, 2017:

"Cybersecurity Firm That Attributed DNC Hacks to Russia May Have Fabricated Russia Hacking in Ukraine" by Michael J. Sainato
http://www.counterpunch.org...

The Ukrainian civil war was well orchestrated by Obama and Hillary's Deep State along with Russian Mafioso and Ukrainian neo-Nazi Stefano Bandera operatives, a dubious mercurial cult from WWII who operated for both Hitler and Stalin's armies, being responsible for the penetration of the OPC's (precursor to the CIA) early Cold War operations behind the Iron Curtain. Every freedom fighter we trained behind the Iron Curtain was immediately identified and assassinated by the KGB because of Belorussian and Ukrainian double agents trained by the OPC-CIA:

  • "Ukraine on Fire" the movie, by Oliver Stone https://www.youtube.com/wat...
  • "The Belarus Secret" by John Loftus https://www.amazon.com/Bela... see pages 16, 66, 101-104 depicting the Ukrainian Stefano Bandera group whose communist double agents had permeated every level of western intelligence and compromised US intelligence during the Cold War
Brett Harris paul dinatale a year ago ,

I don't see how Alperovich is connected to Russia, he arrived in the US as a 15year old, and has been working hand in glove with the Obama Administration, especially during the Ukraine coup in 2014. Crowdstrike has already been caught using the same techniques as in the DNC, to "prove" that Russia hacked Ukranian artillery guidance computers. The Ukrainian military has come out and explicitly denied that any artillery was infected, and has been independently verified.

Crowdstrike is just another US based start-up getting high on the hog of government contracts, and was keen to be there at the beginning of the Clinton presidency. The evidence from "Adam Carter" shows that Guccifer 2.0 was almost certainly a creation of Crowdstrike, in order to manufacture the story that it was a Russian hacker and not a disgruntled DNC leaker.

The setup was in the media. On June 15 2016, Crowdstrike announced that the DNC had been hacked by the two "bears", but the only thing missing was opposition research on Donald Trump. The next day, G2 appears, "leaking" the very boring "Trump research". The problem is, that that document didn't come from the DNC leak, it came from the Podesta email leak, yet that was never revealed at the time. How did Crowdstrike know on the 15th, to say that the DNC hackers took the Trump research, and G2 appears the next day claiming to release the document, when in actuality, G2 got the "Trump" file off Podesta's machine?

Plenty of Ukrainian collusion with the DNC, along with British and Australian collusion to undermine Trump, no "collusion" or any other evidence that Russia hacked anyone.

[Feb 19, 2020] One bonfire that refuses to die and flamed up again today - Crowdstrike and the media's total refusal to even mention its name, which was the really critical part of the Ukrainian phone call. Not their phony quid pro quo.

Feb 19, 2020 | turcopolier.typepad.com

D , 16 February 2020 at 01:06 PM

One bonfire that refuses to die and flamed up again today - Crowdstrike and the media's total refusal to even mention its name, which was the really critical part of the Ukrainian phone call. Not their phony quid pro quo.

All Democrat candidates need to questioned about Crowdstrike, since it led to two failed major Democrat-led actions against President Trump - The Mueller investigation and the Democrat impeachment.

Following article underscores what Larry Johnson has been reporting for years:

https://thenationalsentinel.com/2020/02/15/crowdstrike-claim-that-russia-hacked-dnc-server-remains-at-center-of-2016-spygate-scandal-hoax/

[Dec 22, 2019] Gussifer 2.0 released nothing remotely damaging to the DNC and is arguably US based (timestamps), and is either CIA or Crowdstrike.

Dec 22, 2019 | turcopolier.typepad.com

Ed Snack , 21 December 2019 at 01:41 PM

Other points to note:

1.

