Who knew?

Passing data through Russian computers and allowing such to show = cover your tracks

Occam's razor.

The FBI and NSA are not weighing in on this because the proof is really not there. The NSA has tools that easily can verify this. Crowdstrike is convenient because they will support a political take as there is a narrative on. The trouble is this is a very dangerous narrative for multiple reasons.

As an aside: Do folks really think that we don't hack Russian and Chinese servers and try to interfere in their internal politics? Is this really worth ramping up tension and potential nuclear war? How about securing the servers and desktops properly and separating critical vs normal communications with more care just as many state governments require?

How about asking why this keeps happening? Or do we continue mediocre security and then act surprised when incidents happen?

The key to security is in the hands of the government. Obviously our end users are not taking care of following proper security precautions or someone is not doing what they should to secure the network (using proxies, limiting ports to the outside, etc.)

I am not going to turn off my mind that is what republicans do.

Have you ever worked in network security? This is obvious stuff. Don't you want a secure infrastructure?

My post is about not dumbing ourselves down for geopolitics (and not escelating to war for stupid reasons, like the Iraq war). If being anti-war is now not in vogue I don't care. I have always felt this way. Get over it.

By all accounts, there could easily have been many intrusions by many diverse hackers into these poorly-protected networks.

that the poster is a Trump supporter? Though personal attacks are a TOS violation, I highly doubt your clique would vote to hide your uncalled for post.

The Nation -  Against Neo-McCarthyism


 In their eagerness to defeat Trump, liberal pundits are reviving a damaging discourse.
By the Editors
The Nation Magazine


https://www.thenation.com/article/against-neo-mccarthyism/


 Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump speaks at the Republican National Convention in Cleveland, Ohio on July 21, 2016. (Reuters / Mark Kauzlarich)

In their zeal to prevent Donald Trump from becoming president—a goal we share—representative voices of the liberal establishment have joined with the forces of neoconservatism to engage in what can only be described as McCarthyist rhetoric. This magazine, which has a long and proud history of standing up to the
 worst excesses of McCarthyism, repudiates this unwelcome echo of the past. Let us recall that McCarthyism impugned the loyalty of American citizens by accusing them of allegiance to the Soviet Union. This political defamation—often a joint undertaking of Congress and the media—suppressed democratic debate over alternative policies and ideas, and in the process destroyed lives by stigmatizing those whose views were deemed insufficiently loyal to Cold War–era orthodoxies. The overall effect was to poison, chill, and censor the political discourse of the nation.

To adopt the pernicious language of McCarthyism is to turn our backs on the best traditions of our country.
While Trump himself has hardly been damaged by today’s revival of McCarthyism, the same cannot be said for our national debate. Over the past month alone, establishment voices like Franklin Foer, Paul Krugman, Jeffrey Goldberg, Josh Marshall, and Jonathan Chait, among others, have Kremlin-baited Trump in lieu of reasoned argument and factual critique. On July 21, The Atlantic’s Goldberg informed readers that “The Republican nominee for president, Donald J. Trump, has chosen this week to unmask himself as a de facto agent of Russian President Vladimir Putin.” Krugman followed this up on July 22 by asking in The New York Times: “If elected, would Donald Trump be Vladimir Putin’s man in the White House?” Krugman then answered his own baseless question: “Mr. Trump would, in office, actually follow a pro-Putin foreign policy, at the expense of America’s allies and her own self-interest.”

The idea that Trump is some kind of Manchurian candidate first took root thanks to a mistranslation of a remark by Putin, which was misconstrued as high praise for Trump by the media—and by Trump himself. To be sure, the GOP candidate has suggested that he may pursue a policy of détente with Russia. He also, in our view wisely, threw out a reckless plank in the Republican platform that pledged to further arm Kiev. But Trump is only following the lead of the current administration. Should we assert seditious links between President Obama’s policy and the Kremlin?

