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On Wall Street, a High-Ranking Few Still Avoid Email (reuters.com)
The world may be increasingly becoming digital, but a small group of the Wall Street elite refuses to say anything substantive in an email, text, or chat, and some will not communicate digitally at all. From a Reuters report: This group, which includes top bankers like JPMorgan Chase & Co Chief Executive Officer Jamie Dimon and powerful investors like Carl Icahn and Berkshire Hathaway Inc's Warren Buffett, were eschewing electronic communications long before the probe of U.S. presidential candidate Hillary Clinton's emails and the recent hacks of her campaign manager's account made headlines. Some on Wall Street are nostalgic for a time when in-person conversations or phone calls were the norm, but others believe the words they type and send can come back to haunt them. Prosecutors have built insider trading, mortgage fraud and rate-rigging cases on embarrassing emails over the past several years, and they are often the most memorable part. Recent email woes among Washington power players have provided yet another reason for bankers to try to protect private correspondence from prying eyes. Dimon uses email but is known to keep his replies short and factual, favoring "yes," "no" and "thank you."
Judging by recent stories, sounds like they're pretty wise.
http://www.geoffreylandis.com
The feds are watching.
Of course they avoid emails.
Traders communicate using IRC and custom chat systems with no logging. Senior management sends order by phone or in person or again on a private channel. CEOs do most non-face-time communication over phone or SMS.
Nobody even take minutes anymore. I don't really believe they really ever did. Communication on Wall Street is as ephemeral, cloistered, and unaccountable as every other part of the business.
Where I work, sometimes you want it on-the-record. I want proof I said something, or did something, far more often than I'd ever want to be able to deny such actions later on.
I know I, as a lowly mid-level person, am very careful and exact about electronic communication. Whatever side of the Clinton email thing you're on, how would you feel about having the last 10 years of your private communication dumped out in an investigation? Would you be comfortable with your emails showing up in a publicly searchable court record even if it was unrelated to you? People have forgotten the basic premise that was drilled into my head when email first arrived -- don't write down anything you wouldn't be comfortable posting in public for the world to see.
Executives are one of the last groups of people in a company to have the privilege of not communicating via email, text, etc. Everywhere I've worked, the execs' secretaries were the only ones sending out emails (logged in as the exec.) This is a big problem in the finance industry, because only the mid-level and below is captured in electronic communication. It makes it extremely hard to build a body of evidence in any legal case directly affecting the executives of a company. It's one of the reasons why lawsuits target the company only, and end with a settlement where the company does not admit any fault.
You know you are in the underclass when you find it useful to have proof of what you have done.
You know you are in the upper class when you find it useful to not have any proof of what you have done.
The obvious conclusion of those statements is that money is a direct replacement for proof.
"There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley
We've seen plenty of other bigwigs who would have been wise to avoid email.
If you are a politician (or work for a politician), never write anything that would look bad in a headline in the Washington Post or NY Times.
If you are a corporate executive, never refer to anything that might be illegal or immoral or unethical. Not even as a joking reference - words can be taken out of context.
For everyone, be aware that whatever you say will stay around until the end of the Internet and may be accessible by anyone or any organization.
I live in email, but I avoid social media for the same reasons. Social media is worse, in my opinion, because you have zero control. At least with email, if it's on my servers, and I'm paying for it, it's my data.
I don't respond to AC's.
So neither does the CEO of Goldman Sachs, since he's doing God's work.
Eventually they will have to. It may be because most of the people they communicate eschew analog communications but its much more likely that the government will actually compel via some form of records retention regulation that will make having in person conversations unpopular because they will need to be recorded.
Suppose you were an idiot. And suppose you were a member of congress. But then I repeat myself. -- Mark Twain
Well if you think Wall Street moguls are a bunch of crooks, let's see who they want to win:
http://www.businessinsider.com...
AntiFA: An abbreviation for Anti First Amendment.
"Anthony Weiner is an Republican Puppet of the KGB! "
If you want subscribers to your newsletter, you have to do better.
Agent K: A *person* is smart. People are dumb, stupid, panicky animals, and you know it.
has to become mandatory then.
