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Secret Service Investigating Romney Tax Hack Claim
A federal investigation has been launched after hackers claimed to have stolen Mitt Romney’s tax returns. The hackers have given Romney until September 28th to pay $1 million in bitcoins or they say they will release the returns. From the article: "The claim was made in a post on the Pastebin site on Sunday that alleged that Romney's federal tax returns were taken from the offices of PriceWaterhouse Coopers in Frankin, Tenn., on August 25 by someone who snuck into the building and made copies of the document. The message author threatened to release the files publicly on September 28 and said copies of the files had been given to Democratic and Republican leaders in that county. Democrats have made Romney's refusal to release his tax returns a key point in their criticism that he is not in touch with working class voters."
If there's one thing you can all agree on, it's that leakers must be punished harshly!
xkcd is not in the sudoers file. This incident will be reported.
Someone actually thinks bitcoins are worth having.
Slashdot - News for Nerds, Stuff that Matters, in ISO-8859-1 Has just realised that beta makes this signature redundant
I don't know about the veracity of the claim that came in yesterday, but one of the things that I thought about when Romney started trying to surpress this information was that is was a just about the same thing as waiving a red flag in front of a bull. It's bound to make a "hacker" go for the ultimate crack and get this information (that most of us think should be public anyway) out of the electronic vault and onto the net.
It also, IMHO, shows that Romney and his band of followers live in a bubble of corporate reality and not in the real world. Only someone one the C** would be arrogant enough to think they could keep this type of information a secret forever when you're that visible to the public and when you're decisions are going to have immediate and lasting consequences for the entire world.
I remember when Bush II was being attacked as a draft dodger. Someone released faked documents, which the news media picked up as real. When they were discredited, no one would touch the issue anymore, whether it was legitimate or not.
This could turn out to be a similar ploy to help Romney - by associating the tax returns with criminal activity, it might get too hot for the Dems to touch, making an otherwise legitimate issue go away.
The original release and on pastebin makes no mention of the money. Speculation at the moment is that someone took the original release and "added" a ransom and resubmitted it to pastebin.
"$1 million in bitcoins" ... and they say *Romney's* out of touch with the real world?
Is there some reasoning why thieves that broke into a building and supposedly made copies of a document(why not just take the actual papers instead of making copies?) would be labeled hackers? The whole thing sounds suspect to me.
Possible, but I am thinking this is actually part of a larger ploy.
Since anyone of even a modicum of technological capability, who actually uses BitCoins, knows that they are somewhat traceable, I wonder why someone would demand such an outlandish sum in them. Let's see here...we have the key words BitCoins, hackers, and all of it tied to a presidential election.
We all know that for the last several months, the press has been falling over themselves to paint BitCoins in the darkest light possible, playing up every rumoured instanced of malfeasance even remotely tied to them. We also know that the military, for lack of enemies, has recently decided that their next shipment of bread and butter will have to come from the 'cyber-crime' division, and that they are desperate to find a playmate, domestic or otherwise, to justify the purchase orders already signed and dated, in top brass's top drawers. And seeing how the BitCoin community has been relatively effective in educating people with regards to the f*cked up claims the press loves to make, perhaps someone decided to take it to the next level. By launching an attack on a presidential campaign, you are guaranteed coverage in the press, at decibel levels well above the normal white noise; you also guarantee that the attacked opponent will respond with a calculated defence (denial, followed by revenge if / when elected), with the added bonus that since you went after a minor but incredibly irritating election issue (his tax returns, and it is), he will take it personally. If he is elected, he will willingly sign any law that mentions this incident and 'justice'; if he loses, the other guy will do the same, as he doesn't like the idea of what happened to his opponent possibly happening to him or his friends. It's the equivalent of a Morton's fork, where the tech industry is damned if they do, damned if they don't. The military gets paid either way, though they won't be invited to any tech parties for a few years.
Hackers (unknown enemy, up there with the boogey-man these days, hiding under your bed and in your computer, going to get you), BitCoins (another unknown, a 'competing' currency to the US dollar, so it's 'patriotic' to be against it; plus 'hackers' and drug dealers use it, unlike the US Dollar, so it must be bad), and a presidential election (when politicians make a black list, and begin adding names).
The best part is, even if the hackers are arrested, we may never get the people behind it all. Sounds a little conspiracy-ish, but it is in the CIA handbook, that you 'groom' someone else to do the dirty work, then get rid of them.
I am John Hurt.
Very nice turn of events would be, to leak the location of that overpass to the press instead of picking up the money.
http://lmgtfy.com/?q=2009+FBAR+amnesty
tl;dr: In early 2009, the Swiss bank UBS was indited in a massive tax-evasion scheme and as part of their settlement with the American IRS, they revealed thousands of names of account holders (to the IRS, but not to the public). The IRS then instituted an amnesty program, where if you came clean about your previously undisclosed offshore accounts in your 2009 tax returns, your penalty would be reduced and you wouldn't go to jail for tax evasion.
Romney is only releasing his tax returns from 2010 or later.
There were two separate pastbin posts.
The first stated papers had been physically copied during a burglary at PWC. There was no randsom demand. They simply stated the papers would be released Sep 28th.
The second paste said they had accessed the file servers during a break in at PWC and accessed the information this way. The second asked for a randsom.
There is no evidence the two posts were by the same people.
This is all too much complexity for most jounalists it seems.
Romney is an asshole. To be fair, the Stone doesn't like Romney at all; but there's not a lot to like. He's a Republican John Kerry.
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and
seem to have a slight discrepancy lol. So they want $1 mil in bitcoins and yet they sent copies to "Democratic and Republican leaders in that county." Oh yes, I'm so sure those will never see the light of day if he pays after they gave them to the democrats. No wonder these people were too stupid to hack it digitally. They're operating this like complete morons.
You keep using that word. I do not think it means what you think it means.
There's a bot in freenode #bitcoin which will answer this question, based on the current depth of the order book. Last time I checked buying $1000000 of bitcoins would push the final price to $15 (from $11), so not exactly skyrocketing. The depth of the market is much greater now than it was last year.
proving once more that bitcoins are the currency of thieves, drug dealers, pedophiles and gun runners
As are dollars. There are about 8 million bitcoins at about $11 a piece. That's 88 million dollars worth of bitcoins. That doesn't even come close to the money stolen by ONE GUY at MF Global.
If you despise thieves, aim your hatred at the finance industry and the politicians that protect them. Bitcoin is negligible compared to these crooks.
Give me Classic Slashdot or give me death!
Back in my day we used to call people who snuck into buildings and stole things "burgalers".
And then they invented spell-check.
Beauty is in the eye of the beerholder.
Slashdot logic: Something i like: is being associated with something bad? It must be a false flag attack.
China is actively working to subvert government it systems? Irrelevant. Cyber-Command will be built on the crumbling remains of bit coin. Srsly?
Now the other side just has to steal Obama's college records and threaten to release them if Romney's tax records get released.
Except Obama's college records are a true "who cares?" and Romney's tax records could show the world he pays a tiny fraction of his income in taxes, that he took advantage of tax amnesty for cheats, etc.
Is he an American? Some people are saying that he was born in Mexico. Why hasn't he produced a REAL birth certificate?
It is also being argued that he will be the first Mexican national to become president of the United States with the purpose of returning all lands taken from Mexico in our wars with them. Some have gone even further and claimed that he does not produce his tax returns because he has been filing them in Mexico, not the US...
There, I Foxified it for you...
Only to idiots, are orders laws.
-- Henning von Tresckow
Comment removed based on user account deletion
Did Mitt Romney accept the IRS Tax Amnesty program in 2009? Did he disclose offshore accounts used as tax havens?
Was Romney part of these 14,700 Americans?
Even Santorum released four years of tax returns, and he wasn't even the nominee.
http://www.taxhistory.org/www/website.nsf/web/presidentialtaxreturns
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Yes, because crackers / hackers, in general, break into large accounting firms, and (this is the kicker) instead of quietly modifying the servers to send large payments to an account outside of the country, they steal the tax returns of a presidential candidate, and publicly black-mail him
Per the summary it was a physical theft.
The claim was made in a post on the Pastebin site on Sunday that alleged that Romney's federal tax returns were taken from the offices of PriceWaterhouse Coopers in Frankin, Tenn., on August 25 by someone who snuck into the building and made copies of the document.
Don't know something? Look it up. Still don't know? Then ask.
As a major presidential candidate, he should have less right to privacy than Joe User.
As a major presidential candidate, he has the same RIGHT to privacy.
However, he also has greater CONSEQUENCES for exercising that right - voters may not vote for him if he won't release his tax returns.
Whether his taxes should be released or not is Mitt's decision. Whether people vote for him or not is their decision.
paintball
The reasoning behind lower taxes for long term capital gains is that it lowers taxes for rich people, and Republicans support lowering taxes for rich people.
"Encouraging investment in activities that create jobs" is a lie that's used to sell it to those who don't benefit from the tax cut.
And it's obvious that it's a lie, because it is IMPOSSIBLE to encourage investment. *ALL* money gets invested NO MATTER WHAT. If you create a new company, you've invested your money. If you REFUSE to create a new company and just stash your money in a bank account, then the bank will loan that money to someone else who will invest it. It gets invested either way.
About the only way to NOT invest money is to hide it in your mattress, and there is no tax rate short of 100% where it would be preferable to hide your money in a mattress instead of a bank account.
The lower rate is nothing other than a tax break for already having money.
paintball
It's a gimmick. It's right up there with having a Philly cheesesteak in Gino's versus Pat's. American politics is filled with those kinds of traps.
All the issue is there to serve is to suggest Romney is "not one of you" and fits the stereotype of "rich white republican."
Truth is, Obama is rich, too. You can't really do federal politics without being quite wealthy.
Time wasted talking about tax returns, or birth certificates, or whatever is time spent not talking about the facts. And when you look at FACTS, both Republicans AND Democrats have each done massive harm to this country over the past 80 years.
More Twoson than Cupertino
That's the core of this : the suspicion is that Romney was one of the many thousands who took advantage of the Treasury's 2009 amnesty for those illegally evading taxes through the use of off-shore banks.
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A fine example of whataboutery. The issue is not that Romney is wealthy - it's a matter of public record that his wealth is double that of the last eight presidents combined - but that he may have been illegally evading taxes through the use of off-shore banks, and took advantage of the 2009 amnesty.
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Back in my day we used to call people who snuck into buildings and stole things "burgalers".
And then they invented spell-check.
Maybe he's British. They're always spelling things wrong over there.
If an action one took was legal at the time it was done, one doesn't need an amnesty.
Lol. So it's the Democrats fault!? The whataboutery-foo is strong in this one. You think they should not have permitted the amnesty? And put the criminals in prison?
I guess you don't understand what amnesty means? To re-cap : following a leak by a whistle-blower, Swiss bank UBS gets sued by the US to release their full list of tax criminals' names. The IRS is more interested in the money than putting thousands of the rich and/or famous behind bars, so offers an amnesty - those tax evaders who voluntarily fess up, report their fraud and pay what's due are not prosecuted.
The tax evasion was and is illegal. Amnesty from prosecution does not magically make the previous behaviour legal. And even if it did, the issue for Romney, if the allegation is true, is that he willfully and deliberately committed massive tax fraud, knowing at the time that it was illegal. That is massively damaging whichever side of the fence you're on. (And by the way, I don't really have a horse in this race because I'm not permitted to vote in that election. If I could vote, I cannot imagine that I would be persuaded to vote Obama).
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Lol. So it's the Democrats fault!? The whataboutery-foo is strong in this one. You think they should not have permitted the amnesty? And put the criminals in prison?
Since I don't like Romney, if they did not permit the amnesty and threw him in jail it would have worked out better IMO. :)
I guess what I'm having trouble wrapping my head around is why was all this tough talk about punishing wall street and fat cat bankers if they're just going to give amnesty out and let them pay the difference and not call foul. Armed with both majority AND a rubber stamp and that's the best they could do? If that's not evidence of the 2nd half original premise, that the Democrats and Republicans are both screwing with the public, I don't know what is. The 1st half is that it's a stupid political game to play. So Romney is evil because he's a rich guy and tax evader? Well, not too long ago they gave everyone a pass, so why the change of heart? It's a game. It's just as stupid as people still demanding to see Obama's birth certificate.
I'd much rather see talk about what each candidate intends to do with the presidency, rather than "vote for me because that other guy's a real dickhead". Seems the 2004 election really made this the status quo on political discourse and, well, I'm just disappointed. But maybe I'm just too young, I'm sure this kind of crap probably went on in years gone by.
More Twoson than Cupertino
I totally agree with your sentiment, but I still think there's a huge difference between "the other guy's a dickhead" and "the other guy engaged in illegal behaviour"
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