This neo-McCarthyism now threatens to derail a vital debate over the substance of the 20,000-plus e-mails, made public by WikiLeaks on July 22, that reveal the purportedly neutral Democratic National Committee’s derision and contempt for Senator Bernie Sanders’s campaign—as well as several aborted attempts to tip the scales against him. While the FBI has launched an investigation, as of press time, nobody has conclusively proven who hacked into the DNC’s network, much less demonstrated what their motives were. But that didn’t stop Clinton campaign manager Robby Mook from appearing on CNN on July 24 to allege that Russia was behind the hack. “Sources are saying the Russians are releasing these e-mails for the purpose of actually helping Donald Trump,” said Mook. To no one’s great surprise, he neglected to tell CNN who his sources were. Nevertheless, liberal-media elites have joined with the Clinton campaign in promoting the narrative of a devious Russian cyber-attack, which Fairness and Accuracy in Reporting’s Adam Johnson correctly points out “is being used to outweigh the damning substance of the leak itself.”

Continued:
https://www.thenation.com/article/against-neo-mccarthyism/

Well you know, they threw a fit when Sander's supporters did what they called "throwing Rachael Maddow under the bus" until the other day when she made a negative remark against former President Bill Clinton for using the word "girl" to describe his wife during her younger years- where upon they threw Rachael Maddow under the proverbial bus themselves. So it would not surprise me in the least i President Obama was thrown under the bus because Trump agreed with something Obama said and repeated it as part of the Trump campaign. That is just how convoluted things have become.

Stephen F. Cohen has helped make The Nation a laughingstock, and their use of the hilarious "neo-McCarthyism" is pure projection. Forgive us in the reality-based community for thinking that the influence of fascist Russia all over this election is something to be concerned about.

https://www.thenation.com/article/against-neo-mccarthyism/

In their zeal to prevent Donald Trump from becoming president—a goal we share—representative voices of the liberal establishment have joined with the forces of neoconservatism to engage in what can only be described as McCarthyist rhetoric. This magazine, which has a long and proud history of standing up to the
 worst excesses of McCarthyism, repudiates this unwelcome echo of the past. Let us recall that McCarthyism impugned the loyalty of American citizens by accusing them of allegiance to the Soviet Union. This political defamation—often a joint undertaking of Congress and the media—suppressed democratic debate over alternative policies and ideas, and in the process destroyed lives by stigmatizing those whose views were deemed insufficiently loyal to Cold War–era orthodoxies. The overall effect was to poison, chill, and censor the political discourse of the nation…

This neo-McCarthyism now threatens to derail a vital debate over the substance of the 20,000-plus e-mails, made public by WikiLeaks on July 22, that reveal the purportedly neutral Democratic National Committee’s derision and contempt for Senator Bernie Sanders’s campaign—as well as several aborted attempts to tip the scales against him. While the FBI has launched an investigation, as of press time, nobody has conclusively proven who hacked into the DNC’s network, much less demonstrated what their motives were. But that didn’t stop Clinton campaign manager Robby Mook from appearing on CNN on July 24 to allege that Russia was behind the hack. “Sources are saying the Russians are releasing these e-mails for the purpose of actually helping Donald Trump,” said Mook. To no one’s great surprise, he neglected to tell CNN who his sources were. Nevertheless, liberal-media elites have joined with the Clinton campaign in promoting the narrative of a devious Russian cyber-attack, which Fairness and Accuracy in Reporting’s Adam Johnson correctly points out “is being used to outweigh the damning substance of the leak itself.”

When someone complains about "neo-McCarthyism" so they can support the fascist Russian government

Don't stress too much about my question. I don't really expect an answer from you.

Russia lost at least 20 million people fighting Nazism — the embodiment of fascism. Why would facism be embraced by Russia today?

Unless they know who it's from.

When screwyouMF@malicioushackergroup.com sends you an email saying, "Look at this photoshop of Trump with a goat" with a link to click on, just don't do it.

I get lots of these in my 17-year-old in box. Facebook claims, voicemail, old friends, Fedex delivery information, special offers. Heck, I've gotten spearphishing attempts allegedly from myself (since at some point they hacked the ISP and apparently got a registry of who sent me email, and I routinely email myself stuff I want to be reminded of; I also treat email like my own private cloud).


