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Palin Email Hacker Found
mortonda writes to tell us that the person responsible for breaching Sarah Palin's private email account has been found. We discussed the breach last Wednesday, shortly before the hacker, a University of Tennessee-Knoxville student, posted a message detailing his methods. Wired has a story examining the potential legal consequences for the hacker.
Cracker is an idiot. Ever hear of Tor? Or better yet, post the information on something like Freenet and just advertise it on Freenet somehow and let other people get the information out to the main web.
Of course, the fact that he posted his nick on /b/ when it's usually forced-anon anyway means he basically confessed. Not to mention that he said which proxy service he used -- note to criminals: if you want to get away with something, don't brag about how you did it!
It's better to vote for what you want and not get it than to vote for what you don't want and get it.
- E. Debs
So "hacking" now includes password guessing?
End of lesson. You may press the button.
There's no evidence that we know of that this kid was indeed the hacker other than a post on /b/. And accepting a post on /b/ to be reliable information is like... trusting /.'s front page.
The important thing is that prosecution comes. Regardless of the politics involved, if there's no charges then any online email service is essentially useless for private communication. Not to mention the law on such matters doesn't "matter."
I'm glad to see Wikileaks is back up, along with the Palin article. For a while I thought it was being censored by the thugs in charge.
What a shame the media is focusing on the hacking angle rather than on Palin's inappropriate use of personal communications channels for government business.
"In prison you just have to shut your eyes and take it. Here you have to shut your eyes and give it."
By Palin using yahoo, it's not closely watched and she can conduct official business off the record.
Or you know, she could in fact SEND PERSONAL EMAIL. Are you saying that no government employee should be able to have a personal email account? Then I guess you're OK with AT&T recording phone conversations without a warrant, because if government employees should not be able to have any private life why should you?
The kid even said there were NO incriminating emails in the account (see: Wired story). So get off your high horse and allow for humans to be humans and have something of a life, even if it's one of your dreaded Repuglithuggnaughtterizies.
"There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley
I want everyone here to think about how they would respond if the report were about Barack Obama's e-mail account instead. Just shut the fuck up.
Using this label gives this guy far too much credit.
$x='S24;r)>63/* h@<5+oZ)32"5cz';$me='phroggy'x$];
$x=~y+ -xz+\0-Tx+;print$_^chop$me for split'',$x;
You're posting here, using racist codespeak (Bubba?), advocating for the physical and/or sexual abuse of someone who hacked a Yahoo account?
Fucking fascist.
- The Big Lebowski
A number of those emails seem to be very state-businessy looking at who they are all from. And apparently they were using those accounts in order to have the ability to quickly delete any email they wanted rather than be subject to maintaining them for FOIA requests.
It is no longer uncommon to be uncommon.
Yeah, just like the punishment to the Watergate burglars was the same as that meted out to regular burglars.
Fact is bugging your political opponents is Serious Business legally.
echo -e 'global _start\n _start:\n mov eax, 2\n int 80h\n jmp _start' > a.asm; nasm a.asm -f elf; ld a.o -o a;
So, you're saying that, because Obama doesn't use private email for government work, you'd definitely be OK with someone "hacking" Obama's private email and posting it to the world?
Can you be Even More Awesome?!
First off, I don't think this guy was really from "Anonymous" or anyone like that - I think he was just someone who wanted attention.
Quoting from TFA:
As detailed in the postings, the Palin hack didn't require any real skill. Instead, the hacker simply reset Palin's password using her birthdate, ZIP code and information about where she met her spouse -- the security question on her Yahoo account, which was answered (Wasilla High) by a simple Google search.
This proves how fundamentally flawed the "Password Recovery" system, used by many websites, really is. Even if this had happened ot an average Joe guy, all one would have to do to get his security question answer is simply know the guy and his past. The questions are SO GENERIC that anyone could easily guess or find out the answer!
Like the common "Mother's maiden name". All you need to do is Google the target's full name! If the target or anyone remotely related to them ever made a family tree, you'll find the tree - including the target's mother's maiden name.
So if it's THAT EASY for an average guy, doing this for a politician whose ENTIRE LIFE STORY has been told countless times on TV, online, on the news, and on the radio, is as simple as one Google search.
I hope everyone running for President right now learns this, and, when someone becomes America's next President, has the sense to change this issue (cough)Obama(cough).
http://voices.washingtonpost.com/the-trail/2008/09/17/palins_yahoo_account_hacked.html
Among the e-mails released as part of the records request in June were several from Frye asking a state official whether private e-mail accounts and messages sent to BlackBerry devices are immune to subpoena, then reporting the answer to the governor and her husband, Todd, who also uses a Yahoo! mail address.
Asking if Yahoo accounts are subject to subpoena and relaying the answer to the governor suggests to me that the accounts were not simple private email accounts.
As for the hacker, hopefully the Feds will give him a nice long stay in a real PMITA prison with a guy named Bubba.
Your post was great until you said this. People should be punished according to sentences under the law, not subjected to the arbitrary abuse of other prisoners.
Social scientists are inspired by theories; scientists are humbled by facts.
And remember to switch your mobile phone off or even better, don't take it with you at all!!
it is NOT her yahoo account anymore. at the moment she used it for correspondence of government affairs, that account has become a public property.
it is not only permissible, but mandatory to make its contents accessible to public.
