March 8, 2017

"So for all we know, 'Russian hacks' might actually be by the CIA, or by the Iranians, or by Indian mobsters. Great."

Instapundit sums up, after an explanation of the meaning of the new Wikileaks leaks from a security expert named Eric Cowperthwait, who said:
The CIA has built a capability to hack pretty much anything, anywhere. It turns out that they, potentially, have more ability to intrude into servers, computers, smartphones and electronic communications than even the NSA.

This capability is now in the hands of people other than the CIA.

All the things you’ve read, that seem like science fiction movie plots, are really true. Other people can listen to you via your smart TV, can read your email, turn on the webcam on your laptop, without you ever knowing.

115 comments:

tim in vermont said...
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rehajm said...

Or the good people who also brought you ToddAndClaire.

Beloved Commenter AReasonableMan said...

As others have pointed out, this was already common knowledge.

tim in vermont said...
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tim in vermont said...

Common knowledge widely repudiated by the Democrats and their loyal talking points scriveners in the media...

Well, in the media's defense, they had a narrative to push.

YoungHegelian said...

To echo ARM above, let me also add:

Well, we told you so....

But, it wasn't just us. Every time I've seen or read interviews with the luminaries of the white or black hat hacker community, they've said the same thing. As the article at Insty so quaintly puts it:

“attribution is hard, bro.”

Original Mike said...

"So for all we know, 'Russian hacks' might actually be by the CIA, or by the Iranians, or by Indian mobsters."

I've thought from the beginning that the existence of evidence pointing to the Russions makes it less likely that it actually was.

traditionalguy said...

Crony Capitalism's World War has erupted at the divide between the CIA Gauleiters and the Populists.The internet has exposed the size of the game. Thank you, Mr. Assange.

Joe Biden, America's Putin said...

Who killed Seth Rich?

Left Bank of the Charles said...

So the Trump campaign may have colluded with Iranians or Indian mobsters. Or the Hillary Clinton campaign was undermined by our very own CIA.

traditionalguy said...

Incidentally, one more time, President Trump was right. The hoard of Feds saying Russians ran hacks on the Dems and Hillary is not a knowable fact at all. It has always been pure propaganda.

Left Bank of the Charles said...

Another thought: Why do we trust that the latest Wikileaks dump came from the CIA. It could be the Russian election hackers. What a perfect way to cover their tracks.

CWJ said...

rehajm,

I clicked through to your link thinking "What do Akin and McCaskill have to do with this?" Best laugh at my own expense that I've had in a long time.

Wince said...

It turns out that they, potentially, have more ability to intrude into servers, computers, smartphones and electronic communications than even the NSA.

Naturally, I would think of the NSA as a wide net for maximum data capture, whereas the CIA would be more focused on particular targets and operations.

CWJ said...

Left bank,

Let's not go full Vizzini on this. You never want to go full Vizzini.

Anonymous said...

It's odd that supposedly it's the CIA. All of these 'hacks' are electronic communications and the bailiwick of the NSA. Why so?

Fernandinande said...

In Trump's America, TV listens to you.

The CIA has built a capability to hack pretty much anything,

The FBI paid a private company > $1 million dollars to hack a factory-standard iPhone - why didn't they hire the CIA?

Fernandinande said...

The CIA has built a capability to hack pretty much anything, anywhere.

That's what they want you to believe. It's not true.

Bob Loblaw said...

The "intelligence community" had better have had more to go on than packet return addresses before blaming the Russian government for hacks.

wendybar said...

I wonder if Obama will say he read this in the Newspaper???

glenn said...

I'll save you the trouble of hacking my TV. I snore really loud.

Bob Boyd said...

So does this mean the CIA doesn't even know if it was hacking the DNC or not?

Unknown said...

Who wrote this post?

Bushman of the Kohlrabi said...

Or the Hillary Clinton campaign was undermined by our very own CIA.

Sounds like a conspiracy theory. I'm going with the more likely explanation that the Hillary Clinton campaign was undermined by Hillary Clinton.

Bob Loblaw said...

The FBI paid a private company > $1 million dollars to hack a factory-standard iPhone - why didn't they hire the CIA?

Leaving aside the question of whether the CIA has this capability, I'm not convinced they would share with the FBI if they did. These sorts of agencies are always in competition with each other, and even beyond that the temptation is always to say "This capability is so critical we can't let anyone know it exists." Once news of a capability gets out (and it will if you start telling other agencies), your targets will start to devise countermeasures.

tim in vermont said...