Ed Snack , 20 December 2019 at 10:56 PM
Other points to note:

1. G2 released nothing remotely damaging to the DNC, the first document was even the DNC's oppo file on DJT
2. G2 did some copying and compress/decompress on files. Imbedded timestamps strongly suggest a US Timezone location
3. G2 released some files claiming to be from the DNC, but which demonstrably came from John Podesta's account
4. G2 did not claim to be involved with the Podesta account, which was phished and not hacked as such
5. As an aside, both the Fancy and Cosy Bear packages had been available for third parties to obtain since 2013-4 or so. So their use is not proof of Russian involvement. One or other has been used in bank exploits before 2016.

I believe that G2 is arguably US based (the timestamps are reasonably conclusive), and is either CIA or Crowdstrike. The existence of G2 is a diversionary one to strengthen the case for blaming the Russians. It may be connected to wanting to divert attention from Seth Rich and his subsequent murder, but may not be - that is Seth Rich's death may be just an unfortunate coincidence, we have inadequate information to conclude either way.

[Dec 22, 2019] So US intelligence tipped off the DNC that their emails were about to be leaked to Wikileaks. That's when the stratagem of attributing the impending Wikileaks release to a Russian hack was born -- distracting from the incriminating content of the emails, while vilifying the Deep State's favorite enemies, Assange and Russia, all in one neat scam

Highly recommended!
Looks like Brennan ears are all over this false flag operation...
Dec 22, 2019 | turcopolier.typepad.com

Mark McCarty , 21 December 2019 at 02:34 PM

Here's a key point - on June 12, Assange announces that Wikileaks will soon be releasing info pertinent to Hillary. HE DOES NOT SAY THAT HE WILL BE RELEASING DNC EMAILS.

And yet, on June 14, Crowdstrike reports a Russian hack of the DNC servers - and a day later, Guccifer 2.0 emerges and proclaims himself to be the hacker, takes credit for the upcoming Wikileaks DNC releases, publishes the Trump oppo research which Crowdstrike claimed he had taken, and intentionally adds "Russian footprints" to his metadata.

So how did Crowdstrike and G2.0 know that DNC EMAILS would be released?

Because, as Larry postulates, the US intelligence community had intercepted communications between Seth Rich and Wikileaks in which Seth had offered the DNC emails (consistent with the report of Sy Hersh's source within the FBI).

So US intelligence tipped off the DNC that their emails were about to be leaked to Wikileaks.

That's when the stratagem of attributing the impending Wikileaks release to a Russian hack was born - distracting from the incriminating content of the emails, while vilifying the Deep State's favorite enemies, Assange and Russia, all in one neat scam.

[Dec 20, 2019] Did John Brennan's CIA Create Guccifer 2.0 and DCLeaks by Larry C Johnson

Highly recommended!
Gossufer2.0 and CrowdStrike are the weakest links in this sordid story. CrowdStrike was nothing but FBI/CIA contractor.
So the hypothesis that CrowdStrike employees implanted malware to implicate Russians and created fake Gussifer 2.0 personality is pretty logical.
Notable quotes:
"... Not one piece of corroborating intelligence. It is all based on opinion and strong belief. There was no human source report or electronic intercept pointing to a relationship between the GRU and the two alleged creations of the GRU--Guccifer 2.0 persona and DCLeaks.com. Now consider the spin that Robert Mueller put on this opinion in his report on possible collusion between the Trump campaign and the Russians. Mueller bluffs the unsuspecting reader into believing that it is a proven fact that Guccifer 2.0 and DCLeaks were Russian assets. But he is relying on a mere opinion from a handpicked group of intel analysts working under the direction of then CIA Director John Brennan ..."
"... In October 2015 John Brennan reorganized the CIA . As part of that reorganization he created a new directorate--DIRECTORATE OF DIGITAL INNOVATION. Its mission was to "manipulate digital footprints." In other words, this was the Directorate that did the work of creating Guccifer 2.0 and DCLeaks. One of their specialties, creating Digital Dust. ..."
"... We also know, thanks to Wikileaks, that the CIA was using software specifically designed to mask CIA activity and make it appear like it was done by a foreign entity. Wikipedia describes the Vault 7 documents : ..."
"... Exhibit A in the case is this d