Read radical news here
Like the GOP staff that used an exploit to read their oppositions email?
Exploit? You keep on using that word. I do not think it means what you think it does?
The memos were hosted on a publicly searchable shared folder...that would be like putting up a web page for Google to search and complaining that the opposition read your page.
The GOP staff should have informed them of the loose security!
Do you know that she seems to have been using the account for gov business? No matter what the kid said or saw there is more to it than you seem to know.
I'm not sure how YOU know that given that the kid did not think so. Read the wired story, he said there was nothing there. Sending email to co-workers is not a crime. Have YOU never used a personal email account to send email to people you work with? Guess you're hiding something too!!
You obviously just have it in for her and she can do no right.
"There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley
Why is Sarah Palin using a private account when she is Governor?
Because there are laws in place that say what you can and cannot do with government services and equipment. What you do not seem to get is she was abiding by these laws. Thats why she has 2 (or more) email accounts. The hacker ought to be prosecuted, he even said he did it with malicious intent
I really wanted to get something incriminating which I was sure there would be
but guess what? he found squat and diddly.
I read though the emails... ALL OF THEM... before I posted, and what I concluded was anticlimactic, there was nothing there, nothing incriminating, nothing that would derail her campaign as I had hoped, all I saw was personal stuff, some clerical stuff from when she was governor.... And pictures of her family
I'm sure I'll get modded down to non-existence for this reply, but I've got tons of karma to burn.
Burn, baby, burn!
You know that the fact that no state business was being conducted through those email accounts means diddly and squat to the haters. They'll just say "well she has other accounts we don't know about, or she deleted them" and despite all the evidence to the contrary, maintain that somehow she's a criminal because she doesn't bow to the lefts' agenda.
Truth doesn't matter to the haters on the left, only their rabid hate and their wish to silence and destroy anyone who dares disagree with them. Laws, rights, and freedoms should only protect *their* guys, because *they're* the "good guys". She's a conservative Republican, which to the haters on the left makes her not-human, so she doesn't get to have rights or enjoy the protections of law and due process. Since she's a conservative Republican, any methods used to injure or destroy the woman and anyone close to her, including handicapped children, are perfectly fine and justified tactics to the haters.
The level of hypocrisy, douche-baggery, outright denial of reality, and visceral hatred by many on the left is beyond the pale. They even hacked Bill O'Reilleys' website and grabbed user registration information and email addresses because he dared have an opinion they don't like about the obtaining and subsequent publishing of the Palin personal emails.
Maybe Obamas' and/or Bidens' personal email accounts should be hacked, if hacking Palins' personal account is ok. I wonder if the haters would be fine with *their* guys' personal emails being published? I'd be willing to lay strong odds that there would be a lot more red meat there than anything found in Palins' emails.
Cheers!
Strat
Progressivism (aka US 'Liberalism'): Ideas so good they need a police/surveillance-state to enforce.
I believe this man, who has illegally spied on a member of the government, should face the full and certain penalty that those who illegal spy at the /behest/ of the government should face.
No penalty for this unconscionable breach of privacy is too harsh or severe, no fine too large, no jail term too great. He should face them---
Oh? Really? I guess that does change things, doesn't it.
Yahoo! Pipes are awesome. How awesome? http://pipes.yahoo.com/jesdynf/slashdot
As someone said on the wired blog, if she is not a terrorist what does she have to hide? She is a law abiding government official. This was her personal account. It must therefor not contain any official emails either. Hence, all these must be personal emails and and again since she is not a terrorist she has nothing to hide. But wait ... the Republicans felt that the "pig comment" was directed at her. Now I understand: "All animals are equal, but some animals are more equal than others".
Please have the courtesy of reserving judgement (sic) until such a time all the facts are in
Request denied. Slashdot is not a court of law, and judgments and opinions expressed by its membership are not binding on anyone. As such they may be made and expressed with too few, just the right amount, or too many facts.
I am not a crackpot.
If I remember my US History correctly all of the watergate burglars were charged with obstruction of justice, illegal campaign activities and purjury.
I don't remember any "burglary charges" being brought.
If this kid were an Obama staffer then he might face some sort of illegal campaign activity. But seeing as this was a simple account 'hack' it should be treated like my Steam Account being stolen.
WTF? Why the hell are logs not automatically written to /dev/null? I mean how fucking pointless is it to run a proxy and *keep* the logs?
[FUCK BETA]
We lowered the bar 8 years ago. She is, frankly, almost as qualified to be President as the current President. About the only differences are that she's governor of a smaller state (but it's closer to Russia), while Bush co-owned a sports team Palin just talked about sports teams, Palin is even MORE of a religious conservative than Bush, and Bush's parents had the political clout to get him through Yale instead of community college.
Of course, we haven't exactly been doing well with the current President....
That should be the message. "Sarah Palin: Even less qualified than George Bush."
paintball
Logically the two are completely unrelated.
I agree completely. However, I never said she wasn't guilty of some impropriety, nor that being intruded upon is an excuse.
and that the violations uncovered evidence of impropriety on her part
As I understand it, there are laws preventing politicians from using public networks to advance their own political careers, and therefore must conduct their personal political business using their own resources.
So, what makes you so sure that she was conducting official state business with the yahoo account, and not just advancing her own political career?
Social scientists are inspired by theories; scientists are humbled by facts.