Slashdot Mirror
Obama's Mobile Phone Records Compromised, Shared
Tiger4 writes "Verizon has confirmed that some of its employees have accessed and perhaps shared calling records of President Elect Barack Obama (coverage at CNN, Reuters, AP). Verizon says the people involved have all been put on leave with pay as the investigation proceeds. Some of the employees may have accessed the information for legitimate purposes, but others may have been curiosity seekers and may have even shared the information around. The account was 'only' a phone, not a BlackBerry or similar device, and Verizon believes it was just calling records, not voicemail or email that was compromised. The articles do not mention the similarity to the warrantless wiretapping or hospital records compromises of recent months. But that immediately sprang to mind for me."
Oversight is OK though right? He has nothing to hide.
If he stops the NSA from spying on domestics then I'll take back my comment.
Some of the employees may have accessed the information for legitimate purposes
Like what?
I doubt if Obama has any problem paying his phone bill.
My brother worked at T-Mobile for many years. (since before they were T-Mobile). Most Hollywood stars have their agents get their phones for them. One day, something happened in the payment process, and Val Kilmer came into a store to make a payment on his phone, instead of his agent. Suddenly, his number was getting passed all over the company, and many employees (mostly young girls) actually called the number to talk to him. A ton of people were fired, and Val got a very nice check from T-Mobile.
What are we going to do tonight Brain?
Most of the media (for example, NPR on the radio today) talks about "unauthorized access by employees", while /. entry is about "sharing" (which is more sinister).
PS. That and unrelated modest and subdued coverage by CNN about yesterday's record Dow-Jones drop remind me of bias in the media.
I do not believe in karma. "Funny"=-6. Do good and forbid evil. Yours, Oft-Offtopic Flamebaiting Troll.
While this is improper and wrong, I think that if the government is allowed to wiretap us, then the same laws should make it legal (Freedom of Information Act or something like that) for us to wiretap them. In fact, all government employees' and officials' calls should be recorded and made available for everyone's listening pleasure at a youtube-like site. Call it govtube. Because we are not subservient to the government; it is subservient to us. We put those people in office for our benefit, and so it is our collective right to know what they're doing over there.
A situation like this is why there are so many stupid rules at work that make people less productive. Why USB ports are disabled, or you can't have an iPod, websites like gmail are blocked. The biggest danger of electronic crime and compromising of personal information come from people that work at the company. Same as most shoplifting is done by employees of the store. The solution is, ironically stolen from the government. In order to see personal data (classified information) an employee of the company must, not only have rights to see the information, but must also demonstrate a "need to know". That two factor authentication will eliminate many of the abuses by corporate and government employees (Joe the Plumber's info breach by the state) and clearly put the action into criminal field as apposed to looky loo.
What will Obama take for his trouble? I wonder who he's been chatting with. I see here a few dozen calls to a payphone in Ottawa. For years people were suggesting the USA could annex Canada if a big enough crisis occurred. Little did they know that Canada would annex the USA after a major stock market crash.
The dangers of knowledge trigger emotional distress in human beings.
No more coffee for you.
Never underestimate the power of stupid people in large groups.
McAdam said the device on the account was a simple voice flip-phone, not a BlackBerry or other smartphone designed for e-mail or other data services, so none of Obama's e-mail could have been accessed.
Never heard of him. You talk as though he was some kind of Super Star like Rajnikant.
sed -e 's/Chuck Norris/Rajnikant/g' joke > fact
Actually you are strangely correct. We should have transcripts of every conversation with lobbyist, campaign contributors, and business relationships. A lack of vision into our corporate and political deal making has lead to many of the abuses over the last decade. If every non-personal conversation by corporate executives and government employees was recorded and made available to the public corruption and graft will be driven further underground.
Every time a celebrity lands themselves in an ER (especially hospitals not accustomed VIPs) then we can expect several violations of HIPAA by unauthorized hospital staff.
They just cannot resist no matter how many times they are warned about activity being logged and threats of dismissal upon violation.
Right, because they want to make sure not to punish any employees who were not acting unethically. Once they determine who did what, they'll probably fire the bad ones, and possibly take legal action against them..
Belief? Hope? Preference?The Existential Vortex
If there is sufficient evidence to connect the suspected employee, they will most likely be fired or worse. Denying the suspected parties their pay is inappropriate until more sufficient evidence is found. Having them show up at work would be inappropriate as well.
No, it's not an ideal situation. But what would you propose?
Sure it's like a vacation. A vacation where you might be fired or charged with a crime. Yeah, I'm jealous.
The parent comment does not deserve mod points. Individuals have been accused, are under investigation and innocent until proven otherwise.
Since Obama voted for FISA it's only fair that the people have access to those records too. :)
Really ? The people who illegaly obtained access to "Joe the plumber"'s records, and went on to check all sorts of things on him
["all sorts of things" means, specifically, his driver's record, and whether or not he owed child support]
are still perfectly gainfully employed by the government
And so are these people. Didn't you even read the summary??? Verizon says the people involved have all been put on leave with pay.
"leave with pay" == "still employed." Sounds like a bonus, not a punishment!
I guess it all depends what side you're on.
Apparently not.
http://www.geoffreylandis.com
Do you think that the President Elect of the United States might have greater personal security concerns than McCain's version of a working class hero? This isn't a matter of "being critical of the president".
The President-Elect has a modern day Praetorian Guard protecting him. It would take either a professional team of assassins, or a very, very lucky suicide bomber/shooter to get anywhere near him. Joe the Plumber? Not so much.
Joe what's his name can't help the fact that McCain made him into a working class hero. He also can't help the fact that a number of people on the left wanted to destroy him for having the audacity to ask a hard, serious economic question of Obama that made Obama look bad. One radio host even called for him to be murdered.
So yeah, I'd say that he had more practical security precautions than a man who had the Secret Service protecting him and his immediate family.
Thank you.
For all the crud that comes around here about how Verizon Wireless is an evil company, I can tell you, they are a very fair and honest company. They truly believe in doing what's right - both by customers, and by employees.
Obviously, things like call records and such need to be kept for some amount of time, both for troubleshooting as well as legal issues (court orders, etc.) That's a pretty serious responsibility. That's why you have audits logs every time that data gets accessed.
The system works, apparently. The folks who got suspended with pay all had their hands in the cookie jar. From what it sounds like, they're going to be sorting out who was there for legit purposes (i.e. a technical issue, billing question, etc.) and who was doing something they shouldn't have been.
I think suspending with pay is quite fair. If you were in those records, doing legitimate work, that will come to light, and you'll have suffered no loss. If you did something you shouldn't have done, well, that'll come out too and when that's determined, due process will catch up to you.
Good call on their part, and frankly, I can't think of any better way to handle it. It's good to see that the right processes are in place such that employees can do their job when they need to, but it gets flagged when someone is doing something shady.
Do you think that the President Elect of the United States might have greater personal security concerns than McCain's version of a working class hero? This isn't a matter of "being critical of the president".
You know my first reaction to this? It's a good thing that this happened. Why? Because it would take a data breach of a major government official before anything really serious is done about the problem. There is a part of me that really hopes that the president and congress get all sorts of personnel data stolen/breached just so they'll start to take the subject seriously.
Now as far as the office of the President and the white house goes... I'd hope that however the white house has their cell phone plan that say that they have some contract and have 50-1000 (how ever many) phones and some peon is in charge of paying bills, setting up/backing up address books other info of officals and that the phone company shouldn't ever know which phones are assigned to which personnel. I'd actually want all their phone conversions encrypted and what not. (Actually, I'd want every cell phone call encrypted as well.)
Now, if this happened to be his personnel cell phone before he became famous president/government official, I can understand how this happened. I'd hope the President of the US or heck of any country or major business has more important things to do than fiddle with their personnel cell phones/tech support/data breaches.
I'll now have that mental image of the President spending an hour on hold trying to get through the cell phone tech support mini hell before he can complain to the cell phone management rather than spending time doing whatever it is presidents do most of the time.
Who modded this "insightful?" White supremacists? Good grief this is horrible!
If he's doing nothing wrong he's got nothing to worry about.
Right?
No sig today...
Lets see if they get the same slap on the wrist that government employees got for accessing Joe the Plumber's tax records, DMV records, medical records, and other supposedly private information.
-=[ Who Is John Galt? ]=-
Joe was just a guy in Ohio. Obama came to his house to campaign. He wasn't an "operative".
Do you guys even care that you're lying? Your guy won. There's no need to continue to smear and lie about Joe the Plumber.
really? Ted Strickland suspended Director Helen Jones-Kelley of the Job and Family Services Department for one month without pay
She, although currently employed, for the next month is not gainfully employed (unlike the people accused hear.)
Everything interesting that was disclosed was public record anyway, IE not a lic plumber, just a dream of someday making enough money to someday buy a business... Just a leading question by a guy who didn't care what the answer was because he had already decided (and was already campaigning for McCain.)
I think Obama's tax plan would still be better for these small businesses, IE a guys who own their own profitable business get to choose how much pay they take away. So as long as he re-invests his profits in his (or other businesses) then Obama's plan is better for him. Only if he decides to cash out big time, would he have be penalized 6% more for not reinvesting in the economy.
So I ask that, what is wrong with a 6% luxury Tax that encourages job creation, at a time when we want to encourage job creation?
I may be wrong about this but I seem to remember speaking to the guy in my IT organization about Blackberry and AES encryption on the Blackberry devices. He said that is an option but it is not the default configuration and you have to specifically configure it. My organization has about 250,000 e-mail accounts and does not use the AES encryption he said. He would know since he designed the system.
"...Look, the people you are after are the people you depend on. We cook your meals, we haul your trash, we connect your calls, we drive your ambulances. We guard you while you sleep. Do not... fuck with us."
I'd hope so. The Video Privacy Protection Act was passed after the rental records of a Supreme Court nominee became public. Seems like the only way we can get any privacy legislation passed is to demonstrate to the ruling class just how important it is by violating their privacy.
Give me Classic Slashdot or give me death!
Just imagine the outrage if someone had broken into one of the candidate's personal email accounts, and posted pictures of their children and private conversations, or...uh...wait...
Here is the link:
http://scienceblogs.com/afarensis/2006/10/27/intelligent_design_and_the_ala/
No sig for the moment.
1. Clinton administration snagging secret FBI background checks on all the nation's leading Republicans.
2. Democrats illegally recording Newt Gingrich cell phone call and leaking it to the press.
3. Democrat breaking into Gov Palin's e-mail account and plastering the contents all over the web.
4. Hoards of Democrats in a bunch of state offices digging into every possible government record looking for dirt on Joe-the-plumber (the average citizen who dared question the messiah)
5. Both McCain and Obama having their passport records breached
6. The pregnancy of Palin's under-age daughter and details about her boyfriend being splashed all-over the papers.
7. Palin's minor daughter's cell phone info being leaked onto the web
Actually, I though of all the recent breaches by people in both parties, but there seems to be a fixation on Cheney/Bush, and a baseless presumption that Democrats value privacy, on the net that is a bit tiresome and some balance is required. The problem is NOT that the wrong people are in charge or the wrong people are the victims; the problem is that humans are corruptible and too much power in the hands of too few, with too little oversight, will always lead to trouble. No matter which side of the aisle you are on, eventually your people will be the victims and the other people will be the perps. Best that people on both sides hammer-out better rules to protect the privacy of everybody... while still protecting everybody from real harm. Anybody who only notices and gets upset when somebody in his political party is violated is somebody who does not truly care about privacy
I believe GPs point was that no one is safe from having it happen to them, not that no one is safe from the consequences of doing the data theft. Obviously (sadly) if you're doing it on behalf of the government, you're ok.
"I'm not sure I like the fugnutish tone you used in your post!" -RogL (608926)-
Yeah I'm "a troll," and this dude is "insightful." If I have to hear "left-wing kook" or "right-wing Bible thumper" one more time, I'm gonna flip my fucking lid! There was a public outcry over the intrusion into Palin's email. And drop Ayers, Jesus! Start thinking critically and stop regurgitating what other people tell you. I could easily say similar things to some Liberals, but you are being a dumb ass right here, right now. I repeat: stop blaming "the Liberals" and 1. start having opinions that have critical thought put into them, and 2. start thinking of how you can help America not how everyone else is ruining it. That's just counterproductive self-pity.
There was no solid evidence prior to a vigilante breaking into Palin's inbox that any law was broken. There may have been an investigation in progress, I can't remember right now, but that is NOT the same thing as substantial evidence or a conviction.
With that single insight your entire argument about the relative moral and legal difference is destroyed.
Since you saw fit to throw in a politically based insult I will now do the same. Please sir, get your head out of Barak's colon and get some fresh air. Your critical thinking skills are oxygen starved.
I'm pretty sure he'll have to get rid of it.
Let's face it -- POTUS has a whole fleet of people who make sure he's got secure and reliable comms, and a group of people to get him to his next appointment on time.
I just can't see it being practicable to have Obama running around with is own damned blackberry/cellphone.
If for no other reason, it just seems stunningly bizarre than anyone who travels in a motorcade and has a 747 at his disposal crammed full of the most advanced communications gear would answer his own damned phone!! There are now people for that. If you're important enough to call through to the president of the United States, some navy guy in white gloves will bring it to him. :-P
The apparatus around POTUS is just too huge for him to continue to carry a cell phone and not have that be odd. Heck, does POTUS even need to carry a wallet?? It's not like he has to stop and buy gas or a quick coffee or anything.
Cheers
Lost at C:>. Found at C.
You can just go read all the pro-invade Palin's email on the hopes she did something wrong crowd here at /. to reveal just how warped this place has become. The number who defended getting to the email of a mere candidate were astounding and was purely driving my political leaning.
Go to a left-leaning site and you'll find an astounding number of left-leaning idiots. Go to a right-leaning site and you'll find an astounding number of right-leaning idiots. The fact that you claim that this was purely driving your political leaning makes me suspect you're one of them as well.
It's not enough to bash in heads, you've got to bash in minds. - Captain Hammer