Why do we trust that the latest Wikileaks dump came from the CIA. It could be the Russian election hackers. What a perfect way to cover their tracks.

I am grading lefty comments now by how well they work as parody. This one is right up there. How much effort would it take to create that many self-consistent documents that also comport, where they touch on real-life, with real life?

It's the same way Santa makes all of those toys! The Russians have a community of elves in the Arctic that pound this stuff out!

tim in vermont said...


Blogger Unknown said...

Who wrote this post?

3/8/17, 9:51 AM


Lol.

Still, assuming this is Unknown Troll, it seems like a point among the left that who is saying something is more important than the content of what they are saying.

tim in vermont said...
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Achilles said...

I told you all this long ago.

I am still a kook, but I was right.

tim in vermont said...

Anyway, the usual suspects seem kind of stunned by a point that we have been making all along that they steadfastly refused to consider.

Drago said...

Left Bank of the Charles: "Another thought: Why do we trust that the latest Wikileaks dump came from the CIA. It could be the Russian election hackers. What a perfect way to cover their tracks"

Just go all the way: Trump is actually the secret candidate of the establishment and this is all "bread and circuses" for the masses.

Ignorance is Bliss said...

Fernandinande said...

The FBI paid a private company > $1 million dollars to hack a factory-standard iPhone - why didn't they hire the CIA?

How do you know it was a private company, and not a CIA front?

tim in vermont said...

That ringing noise you are hearing is the sound of cognitive dissonance of the loyal Democrat talking-point parrots leaking out of their ears.

khesanh0802 said...

I think this is a good spot to repost rajahm's link from yesterday. The CIA, and I believe every other intelligence agency, has taken advantage of the ISIS threat/Patriot Act and is out of control. Congress, which is supposed to provide oversight, clearly isn't. Tear them down one at a a time and see who we really need and who we don't. Can probably cut the total federal budget by 10% in this area and never even know.

madAsHell said...

So, then I must conclude that Obama's teleprompter was hacked as well. Which would explain a lot!!

traditionalguy said...

I told you. Trump marries slavic girls. And he names his favorite child Ivan-ka. Those are all Russian tells.

And now he wants to add an entitlement, just like a good Boshevik.

But does this mean Trump will rule over Russia instead of Putin ruling over America??? Or will Farage rule over them all?

Achilles said...

The deep state didn't go down without a fight and they are not finished. But they have lost.

It is only a matter of time now before that rotten melon is cored out. The only question is how many DC politicians go to jail with them.

Birches said...

Sounds legit, but I remain skeptical of all takes. Remember when insty was retweeting John Schindler all the time and he seemed to be normal? Sometimes these experts get a little too deep down the rabbit hole and don't see the big picture or any evidence that doesn't support their theory.

Unknown said...

Jeez! This SO old news.

The Cracker Emcee Refulgent said...

"The CIA has built a capability to hack pretty much anything, anywhere."

I'm sure they wish they could, but it ascribes a levels of competence to the CIA that they have never demonstrated, anywhere, at any time. Like most bureaucrats, they spend a lot of time making shit up for their own self-aggrandizement.

Mike Sylwester said...
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Mike Sylwester said...

The Liberty Unyielding website has published an interesting article titled "The ‘back door’: How Trump, Clapper, and Comey could all be right about ‘wiretapping’ Trump Tower".

Essentially the article says that the weasel word is "wire-tapped".

Instead of wire-tapping Trump and his associates, Clapper and his ilk mainly just searched through the US Government's huge database of stored communication-intercepts to find info they might use.

http://libertyunyielding.com/2017/03/06/back-door-trump-clapper-comey-right-wiretapping-trump-tower/

bagoh20 said...

As for why Trump won and Clinton didn't, check out this experiment. The result is amazing, but only to Clinton people.

Trump as a woman:

http://reason.com/blog/2017/03/08/gender-reversed-presidential-debate-reve

Fernandinande said...

"Weeping Angel -- which requires physical access to the television set -- puts targeted TVs into a fake off mode, so even if the TV is turned off it is actually recording and picking up conversations and sending them to a CIA server."

Here is a "how-to" from some wily Koreans.

tim in vermont said...