Given that these have been the source of successful prosecutions and large awards to those VICTIMIZED by those voice and hand written conspirator communications.
At least, that is the logical inference from the article.
and your sociopathic coworkers.
Post may contain irony: discontinue use if experiencing mood swings, nausea or elevated blood pressure.
I had an uncle who was prosecuted for insider trading maybe 10 years ago. He was on the board of a multi-billion dollar international merger. They didn't have any emails or anything like that and they didn't need it (sadly, system is screwed up). He had the best lawyers money could buy too. He wasn't a poor man by any stretch of the imagination.
What they had were phone logs and his business colleague's testimony who had supposedly received the insider tip and who had bought stock.
So the way this works is they let the person who they accuse of having received the insider information off the hook in exchange for testifying against the person who they claim gave the information.
Do you see a problem with that? I do. There was zero evidence other than that from a compromised source that can't be trusted to provide non-biased testimony. The reason it is biased is because the source is exchanging testimony against the accused for a lenient sentence (ie no jail time). It doesn't matter if my uncle didn't do the crime because they've given incentive to another to testify that he did.
They were basically just going to demonstrate that my uncle communicated (phone call records) around the same time my uncle's business colleague made a buy totally ignoring the other logs that showed they communicated regularly. An intelligent person would realize it is completely plausible and likely that it was all a coincidence.
Juries and judges put people to death all the time based on such coincidental "evidence" and blackmailed testimony. And don't give me that non-sense about how one can get up on the stand and testify that the crime didn't happen. They throw people in jail for doing that when they don't believe them and of course they don't believe them if they don't side with the prosecutor's story. The people being made to testify know what they have to say without being told what to say.
Our system is f'd.
I should also point out that they accused my uncle's brother of receiving insider info too. They dropped his case only because he had kept detailed written logs of his trading and they didn't want to lose at trial. If the logs had been introduced as evidence at trial it would have been apparent his trades were not based on insider info at all. Rather it was based on public information which is allowed. I'm not sure exactly what these logs might have included, but I guess they were notes detailing public info that would have demonstrated what he was taking into account during his decisions to trade on these and other unrelated stocks. I don't think it's something most people would have had so most people would have ended up serving time had they been accused despite being innocent.
Anyone who thinks just being honest in their communications will protect them in a lawsuit has never been closely involved in a lawsuit.
I once saw it stated like this: Testifying in a recorded deposition that you are working toward a GED, actively participate in Big Brothers charity, and have had three job interviews this week will be presented by the prosecutor as: you are an unemployed, high school dropout, who likes to hang around young children.
God help you if you ever made a comment in email that there might possibly be a problem with security or worker safety before a problem occurs. They will shout from the rooftops that you KNEW FOR CERTAIN that there was a problem, and yet being the callous bastard you are, you did not solve it completely.
In general, being involved in a lawsuit is like talking to the cops. The less information they have to twist the better.
Having half a million bits of information show up on an old investigation is the opposite of your "starting" or "not concrete".
Can't wait until this election is over and we can get back to being screwed over by the 1% regardless of which corrupt party wins.
No. Sounds like people are responding the way they always do to oppressive surveillance: censor their words and funnel their beliefs into less traceable action instead.
I'm honest, so it doesn't matter.
Apparently you are naive too. Just because you have nothing to hide does not mean you have nothing to fear. It is VERY easy for a lawyer or law enforcement to make even innocent sounding statements into something incriminating. Your honesty may not be any protection and in fact might serve as "evidence" to hang you with.
This is only a problem if you're a dishonest scumbag.
You REALLY need to watch this video about why you should never talk to the police.
Encryption is fine, but you have to be able to read it at some point.
Carrier Pigeons FTW.
Though the decryption process can be rather rough on them.
Based on WHAT? Has he done a single trustworthy thing in his life?
He can't even speak a single sentence without denying he said it in the next one...
I've always only committed to emails what I wouldn't mind becoming public knowledge.
For sensitive business I always pick up the phone, and I am pretty sure I am not the only one who operates this way.
A beeping phone lines that record all conversations.
But there is no way to insure nobody goes to side channels. There basically can't be a way.
John McAfee 'It was like that time I hired that Bangkok prostitute; to do my taxes, while I fucked my accountant'
One of my old bosses used to respond with just OK and then later he said OK just means I just received the email (what a wanker)
I used to take the piss and respond with just the number "204" (HTTP code for No Content he never got the joke)
"Never write if you can speak; never speak if you can nod; never nod if you can wink." --Martin Lomasney
It's part of the 'Don't talk to the Police, ever!' strategy.
All criminals know that.
It's funny how Americans always think money is the same thing as class.
I don't think you are thinking of the same definiton of the word "class" I am using. I am speaking of categorization only, not worth in any sense.
Power and influence is the direct replacement for proof
Both of which are easily obtained by money; your statement is merely a superset of what I was saying.
there's no guarantee that having money will give it to you,
There I disagree. You can always find some way to convert money to power. It is possible to fail but it is always possible to succeed.
"There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley
Between work and home and carrying a phone, I spend 95% of my waking hours within arms reach of a computer that can send email.
If I was as rich as these guys I would never send another email in my life. My communication would all be pgp-signet-ring couriers. 3 at a time with different messages to keep my enemies confused if one gets captured and the message encrypted.
However this may be some kind of technomedieval delusion.
I'm a good cook. I'm a fantastic eater. - Steven Brust
I think it is a status symbol, being so well off that you don't have to worry about always being onlline, like most of the middle classes are. There is something about the rich and powerful choosing some sort of "handicap", almost, to show off the fact that they can afford to rely on the efforts of others - like in Imperial China, when the high-ranking officials would dress in ridiculously impractical clothes with far too long sleeves to indicate that they rarely needed to use their hands; or now-a-days when women totter around clumsily on stiletto heels and look decidedly un-sexy. So, I think not having a mobile and avoiding electronic communication is about showing that you are so powerful that you *can*. And, to be honest, don't most of us sometimes wish we could do the same? I know I do.
In other words: Quod licet jovi, non licet bovi.
That's either a usual pissing-contest like display of power ("I have people to do email for me"), uncureable backwardness ("Yes, I'd like to send this letter to the Prussian consulate in Siam by aeromail. Am I too late for the 4:30 autogyro?") or a obvious cover-my-ass just as any petty criminal would to to avoid leaving tracks.
So, why again should we use that as a role-model? Why are we letting get them away with it to begin with?
bickerdyke
the correct title was "electronic communication" instead of "e-mail"
I've seen this a number of times.
Not always, but sometimes when a manager contacts you over the phone and asks you to do something there is a very specific reason they are asking you over the phone, in that there is no record of them asking you to do it in the first place. If said thing is somewhat questionable, it will be your ass in the fire, not the managers who could simply say that they said nothing or that you must have "misunderstood" what they really asked you to do.
Most times it is just innocent simple things, however sometimes it will be something contentious at which point you have to use your best judgement as to how to respond.
I did have one request that I considered unethical (if not illegal) that I found very suspicious that they would only talk over the phone, or in meetings about, and whenever I sent emails looking for clarification I would get no response other than another phone call or another meeting on the matter. In the end I decided that indeed it would be my ass on the line, and basically told the manager that sure I would do it, however not without an explicit email or other documentation specifically ordering me to do so, otherwise I would not. Not exactly the kind of tack you really want to take with any manager. However I was in the right, and as it turned out that request quickly went away, and the proceeding actions took place exactly as I had foresaw (i.e. possible serious repercussions). It had to do with withholding information from a request that had been made to me using false pretenses to justify the action when they should be legally allowed access. I'm glad I handled it the way I did, however years later I was rather unsurprised when that same manager declined an interview despite having well over a decade more experience and qualifications than the successful candidate. Which is probably for the best anyway all things considered as I'd probably not want to work for them anyway (application was more to prove a point about inequality in the hiring practices more than anything else, where I bet people before hand that I would inexplicably not even get an interview to what is supposed to be a fair and impartial process).
What kind of results? Fraudulent ones that only benefit himself. Look at the history around his various resorts and casinos. He has left a crapflood in his wake.