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A 15-Year-Old Convinced Verizon He Was the Head of the CIA (newsweek.com)

Posted by EditorDavid on from the one-factor-authentication dept.

schwit1 shares an interesting story. Newsweek reports: A British teenager managed to obtain access to sensitive U.S. plans about intelligence operations in different Middle East countries by acting as former CIA Director John Brennan, a court heard on Friday. Kane Gamble, 18, researched Brennan and used the information he gathered to speak to an internet company and persuade call handlers to give him access to the spy chief's email inbox in 2015. He pretended to be both a Verizon employee and Brennan to access Brennan's internet account.

Astonishingly, Gamble managed to gain access to Brennan's emails and his addressbook, as well as his iCloud storage. He even managed to remotely access the iPad of Brennan's wife... Gamble, aged 15 at the time, also persuaded a helpdesk at the FBI that he was the then deputy director Mark Giuliano... In October 2017, Gamble pleaded guilty to 10 charges, including eight charges of "performing a function with intent to secure unauthorized access" to the computers and two of "unauthorized modification of computer material."

7 of 143 comments (clear)

  1. Good by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0, Insightful

    The USA government types are incompetent with IT.

    1. Re:Good by hambone142 · · Score: 2, Insightful

      Not only I.T. but most categories.

      Government workers are often chosen due to aspects unrelated to ability.

      We shouldn't expect much from them.

    2. Re:Good by vtcodger · · Score: 3, Insightful

      "Isn't this about Verizon failing, not the gov?"

      Largely. However in a perfect world Brennan's Verizon accounts would contain nothing but emails to his family and friends, ecommerce orders and confirmations, and the usual spam. All his government traffic would be from his .gov account and even that would only contain unclassified material. Classified stuff goes by other means.

      Got all that?

      Think it works?

      --
      You can't see ANYTHING from a car, You've got to get out of the goddamned contraption and walk...Edward Abbey
  2. Mainstream media will give little airtime to this by bogaboga · · Score: 1, Insightful

    Yes, they will accord little to no serious air time to this story. Instead, they will promote the so called [Russian] "collusion", something I have never bought.

    But that aside, isn't this rather embarrassing?

  3. They need to give him a JOB by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 3, Insightful

    Waste of talent in prison

  4. So this means... by bradley13 · · Score: 5, Insightful

    If this: "military operations and intelligence operations in Afghanistan and Iran" ...is the kind of thing that John Brennen keeps on an ISPs servers, instead of secured government systems, then he needs the cell right next to Hillary.

    Oh, right. They are our betters. Laws don't apply to them.

    --
    Enjoy life! This is not a dress rehearsal.
  5. Re:Mainstream media will give little airtime to th by serviscope_minor · · Score: 3, Insightful

    Yes, they will accord little to no serious air time to this story

    Good job denying reality. It's on literally every main stream media site.

    --
    SJW n. One who posts facts.