Hacker Guccifer Claims He Easily and Repeatedly Broke Into Hillary Clinton's Email Server (foxnews.com)

An anonymous reader quotes a report from Fox News: The infamous Romanian hacker known as "Guccifer," speaking exclusively with Fox News, claimed he easily -- and repeatedly -- breached former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton's personal email server in early 2013. In the process of mining data from the Blumenthal account, Lazar said he came across evidence that others were on the Clinton server. "As far as I remember, yes, there were up to 10, like, IPs from other parts of the world," he said. From the report: "'For me, it was easy ... easy for me, for everybody,' Marcel Lehel Lazar, who goes by the moniker 'Guccifer,' told Fox News from a Virginia jail where he is being held. Fox News could not independently confirm Lazar's claims. The 44-year-old Lazar said he first compromised Clinton confidant Sidney Blumenthal's AOL account, in March 2013, and used that as a stepping stone to the Clinton server. He said he accessed Clintonâ(TM)s server 'like twice,' though he described the contents as 'not interest[ing]' to him at the time." Guccifer was sent to prison last month, which is when his potential role in the Clinton email investigation became apparent.

Comments

The only possible hope

[Anonymous Coward]

Here's what's clear to anyone and everyone who lives in America:

Hillary is untouchable. Elites in general are untouchable. This entire debacle won't amount to anything because we're talking about one of the most powerful and connected people in the world.

Is the Clinton Foundation a slush fund for the Clinton family? Of course. Is it a real charitable organization? Barely (15% goes to charity). Did Clinton intentionally set a server up in her house to allow her to do things outside the watchful eye of the State Department? Of course.

Doesn't matter. None of that matters.

There is one and only one possibility that this entire thing blows up:

A leak from someone at the FBI. And it's not all that unlikely either. The mood at the FBI is rumored to be frustration. Frustration because they know that they have a rock solid case, and it will go nowhere. That's a recipe for a leak.

Aside from that, this goes nowhere.

Re:The only possible hope

[Anonymous Coward]

A lot of "Correct the record" folks here tonight.

Re:The only possible hope

[DNS-and-BIND]

The scandal makes complete sense, unless you are a hyper-partisan who thinks it's OK when your side breaks the law. If any other federal government employee tried to hide her official correspondence with a hidden server, that person would now be on year 3 of a prison sentence. But, it's Hillary Clinton, so she didn't even get her security clearance revoked. You really don't get how outrageous the whole thing is? And if she does get away with it, it's just going to embolden thousands more government apparatchiks to take even more liberties with our already-overstretched laws?

Re:The only possible hope

[AmiMoJo]

That's not exactly what happened though, is it?

She had a private server and Blackberry phone. When she came into her role as foreign secretary they told her that she needed a more secure means of communication, but were unable to come up with anything suitable for her office. So she carried on using her private server. Didn't hide it, I mean it's pretty obvious that hillary@clintonemail.com is not an official government account and the payments made to the company running the server are part of the public record.

Eventually someone took a proper look at the situation and realized it needed fixing. She screwed up, but the lack of intent and the fact that other parts of the government knew and failed to take more immediate and decisive action makes it very difficult to prosecute her for anything. She would probably be able to argue that she delegated that stuff to others whose responsibility it was to ensure compliance with relevant record keeping rules.

I'm not saying she did nothing wrong, she clearly screwed up badly here, but realistically it doesn't matter who she is - there just isn't enough there for a conviction.

Re:The only possible hope

[drinkypoo]

She had a private server and Blackberry phone. When she came into her role as foreign secretary they told her that she needed a more secure means of communication, but were unable to come up with anything suitable for her office.

That is a lie, and you are a liar. They offered her a secure device which other people were using successfully. That Hillary Clinton is too stupid to figure out WinMo and has to use a crackberry doesn't mean that the solution was unsuitable. It means that Clinton was unsuitable.

So she carried on using her private server. Didn't hide it,

Yes, she did not bother to hide her illegal activity, because she knew she was untouchable.

Re:The only possible hope

[Anonymous Coward]

And it's not clear that using the private server was an attempt to evade record keeping. Most indications are that Clinton really wanted to keep using a Blackberry and wanted access to her current email and the NSA and State Department weren't able to accommodate her so she just gave up and did her own thing.

So your excuse is that she broke the rules because the people who understand security said "no", and getting her way is more important than following those rules?

Laws should be applied consistently, that doesn't just mean the rich and powerful don't get off easy, it also means you don't get to throw the book at someone just because you don't like their politics.

Are you saying that if a low-level government employee ignored the legally mandated rules for handling sensitive data, they would not be charged with treason? You, sir, are full of shit.

email server

[Anonymous Coward]

So, he told *Fox News* this story (A Fox News story about Hilary Clinton, gee, what a surprise).

And Fox News could not verify his claims (gee, another surprise).

Unverified by Fox News (and presumably by anyone), and yet, here it is.

You type it in over there, it pops up over here. Might as well be true then.

Why is he in jail?

[guruevi]

Why is he in jail and Hillary isn't? If anything, he's a whistleblower on major criminal activity.

Re:Why is he in jail?

[Gussington]

Why is he in jail and Hillary isn't? If anything, he's a whistleblower on major criminal activity.

Two reasons:
1. "a report from Fox News"
2. "Fox News could not independently confirm Lazar's claims"

You need to improve your critical thinking skills before calling for the noose...

Re:Why is he in jail?

[Anonymous Coward]

Same reason the guy who hacked Sarah Palin's Yahoo Mail account (proving she was illegally conducting official business on a personal email account) went to jail but Sarah Palin didn't. The elites don't go to jail in America.

Since when is Palin an "elite" in America?

Anyway, Palin didn't go to jail not because she is an elite but because her emails were incredibly dull, and nobody really cared enough about the little bit of mixing of personal and official emails, that there was evidence of, on the same account. Unlike Clinton, she didn't have access to top secret information. That is enough to make all the difference. It is enough to make these silly comparisons between Palin and Clinton completely pointless. Clinton is not being investigated by the FBI just for conducting government business on a private server; she is being investigated for potential mishandling of classified material.

But you're right. She probably won't get to jail. She is, after all, a Clinton.

Re:Dear Slashdot

[Khyber]

Not correct, Whipslash.

Quite often, clicking on a headline with NO POSTS just brings you to the front page of slashdot.

In fact, oh, look, hovering over one story right now with NO POSTS shows the URL link at the bottom to be THE FRONT PAGE OF SLASHDOT.

In fact, right now, clicking any link in the Firehose just expands the story, and never takes you into the actual submission itself.

Please read and understand your own code base before being silly like that again. I've been here way longer than you and know every change about this site (including having a ripped copy of the BETA slashcode. I know all this site's shitty issues.)

Oh, knock it off

[Anonymous Coward]

The big joke turned out to be Sarah's critics. The NYT even encouraged its readers to help go through all her PERSONAL email account contents (which she'd written assuming nobody would ever see them) and NOTHING illegal was found. They did not even find anything blatantly unethical. For all the hyperventilation about the contents of her e-mails, all the liberal press dropped the whole thing when there turned out to be no wrongdoing there.

Character is measure by what we do when we think nobody will ever see/know. By that measure, Sarah Palin has better standards and character than most people.

What do you think we'd learn from Hillary's e-mails? How about the 30K plus e-mails Hillary deleted when she realized there were lawsuits underway to examine them? Do we REALLY want a president who cannot measure up to Sarah Palin standards????

Like Hitler

[Anonymous Coward]

You sure sound like a Clinton drone with more nonsense that Trump is somehow like Hitler. Is that because he wants to protect borders from *illegal* immigrants? Or stem the flow of new voters who come from a fundamentalist religion that oppresses women? Is it because the Trump organization hires so few black people? Oh wait...he hired a higher percentage of African Americans and Latinos than anyone else in the race. Is it because he hates women? Evidence please. Is it because he hates Jews? Oh wait... His daughter is Jewish.

Talk about a "false scandal". Enough with your Clinton propaganda.

Trump is like Hitler in many ways. He is not Hitler, but let's not pretend they have nothing in common.

They are both white and have a penis, and have a great deal of DNA in common. So nobody who is trying to speak truth can say they have nothing in common. I know that's a bit silly, but you do a disservice to your cause by saying it's "nonsense that Trump is somehow like Hitler."

But going beyond that, there are more troubling things they have in common. Both use the uneducated masses, fear and hatred of the other, anti-intellectualism, and threats and intimidation to get their way. If you read Trump's interview with the Post editorial board, you will also learn that Trump at least, if not insane like Hitler, is at least incredibly stupid. Probably stupider than the average american, certainly stupider than the average professional.

Hitler said "What luck for rulers that men do not think." Trump appears to have taken that to heart.

As for woman-hating, look at Trump's language. If you think he treats women as equals, you were born in a cave. *Fox News* turned against him because of how much he attacked women. The Network that had defended the entire talking point of the "war on women" for years before Trump showed up.

Look, nobody's saying Trump is like Hitler in that he's going to start digging mass graves for the Muslims in America. But he's like Hitler in that he's a pretty terrible guy to rule a country and the racist, bigoted, international and military consequences of having him as President of the United States could have unpredictable and potentially devastating effects.

Re:False Scandal

[jandersen]

Hillary is above the law, it doesn't matter what regulations she may or may not have deliberately subverted. This is just a distraction to try to help the Trump/Hitler ticket win. And sure, we don't know who Trump will choose as running mate, but anyone who does join him will be just as bad.

I'm not a huge fan of Ms Clinton, but so far I haven't seen or heard anything that would indicate that she is any worse than the average politician, or the average citizen of any Western nation one would care to mention. To me it is suggestive of a feeble mind to expect a politician to be any better than the average of the population they represent, or be wildly outraged to discover that they have done what most people, regrettably, would have done, and taken an unfair advantage of their privileged position. Who on /. can honestly claim to never knowingly have done anything that was even slightly dishonest, unethical or illegal?

Being a politician, and especially one with a lot of power, requires somebody who is realistic and pragmatic, who has a steady hand in a crisis and is able to think before they talk. It would be nice if they are also good and honest, but I don't know how realistic it is to expect a person like that to be able to rise to the top and get real results in the political system in America. Just look at a guy like Obama who, to the dispassionate observer, seemed to be a fairly honest, well-intentioned person, if somewhat naive in his idealism; and how much has he actually achieved, that wasn't simply dictated by circumstances? Perhaps the fact that Ms Clinton doesn't seem to be squeaky clean is an advantage - and considering the amount of relentless scrutiny, it is impressive that a poorly managed email server is all that has turned up. Compare that to Mr Trump, who hasn't been exposed to quite the same amount of hostile snooping, but still seems to be surrounded by an odious pong - violent supporters that he appears to passively approve of, dodgy tax affairs, and if we dig deeper, probably a lot more.

I understand the anger that drives Trump's supporters - I think we all feel deeply frustrated with the way society is going, but I think it would be stupid to follow whoever seems to be shouting the loudest about it without considering carefully whether they would be able to do anything - or even be willing to seriously try. Does anybody really believe that Trump can "build a wall and force Mexico to pay"? Or that it is possible to round up all illegal immigrants and deport them, just like that? And so on? And what does it mean, "I will make America great again"? Isn't America great now? Everybody outside thinks so. Or "I will be so presidential, ...."? It sounds like what the contestants in a low level wrestling match would shout out. However, I don't think it is true that he is like Hitler - he's just an average crook, a narcissist with a hugely inflated view of his own importance.

In the end, neither he nor Clinton, Sanders or any of the others will be able to change what is wrong in America; for that to happen, people - ordinary, everyday people - will have to overcome their differences and unite against the culture that glorifies greed. The revolution must start in your heart, if you want to wax lyrical about it.

Re:Now we have established that you know nothing

[MysteriousPreacher]

Christianity does not oppress women. It treats women as having the same value as men in the eyes of God, and having just as much responsibility and accountability as men. This does not mean that some televangelist somewhere isn't a jerk, or that some small-town preacher isn't only reading Bible verses that tell women to behave in some particular way, only that the faith itself and its scriptures in their entirety and in-context do not teach the oppression of women.

unless, of course, you were pretending that not treating men and women as interchangeable gears in a machine is equivalent to "oppressing" women; Christianity does indeed teach that men and women are different and have different roles, but it does not teach that women are the property of men as Islam does, or that the word of a woman is equal to one forth of the word of a man in legal proceedings as Islam does, etc. Husbands are not wives and wives are not husbands. Mothers are not fathers and fathers are not mothers. If you don't like those basic biological facts, then your argument is with reality.

Oh yeah, equal value. It just happens that women are notably absent from historical church leaders, and not permitted to be priests in the largest denominations. It's one thing to have different roles that are complimentary. It's quite another to simply say only men can occupy these positions for no reason other than gender. The Mormons get flak for having forbidden blacks to become leaders in churches, yet the Catholic church does exactly the same thing on the basis of gender. That's their choice, and I'd defend that. I just wouldn't be so dishonest as to claim that Christianity isn't practicing gender discrimination. The bloody thing begins with a woman leading a man astray, and that's a recurring theme. And that women, depending on which creation story you read, was created merely as company for the man.

Christianity says nothing (no matter what one church led by a guy called a Pope may wish) about controlling CONCEPTION. So we're not really arguing about not conceiving a child, but rather about killing a child that has already been conceived. Christians generally are opposed to abortion, not as a form of oppression of women, but rather because a baby is not part of a woman's body; it's another individual human being and Christianity generally frowns upon the murder of innocents. Christianity also explicitly forbids child sacrifice, unlike most other religions in human history. Killing a child for economic reasons, or social reasons, etc is no different from ancient pagans throwing their children into a pagan fire.

I'd agree that prohibitions on contraception are largely a Catholic thing, but aren't Catholics the single largest Christian denomination worldwide by a long margin?

Perhaps you see opposition to prostitution as "oppression". Well, it's generally not as "victimless" as portrayed; it creates a marketplace for the abuse of women, puts a price tag on all women, deprives any woman of the right to claim to be unemployed, and endangers women whose men cheat on them with prostitutes and bring home a few biological surprises. Women whose husbands give them a case of herpes or worse tend to feel a bit oppressed. For most of the past 2000 years, these things were considered advancements over the positions of nearly all other belief systems in human history where women were often presumed to be little more than bi-pedal farm animals.

Women had value because men wanted them and they could product offspring. Offspring in those times were both a retirement plan and your legacy. It's no wonder there were moves to protect women.

This is fundamentally different from the religion of Islam which explicitly values women as less than men, makes them property, denies them basic freedoms (including things like medical care in primitive locations like Afghanistan where it is practiced strictly and women are

Re: False Scandal

[AmiMoJo]

Is that because he wants to protect borders from *illegal* immigrants?

It's the manner in which he wants to protect the borders. Building a wall is an incredibly dumb idea to start with (because of ladders and the immense cost, which Mexico definitely isn't going to pay for), but it's also both inhumane and ineffective. People will just take greater risks, perhaps going by sea or trying to scale the wall. The real solution requires socialism, creating a framework where more people can come legitimately (so they don't cause problems or get exploited) and helping people in Mexico so they are not motivated to travel.

Trump takes the simpler approach of blaming immigrants for a number of problems and then saying he will take the obvious and wrong but tough sounding solution. Much like Hitler in fact, who blamed many of Germany's problems on immigrants and Jews, and then enacted the simple and tough sounding solution. Not as bad of course, but similar.

Or stem the flow of new voters who come from a fundamentalist religion that oppresses women?

Wasn't your country started on the basis of religious freedom? And again, it's a lot like blaming Jewish culture.

Is it because he hates women? Evidence please.

The way he treats female critics differently, often referring to their gender and bodily functions suggests that while "hate" might be too strong a word, he certainly is biased against them.

Re:The onus is on the "no evidence" crowd

[khallow]

I don't recall any proof that this server was completely without security or updates.

Exactly the prior poster's point.

To be honest, I could give a damn less if Clinton did a crappy job of email security.

I'm sure you don't give a damn about a lot of important things. So what? Here's the relevant matters. First, it looks like Clinton broke the US's laws on handling classified information multiple times, each time a felony. Second, there's a really good chance she created security holes which were exploited, which is what this thread is about. You might not care, but anyone who does care about the US's national security should be concerned at how sloppy she's been here.

Third, there's the matter of why she did that. Namely, that it appears she did so to evade laws that would have made her emails accessible to FOIA requests and archival by the federal government.

Seriously folks, why are we still bitching about email security? The choice is between Clinton and someone who would make the worst used car salesman blush. Trump has no redeemable qualities. He says one thing, then ten minutes later contradicts himself. Hell, most politicians keep the promises they make, or at least try. Trump doesn't even admit to what he said yesterday, or even admit that half the crap he shovels is utter unworkable nonsense, and he knows it.

Your concern would be more relevant, if Clinton didn't do the same thing and wasn't the same kind of beast. Trump just is just a bit more blatant about it. I wouldn't buy a used car from either Trump or Clinton, but at least Trump would be entertaining.

My view is that I'd take the complainers about Trump more seriously, if they were backing someone who wasn't crooked like a snake. But it's clearly an attempt at a lesser of two evils ploy. And like a lot of people, I just don't see that Clinton is the lesser of two evils.

Re: False Scandal

[DarkOx]

While I think Clinton is probably just as disingenuous, it's probably a little easier to anticipate how she'd act as President, because she has a long political track record.

A long track record of flip flopping on every social and moral issue that faces us; and a history of Polsplain away how she never fails to protect monied interests.

Clinton is worst kind of hypocrite, she is the cancer in American politics that rots out or principles and lowers us all. She is EXACTLY like Trump! The only difference is branding and who she is trying to sell herself out too. Its like a how a Dodge Dart is different from a Chrysler 200 - the target buyer.

Re:Does it even matter?

[Anubis IV]

There have been multiple instances where the people she was corresponding with for work turned over copies of conversations they had with her that contained e-mails she had failed to supply, and there are large date ranges missing from the copies she supplied (particularly around times when suspicious activity may have been taking place, such as the stuff related to Benghazi), despite the fact that the government procured copies of some of the messages she sent during that time from other sources. It's well-established that it's not just personal e-mail that she failed to supply. Some of those work e-mails were subsequently "found" by Clinton, but the question remains how many will never be found.