Before, we were dead certain that Russia was behind everything, now it's "old news" that nobody can be sure of anything.

Looks like ARM got his talking points before Unknown Troll.

tim in vermont said...

I would stay away from the phrase "old news", that was trademarked by the Clinton machine when defending whatever sexual assault or rape he was involved in at the time. Get a new playbook.

Levi Starks said...

You might reasonably think that Russia, the worlds master hacker would have done a better job of covering its tracks.

Anonymous said...

EDH said...
Naturally, I would think of the NSA as a wide net for maximum data capture, whereas the CIA would be more focused on particular targets and operations.


NSA is more in the collection business. It's evil twin, USCyber Command has too many lawyers and ROE to be an effective Offensive Cyber player in real time.

The CIA, till now, had a silent capability and was off the radar WRT ROE. IOW, they could deploy offensive cyber with little oversight.

Fernandinande said...

Ignorance is Bliss said...
"The FBI paid a private company > $1 million dollars to hack a factory-standard iPhone - why didn't they hire the CIA?
How do you know it was a private company, and not a CIA front?


That's a good point, and I don't really know since our public servants are sneaky and dishonest; I just assume that very few smart technical people are directly employed by the government cuz the money's in the private sector and contracting.

Anonymous said...

Didn't Gauleiter Inga (Unknown) try some nefarious actions against commenters here she doesn't like.... you know, trying to get them fired and other such nonsense. If that is correct, why is she still allowed to post here?

Or was it the CIA posing as SS Sturmbahnfuehrer Inga?

n.n said...

Or the Serbs attacked for being Christian, or the Iraqis exploited under "oil for food", or any number of diverse nations and people who have been poked and prodded by the Clintons. Perhaps unsatisfied foreign foundation clients, or domestic Democrats disenfranchised by the Clinton first campaign.

n.n said...

Maybe it was Kid Karma.

Abortion! What is it good for? Wealth, pleasure, leisure, Democratic leverage, and Planned Parenthood.

Achilles said...

Blogger Mike Sylwester said...

"Instead of wire-tapping Trump and his associates, Clapper and his ilk mainly just searched through the US Government's huge database of stored communication-intercepts to find info they might use."

People are finally waking up.

Anonymous said...

I've always known any 10 year old worth their salt could hack the DNC and blame it on the Russians. The question is why did the media elite also know this and choose to present the lie that Donald Trump is a liar. It's a big word game to them. This is what Trump has always fought against. If you want to call evil the events when good people knowingly and maliciously do wrong then Chuck Todd and Anderson Cooper are evil people. They are corrupt. Not a good corrupt like they fool themselves into but a bad corrupt where they are turning the world into crap.

grackle said...

I've thought from the beginning that the existence of evidence pointing to the Russians makes it less likely that it actually was.

Bingo! A brand new GE toaster for this player …

President Trump was right. The hoard of Feds saying Russians ran hacks on the Dems and Hillary is not a knowable fact at all. It has always been pure propaganda.

Trump is usually right about most everything important but never forget … he DID talk about how celebrities can grab the pussies of groupies. THAT, of course, proves that Trump rapes women at the drop of a hat – so the Left still has that. And his taxes! His taxes would prove EVERYTHING! If only he would release them so they could create MORE false narratives out of nothing. The cad … and … and … he said nice things about Putin. To the Left that PROVES Trump is Putin’s puppet.

That sound you hear is the collapse of a couple of cherished false narratives.

eric said...

It's time for Trump to start saying "You're fired!" To a lot more people in Washington.

Bob Loblaw said...

I'm sure they wish they could, but it ascribes a levels of competence to the CIA that they have never demonstrated, anywhere, at any time. Like most bureaucrats, they spend a lot of time making shit up for their own self-aggrandizement.

If the CIA had a tiny fraction of the competence the Chomsky types ascribe to it the US would dictate events on every square inch of the planet. From what I can tell it's like any big bureaucracy that's been around for decades - the maintenance of the bureaucracy has become its primary goal, and fulfilment of its official purpose a far distant second.

I do agree with khesanh0802, though. 9/11 and the consequent loosening of legal restrictions have allowed the agency to get into activities it really shouldn't be getting into. The CIA used to be constrained to act only in the area of foreign intelligence. They don't seem to have much in the way of limitations these days, and we really ought to change that.

Unknown said...

I've thought from the beginning that the existence of evidence pointing to the Russians makes it less likely that it actually was.

I thought it bizarre that the Russians are regarded as extremely capable, and yet all their hacking activities provide a direct link back to them. Even private actors are good at covering their tracks, but apparently Russian state-sponsored hackers are too dumb to walk and breathe.

grackle said...


Here's the opinion of a real hacker …

@realDonaldTrump would go totally ballistic if he knew what the Obama CIA did. They used his phone cam & mic. Watching and listening 24/7.

Nyamujal said...

The technology exists, so you're asserting that this was a false flag operation launched by the CIA to hack the DNC and then blame the Russians? Riiigghht...

Nyamujal said...

"All the things you’ve read, that seem like science fiction movie plots, are really true. Other people can listen to you via your smart TV, can read your email, turn on the webcam on your laptop, without you ever knowing."

It's not like this shit isn't available to an enterprising techie with the right tools. This stopped being science fiction circa mid-90's or earlier.

Quayle said...

Folks, none of us know that the leaks are of real protected information, or are pre-fabricated sets of data with fingerprints on them to flush out the leaking channel.

Lets face it, we all depend on hearsay for all of this.

Nyamujal said...

The real conspiracy here is CHEMTRAILS and the LIZARD PEOPLE! Wake up sheeple!

damikesc said...

I've thought from the beginning that the existence of evidence pointing to the Russions makes it less likely that it actually was.

I was saying that you could get these hacks online from assorted sources that are very much non-Russian.

But, no, the press had to pimp that RUSSIANS did this.

But Trump...he's the one who lies a lot.

Why do we trust that the latest Wikileaks dump came from the CIA. It could be the Russian election hackers. What a perfect way to cover their tracks.

Because, whatever you might think of them, Wikileaks has a tendency to be accurate on their releases.

It's odd that supposedly it's the CIA. All of these 'hacks' are electronic communications and the bailiwick of the NSA. Why so?

As has been reported, the CIA has been bulking up its hacking operation so they don't have to use NSA.

Anonymous said...
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tim in vermont said...

Anything to deflect from Clinton Russia connections. Google Clinton Cash and New York Times

Bruce Hayden said...

I went into more detail on my theory about why Russian fingerprints were found on the DNC hacking in an earlier thread. In short, it is that the Russians have always been a bit crazy, everyone knows it, and esp now under Putin. Most of the world won't call their bluff, if, indeed, they are bluffing. The Norks are probably crazier but lack the Ruskies' nuclear arsenal, or, indeed the ability to project physical or financial force outside their territorial limits. So, the Russians are the perfect party to blame any hacking on.

mockturtle said...

The CIA has had a free pass for far too long. They have been, not just a tool of any given administration, but a maverick organization whose budget is classified and whom no one can properly investigate. Not only do they sell arms and heavy weapons--and pocket the money--but have sold drugs, as well. IMO, it's time to dismantle this organization and build it over from scratch.

Yes, I do have links to substantiate the above-stated claims but I didn't want to bother right now.

Anonymous said...

So why has Trump been Putin's best buddy for so long now? Why the Russian connection to Flynn, Sessions, Manafort, Carter Page, and other Trump associates? This truly is the Season of the Conspiracy. Anything to deflect from any Trump Russia connections.

(Don't talk on the phone and type at the same time.)

Drago said...

I see Unknown, in all her confusion and desperation, has reverted to last weeks talking points!

#Sad

Drago said...

I'm preparing a GoFundMe page to fund a membership for Unknown in "The Bubble"

http://www.nbc.com/saturday-night-live/video/the-bubble/3428577?snl=1

Of course, even in The Bubble Big Brother is still watching...

Anonymous said...

What's truly sad is this desperate search for "alternative facts". You people have twisted yourselves in so many knots trying to distance Trump from Russia, it's going to be very interesting to see what you people do when the results of the various investigations are released to the public.

Achilles said...

Unknown said...
So why has Trump been Putin's best buddy for so long now? Why the Russian connection to Flynn, Sessions, Manafort, Carter Page, and other Trump associates? This truly is the Season of the Conspiracy. Anything to deflect from any Trump Russia connections.

(Don't talk on the phone and type at the same time.)


This is what blind idiocy looks like. Trump is already smashing the Russian economy and putting America first. There are no Trump Russia connections unlike Obama who:

1. Slashed military spending and decimated military readiness.
2. Performed unilateral nuclear disarmament.
3. Gave Russian ally Iran billions of dollars and misleading congress and the american people about it because he knew it was against all of our wishes.
4. Was caught promising more flexibility after his last election.
5. Did everything in his power to stop fracking and pipeline development raising the cost of energy and bolstering Russia's economy.

Only a first class douchebag and complete moron would think Russia wanted Trump instead of Hillary who took millions from Russia in donations and lobbying and personally gave Putin a "reset" button.

And now that top officials including Mook have admitted to knowing about the surveillance we can add police state bully to Obama's list.

Achilles said...

Unknown said...
What's truly sad is this desperate search for "alternative facts". You people have twisted yourselves in so many knots trying to distance Trump from Russia, it's going to be very interesting to see what you people do when the results of the various investigations are released to the public.

Oh yes it will be interesting. The American people will not take kindly to a sitting president using the National Security Apparatus on political opponents.

There are going to be a lot of lefties going to jail.

Anonymous said...

No, blind idiocy is thinking that Trump the Oligarch and his Oligarch Cabinet will save America from the Oligarchs.

Achilles said...

Unknown said...
No, blind idiocy is thinking that Trump the Oligarch and his Oligarch Cabinet will save America from the Oligarchs.

Just to goad you into action I want to point out you haven't posted anything. Go read your own posts. They are completely devoid of facts, arguments, or any real intuition. You are a boring tool that writes the first 30 words they read on Huffpo.

You are boring. Try harder please. Learning something new and bringing it back here would be a good start.

The Cracker Emcee Refulgent said...

"So why has Trump been Putin's best buddy for so long now?"

You might want to check your Twitter feed or Facebook page. The world has moved on while you were passed out.

Fabi said...

Oligarchs -- drink!

Drago said...

Unknown: "You people have twisted yourselves in so many knots trying to distance Trump from Russia,..."

Unknown is very very upset that Russia will not be able to get their little grubby hands on any more of our uranium.

Plus, Tony Podesta is going to have some explaining to do to his Sberbank client!

Bob Ellison said...

India has lobsters?

grackle said...

I guess we can conclude with these latest Wikileak/CIA revelations that Trump lives a personal life that is devoid of real controversy. No sexual hi-jinks, no immorality, no illegal activity at all, otherwise it would’ve been leaked by now, along with the Billy Bush tape. If augmented in such a manner the Billy Bush tape would have been effective instead of the failure it was.

The mistake made with the Billy Bush tape was that they tried to claim it proved Trump is a sexual predator. Their overreach on that point was fatal. If they had just allowed the tape to be leaked and had avoided the temptation to falsely characterize it their dirty trick might have worked. But they can ALWAYS be depended upon for the inevitable overreach.

Case in point: The Obama administration wasn’t satisfied with illegally surveilling Trump Towers and getting away with it. They also made sure the harmless material(meetings and conversations with a Russian diplomat) they dug up were leaked so the MSM could create false narratives with it.

But that bit of icing on the cake also proved that Trump Towers was illegally surveilled. They can’t win for losing – poor dears.

John henry said...

Awad brothers

John Henry

Anonymous said...

Achilles.

Your posts have been rife with conspiracy theories, never backed up by any citations. You live in the fever swamp of your own mind and you drag the scum of your thoughts here to Althouse.

damikesc said...

So why has Trump been Putin's best buddy for so long now?

He hasn't been.

Why the Russian connection to Flynn, Sessions, Manafort, Carter Page, and other Trump associates?

All dwarfed by the Podesta ties.

johns said...

The media's credibility is shattered into tiny pieces. The media no longer has the power to hurt those on the right that they want to destroy.

The CIA and NSA have now similarly had their credibility smashed. No one will believe any future refutation of a Trump statement by hauling out James Clapper or any other clapped-out "national security expert."

We may not know what to believe, but we do know not to listen to anyone in Washington. Meanwhile, regulations are being eliminated and jobs are being created.

mockturtle said...

johns asserts: We may not know what to believe, but we do know not to listen to anyone in Washington.

Exactly! And we may not know which news we can rely on but we know not to believe CNN, NBC, the WaPo or the NYT. We can just categorically dismiss them.

Drago said...

Unknown simply can't come to grips with the fact that the over 50 year lefty/MSM "jig" is up. Republicans and independents together now contain large/significant majorities that have seen the MSM's bias in action in real time and know to discount those outlets.

Almost a third of dems even accept the clear fact that the MSM is the "opposition".

However, for the lefty dead-enders every new informational element that emerges, such as the topic for this thread, has to somehow, someway, get shoved into the past "successful" lefty playbook frameworks even though it's a joke and they don't fit.

Hence the increasing open violence by the left against anyone who doesn't toe their stalinist line.

Even more #Winning and inevitable leftist violent reactions ahead.

Achilles said...

Unknown said...
Achilles.

Your posts have been rife with conspiracy theories, never backed up by any citations. You live in the fever swamp of your own mind and you drag the scum of your thoughts here to Althouse.


Boring.

Anonymous said...

"Oh yes it will be interesting. The American people will not take kindly to a sitting president using the National Security Apparatus on political opponents.

There are going to be a lot of lefties going to jail."

Insane wishcasting.

Anonymous said...
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Anonymous said...

Let's see what this turns up. If they find the applications, they will also hopefully see what info the application was based on. To issue the warrant, it needs to be based on probable cause. Hopefully we'll all be able to put these nutty conspiracy theories to rest...well, some will still cling to them, no doubt.

http://thehill.com/blogs/floor-action/senate/322959-senators-want-warrant-request-court-documents-for-trump-wiretapping

"Sens. Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.) and Sheldon Whitehouse (D-R.I.) are requesting the Justice Department and FBI hand over any potential applications for a warrant to wiretap the Trump campaign.

"We request that the Department of Justice provide us copies of any warrant applications and court orders ... related to wiretaps of President Trump, the Trump Campaign, or Trump Tower," the two senators wrote in a letter to Dana Boente, the acting deputy attorney general, and FBI Director James Comey."

traditionalguy said...

Everybody knows the Lizard people live inside Antarctica. And they are trapped there by the ice.

But Chem Trails are everywhere. Stop breathing, quick!

Anonymous said...

Well, maybe the Chem Trails have already affected Trump's amygdala.

Drago said...

Unknown: "Let's see what this turns up. If they find the applications, they will also hopefully see what info the application was based on."

Uh, yeah, that's sort of the point.

Nothing gets by you Unknown.

Drago said...

Unknown: "Well, maybe the Chem Trails have already affected Trump's amygdala."

We already know the Kaine and Biden families have been affected.

Anonymous said...

Drago, you have been furiously asserting that Trump was wire tapped illegally or for reasons that are bogus. With the applications and court orders we'll obviously see if the reasons for the warrant/s were bogus or not. It's not illegal for the DOJ to issue a warrant for cause.

Are you worried? You sound like it.

Drago said...

Unknown: "Drago, you have been furiously asserting that Trump was wire tapped illegally or for reasons that are bogus."

The Michael Flynn phone call transcript exists. Thats apparently one of the very few "facts" that is not disputed by anyone.

So something happened that caused the NYT/Wash Post/rest of MSM to report that multiple (up to 9 according to the NYT) US Intelligence sources confirmed the transcript as it's contents were leaked to the MSM.

Drago said...

Unknown: "Are you worried? You sound like it."

Oh yes. We are all worried what with the many many many claims by you and your pals of nefarious activities on the part of the Trump staff!

Let's see if we can recall all your accusataions: collusion with Russia, Treason, Espionage, Fraud, Bribery, Blackmail, Jaywalking, the term "murderous" was used by lefties at the rallies today so we'll include that, Tax Evasion, Jaywalking (Trump really likes to Jaywalk), etc.

Yep, there is a pony in there somewhere!!

Beloved Commenter AReasonableMan said...

Good non-technical discussion of the leaks. Argues that the leaked documents only show that the CIA is repurposing successful code rather than deliberately trying to deceive regarding the source of the attacks. Not that this wouldn't be a shrewd thing to do, but not what the documents actually describe.

Anonymous said...

Thanks for the article ARM, it makes a lot of sense.

“With UMBRAGE and related projects, the CIA can not only increase its total number of attack types, but also misdirect attribution by leaving behind the ‘fingerprints’ of the groups that the attack techniques were stolen from,” Wikileaks writes in a summary of its CIA document dump

It’s a claim that seems intended to shed doubt on the U.S. government’s attribution of Russia in the DNC hack; the Russian Federation was the only nation specifically named by Wikileaks as a potential victim of misdirected attribution. It’s also a claim that some media outlets have accepted and repeated without question.

Robert Graham, CEO of Errata Security, agrees that the CIA documents are not talking about framing Russia or other nations.

“What we can conclusively say from the evidence in the documents is that they’re creating snippets of code for use in other projects and they’re reusing methods in code that they find on the internet,” he told The Intercept. “Elsewhere they talk about obscuring attacks so you can’t see where it’s coming from, but there’s no concrete plan to do a false flag operation. They’re not trying to say ‘We’re going to make this look like Russia’.”

The bottom line with the CIA data dump released by Wikileaks is that journalists and others should take care to examine statements made around them to ensure that they’re reporting accurately on the contents."

Achilles said...

Wouldn't it be nice to know who Reid, Pelosi, and Schumer are up to? After he is one with them he could start on Warren and Booker. Just go through all of their calls and emails and leak anything juicy to Breitbart and Drudge.

That is OK right? It apparently was OK to do that to Trump and his campaign.

Just out of curiosity why hasn't the DNC let the FBI analyze it's servers after the "russians" hacked them?

Jon Ericson said...

UNK#98, Formerly UNK#55 (or is it UNK#51?);
I, for one, am delighted and appreciate all of your rigorous defenses of the CIA, DIA, FBI etc.
Look for your "Junior G-Man" badge, coming soon to a drop-off near your place of residence.

Static Ping said...

Bob Ellison said... India has lobsters?

Looking up... slipper lobsters. Not true lobsters but they look similar, edible and fished off the western coast. India also had lobster farms. I didn't know this until about 5 minutes ago.

tim in vermont said...

Argues that the leaked documents only show that the CIA is repurposing successful code rather than deliberately trying to deceive regarding the source of the attacks.

So we are supposed to ignore the fact that other actors are quite able to disguise the source of the attacks because the CIA, to our current state of knowledge, has not done so.

Have we moved the goalpost since this morning to the place where, if it wasn't the CIA, it had to be the Russians?

Just trying to keep track.

damikesc said...

“What we can conclusively say from the evidence in the documents is that they’re creating snippets of code for use in other projects and they’re reusing methods in code that they find on the internet,” he told The Intercept. “Elsewhere they talk about obscuring attacks so you can’t see where it’s coming from, but there’s no concrete plan to do a false flag operation. They’re not trying to say ‘We’re going to make this look like Russia’.”

But it makes the whole "RUSSIA DID IT!!" claims a bit of a stretch.

tim in vermont said...

This morning it was "old news," now it's "the CIA didn't do it, and that only leaves Russia."

Has anybody showed any of the things that embarrassed Hillary and the Democrats to not be true? Is ARM so butt hurt because the American people have no right to the truth? We are only to be told what the media, which we know from Wikileaks, authentic, true email, which we know from Wikileaks to work hand in glove with the Democrats, to the point of sending articles to the Clinton campaign for approval before publishing them?

Is that the cause of all of the butt hurt?

mockturtle said...

No, the latest version has CIA 'contractors' leaking the information.

tim in vermont said...

The same media that HIllary was encouraging to write about Trump at a time when lots of places, including this blog, were begging the media to stop writing about him, we know from Wikileaks that Hillary encouraged the media to help Trump get the nomination because she thought he would be easy to beat.

We know that for a fact. But nobody is mad at Hillary the fuckup, it's the Russians, even though it is abundantly clear that the whole case against Russia for hacking the DNC carries zero weight. Just like has been argued here for months now.

mockturtle said...

The more I hear from 'Unknown', the more I want her to remain so.

Original Mike said...

"So we are supposed to ignore the fact that other actors are quite able to disguise the source of the attacks because the CIA, to our current state of knowledge, has not done so."

That's what she's arguing.

Dave said...

I seems time to consider whether or not there is a net benefit to the CIA's continued existence.

Robert Cook said...

"I seems time to consider whether or not there is a net benefit to the CIA's continued existence."

No, there is not. It is a criminal organization, the directors and chief officers of which should be prosecuted for their crimes. (The same is true of the NSA, as well.)

mockturtle said...

Dave and Robert are both correct. See my post at 12:27 yesterday.