The proof is sort of there. It's pretty clear Russian-speakers are doing it, and two different groups with different attacks are involved. It's only likely that these attacks are at the behest of some Russian-government agency, probably military, because of past history; even having two separate attacks works because Russian military intelligence is anything but monolithic. But perhaps not. A lot of "patriotic" Russian hackers do this kind of stuff for giggles. Some of those Russian hackers are in Ukraine or other former Soviet states. When one hacker was accused of being Russian, something turned up in Romanian--but not colloquial, fluent Romanian (so perhaps the guy was from trans-Dnistria?).

Some evidence is sketchy: The attacks align with Russian working hours and don't occur during Russian holidays. So that means it's "hacker staff", you'd think. Or that the hacker is using his work computer or work Internet access. Perhaps it's a teen who can't hack unless his mother's at work. Spearphishing is a simple hack. The code that's linked to winds up being distributed so even kiddy-hackers can use it.

I have no problems in concluding that Russians are behind it. Now, are "the Russians" behind it? There's the rub.

In many ways, though, this attack is enabled by both poor quarantine/anti-spam filters *and* by dolts saying, "Yes, I want to see that photoshop, please hack my computer."

I do not want to go to nuclear war because we don't secure our networks properly and allow other states to hack information.
Trying to stop the attempts is equivilent to trying to eliminate spies and then potentially ratcheting up a war because we caught several. We do this and they do this. We use information to our advantage (and yes we do) and we also use it to effect politics in other countries. This is EXPECTED.

We need to be better than this. It is flat out STUPID to not do our jobs and then risk nuclear war over it. This kind of stuff should fly under the radar just like it always did during the cold war and we should be working harder behind the scenes.

For heaven's sakes.

We all wanted "open and transparent"!

Big Brother? Russian hackers? The geek down the street in momma's basement?

It's done.

Those damm Russians. I think the Dem groups need
to install or use better cyber security.

I hope they're not worried about having their donors revealed.

and the government will continually get hacked until they insist that the network is properly secured and monitored.

There should be no way for a hacker to get in: Use proxies for internet access. Use solid antivirus products. Use an internet filter (no searching porn sites etc). Separate critical information from less critical information and handle it more carefully. They should not even be able to access the emails. Are they using TDP encryption on the drives? Are they reqiering strong passwords (or allowing congressmen and women to use their dogs name because they insist and don't want to use one. Better yet are they using a physical Key?

Just wondering. After all, Trump said he wanted to emulate Nixon.

GOP conspiring with foreign government.

change passwords, make them complicated. sheesh. I'm not about to blame anybody, especially the GOP. That's just wrong.

Of course, if they can prove the GOP did it, well, that's another story entirely.

IT admin, I think I know what I speak of.

Passwords of course are only one line of defense. But here is how to do them:

Public service announcement from http://xkcd.com

but, it's the first line of defense. Single point of failure thing.

Last edited Fri Jul 29, 2016, 03:13 PM - Edit history (1)

We have a lot of history being ignored as Trump works very hard to create a Russia focus. Geee, I wonder why?

Because someone may have murdered the Republican master spy who set up the firewall at the U.S. House of Representatives?

For those with little memory of past Republican crimes, Republicans spied on members of Congress using the Congressional computer network:

The Democratic National Committee was warned last fall that its computer network was susceptible to attacks but didn’t follow the security advice it was given, according to three people familiar with the matter...

“Shame on them. It looks like they just did the review to check a box but didn’t do anything with it,” said Ann Barron-DiCamillo, who was director of US-Cert, the primary agency protecting U.S. government networks, until last February. “If they had acted last fall, instead of those thousands of e-mails exposed it might have been much less.”
The assessment by Good Harbor Security Risk Management, headed by the former Clinton and Bush administration official Richard Clarke, occurred over two months beginning in September 2015, the people said...

The review found problems ranging from an out-of-date firewall to a lack of advanced malware detection technology on individual computers, according to two of the people familiar with the matter.The firm recommended taking special precautions to protect any financial information related to donors and internal communications including e-mails, these people said.

The DNC paid $60,000 for the assessment, according to federal filings.

Since the Clinton email scandal came out 6 months earlier, there was no excuse to ignore email security recommendations. It's past time to take some responsibility.

The AP report doesn't give the detail of the original Reuters one: