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Top Defense Contractor Left Sensitive Pentagon Files on Amazon Server With No Password (gizmodo.com)
Sensitive files linked to the National Geospatial-Intelligence Agency -- which works with the nation's intelligence agencies to analyze aerial data -- were apparently left on a public Amazon server by an employee of Booz Allen Hamilton, one of the nation's top defense contractors, reports Gizmodo. From the article: A cache of more than 60,000 files was discovered last week on a publicly accessible Amazon server, including passwords to a US government system containing sensitive information, and the security credentials of a lead senior engineer at Booz Allen Hamilton. What's more, the roughly 28GB of data contained at least a half dozen unencrypted passwords belonging to government contractors with Top Secret Facility Clearance. The exposed credentials could potentially grant their holders further access to repositories housing similarly sensitive government data. Countless references are made in the leaked files to the US National Geospatial-Intelligence Agency (NGA), which in March awarded Booz Allen an $86 million defense contract. Often referred to as the Pentagon's "mapmakers," the combat support agency works alongside the Central Intelligence Agency, the National Reconnaissance Office, and the Defense Intelligence Agency to collect and analyze geospatial data gathered by spy satellites and aerial drones. The NGA on Tuesday confirmed the leak to Gizmodo while stressing that no classified information had been disclosed.
Accidentally, on porpoise?
> . . . an employee of Booz Allen Hamilton
Isn't that the company Snowden worked for?
I'll see your senator, and I'll raise you two judges.
Accidentally leaving information for someone else to obtain is a great way of escaping a harsh punishment.
Refuse to allow Booz any new government contracts for their incompetence. (Won't happen)
Make me a map, Find me a find, catch me a catch...FOTR
Remember where Snowden worked? Where their any consequences for his employer? Not that I know of. Remember Harold Thomas Martin III who stole 50 TB of NSA data? Guess which company he worked for? Any consequences for the company? Haven't heard of any. They are still a government contractor.
Booz Allen Hamilton can do whatever the shit they want.
let's see how well the hillary defense holds up on this one.
This guy should go to jail.
sed -e 's/Chuck Norris/Rajnikant/g' joke > fact
it doesn't count if you didn't mean to, right?
... or it didn't happen.
He certainly didn't have intent to do that, so he shouldn't be prosecuted... right? I mean, that's what the FBI and Hillary Clinton said, so it must be right?
Intent does not change the color of the pregnancy test stick.
Intent does not bring people back to life after collision with drunk driver.
Intent is not going to undo the results that will follow from putting a clown circus in power.
The road to somewhere is paved with good intentions.
I'll see your senator, and I'll raise you two judges.
Why do documents with plain-text user credentials exist ANYWHERE, for ANY REASON in the first place? Is the government (or at least the NGA) really that completely incompetent? This is shocking! I don't care that it was leaked. We need to assume that is ALWAYS going to happen. I care that such documents were ever created in the first place.
Possible options:
Idiotic contractors
Idiotic employers
Any blend of the above
Sent as ripples into the electromagnetic field. No single photon has been harmed in the process.
Why should the gander have different rules than the Russian goose?
That said, the NSA toolkit originally was from a cloud store that should never have been let outside of the secure net.
-- Tigger warning: This post may contain tiggers! --
Remember Obama leaking the doctor's name in Pakistan that led us to Osama Bin Ladin.
Remember that doctor being killed because of Obama's leak?
Yea, Obama leaked and allies died. You didn't care.
'nough said
...quick question: did this numbskull ACTUALLY GET FIRED?
Because what I'm finding in our firm's dealing with government and contractors is that very, very few people are ever *actually* held accountable for fuckups.
And I'm talking about people from congresscritters and senior presidential staff on down.
-Styopa
An unintentional act of treason . . .
"I believe in Karma. That means I can do bad things to people all day long and I assume they deserve it." : Dogbert
Was someone just typing in random url's or ip addresses with random sub-directories and .... surprise??
If they get nailed bad enough, all the management on the impacted contracts will leave/be fired. They will open a new defense contractor and in 6 months bid on the contract with a 3% cost reduction to the govt.
They will win, because they are the low bidder.
That leaves all the prior workers stuck, looking for a job, which they will each be offered at the new company for a 10% pay cut.
The new company will lease the exact same building, same furniture, use the same medical insurance, and probably even keep the same parking space reservations from before.
On day one of work for each worker, they will be provided a new sticker and new HR forms to sign, but told to go to their old office/cubes and get to work.
In effect, 5% of the upper management will be replaced. 10-20% of the old workers won't be hired back (usually those with expertise or near retirement) and for that, the new company will be slightly more profitable off the bat.
Nothing about the processes and procedures will be effectively changed. Nothing.
BTW - I say this as someone who did the exact same job over a 7 yr period, but with 4 different "stickers" over my company access badge.
Besides the new upper management, only the card stock/business card people made out.
>Booz Allen... Often referred to as the Pentagon's "mapmakers,"... the combat support agency...
WHY are we still relying on contractors for combat support. Heck for anything? Can the government not just 'hire' their own mapmakers?
I understand one reason gov does not hire so many staff, (preferring to administer contractors instead), is the retirements, health ins, benefits, etc. outweigh what contractors cost.
Anyway, back to the original point, why do departments not have in-house staff for these things?
All statements are true. I don't care for people using intent to completely wave consequences for one's actions. It matters for sentencing, but that is about it.
I'm sure it was an amazon instance hosted in Russia.
Probably the same clown that left the files unprotected on Kim dot coms equipment - which is why it had to be confiscated.
I hope the people on gizmodo put up a torrent with the files somewhere, because sharing is caring.