Fedgov Hacking Reporters' Computers, Installing Spyware, Seeding Classified Docs

[roo_ster]

http://www.powerlineblog.com/archives/2014/10/the-most-stunning-news-story-of-2014.php
http://nypost.com/2014/10/27/ex-cbs-reporter-government-related-entity-bugged-my-computer/

Back in June 2013, we covered the hacking of at least one of reporter Sharyl Attkisson’s computers by persons unknown.

    A cyber security firm hired by CBS News has determined through forensic analysis that Sharyl Attkisson’s computer was accessed by an unauthorized, external, unknown party on multiple occasions late in 2012. Evidence suggests this party performed all access remotely using Attkisson’s accounts. While no malicious code was found, forensic analysis revealed an intruder had executed commands that appeared to involve search and exfiltration of data.

    This party also used sophisticated methods to remove all possible indications of unauthorized activity, and alter system times to cause further confusion.

But we heard nothing further until the publication of Attkisson’s explosive book...Now the next shoe has dropped, as the New York Post reports:

    In her new memoir, Sharyl Attkisson says a source who arranged to have her laptop checked for spyware in 2013 was “shocked” and “flabbergasted” at what the analysis revealed.

    “This is outrageous. Worse than anything Nixon ever did. I wouldn’t have believed something like this could happen in the United States of America,” Attkisson quotes the source saying.

    She speculates that the motive was to lay the groundwork for possible charges against her or her sources.

    Attkisson says the source, who’s “connected to government three-letter agencies,” told her the computer was hacked into by “a sophisticated entity that used commercial, nonattributable spyware that’s proprietary to a government agency: either the CIA, FBI, the Defense Intelligence Agency or the National Security Agency.”

    The breach was accomplished through an “otherwise innocuous e-mail” that Attkisson says she got in February 2012, then twice “redone” and “refreshed” through a satellite hookup and a Wi-Fi connection at a Ritz-Carlton hotel.

    The spyware included programs that Attkisson says monitored her every keystroke and gave the snoops access to all her e-mails and the passwords to her financial accounts.

    “The intruders discovered my Skype account handle, stole the password, activated the audio, and made heavy use of it, presumably as a listening tool,” she wrote in “Stonewalled: My Fight for Truth Against the Forces of Obstruction, Intimidation, and Harassment in Obama’s Washington.”

    But the most shocking finding, she says, was the discovery of three classified documents that Number One told her were “buried deep in your operating system. In a place that, unless you’re a some kind of computer whiz specialist, you wouldn’t even know exists.”

    “They probably planted them to be able to accuse you of having classified documents if they ever needed to do that at some point,” Number One added.

Why am I not surprised?

IF THE GOVERNMENT CAN PLANT EVIDENCE ON SHARYL ATTKISSON’S COMPUTER, then they can plant evidence on yours. Which means I’m going to view a lot of computer-crime prosecutions with a jaundiced eye.

Indeed.  "Prove the gov't did not hack & plant and I'll be happy to accept this sort of evidence Mr. Prosecutor."

Until then, the evidence will be viewed in the same light as that provided by a career criminal fraudster.  Might be legit, but given from a source know to lie and commit felonies in the past.

[Parker Dean]

Clearly a cover story for having the documents. I mean, we all know that if the .gov wanted to discredit somebody they would've placed child porn on the computer and it would be far more effective at destroying the targets credibility than any unauthorised classified document access.

[Parker Dean]

Sorry, forgot

/sarcasm

[TommyGunn]

Dealing with fedgov is increasingly like living in a real-life John LeCarré novel.

[Angel Eyes]

Dealing with fedgov is increasingly like living in a real-life John LeCarré novel.

I would have said Kafka, but yeah.

[AJ Dual]

I know I'm a broken record on the subject, but people, all thinking "they're doing the right thing" are how evil arises as an emergent property of any government or most any institution that's large enough.

Most people think there has to be a Hitler, a Stalin, or a James Bond-esque Blofeld or Dr. No behind the scenes, some sort of mustache twirling villain for there to be "evil".  Even people here on this board.

The cop that tazes the old lady for a speeding ticket doesn't wake up that morning and think "Gee... I can't wait to protect-and-serve the *expletive deleted*it out of someone today!"

That said, the REAL problem is that it only takes a 6 month media blitz of hopey-changey agitprop to install such a government, and it takes 6 years of pain to get people to wake up. This is not a winning formula. And of course, the alternative party's main claim to fame is being almost, but not quite as bad.  

[RevDisk]

Until unofficial leaks of official govt documents come out, it won't make the main news. It's obvious who did it, but without proof, it's easy to deny. If the originating agency was half way intelligent, they would have contracted it out for even further deniability.

[Hawkmoon]

Dealing with fedgov is increasingly like living in a real-life John LeCarré novel.

Three Days of the Condor