SoylentNews is people
SoylentNews
We had two submissions on reports that maybe the Russians were not behind the hack of the DNC (Democratic National Committee):
Evidence that Undermines the "Election Hack" Narrative Should get More Attention
Bloomberg reports:
The Veteran Intelligence Professionals for Sanity (VIPS) have been investigating the now conventional wisdom that last year's leaks of Democratic National Committee files were the result of Russian hacks. What they found instead is evidence to the contrary.
[...] The VIPS theory relies on forensic findings by independent researchers who go by the pseudonyms "Forensicator" and "Adam Carter." The former found that 1,976 MB of Guccifer's files were copied from a DNC server on July 5 in just 87 seconds, implying a transfer rate of 22.6 megabytes per second -- or, converted to a measure most people use, about 180 megabits per second, a speed not commonly available from U.S. internet providers. Downloading such files this quickly over the internet, especially over a VPN (most hackers would use one), would have been all but impossible because the network infrastructure through which the traffic would have to pass would further slow the traffic. However, as Forensicator has pointed out, the files could have been copied to a thumb drive -- something only an insider could have done -- at about that speed.
Adam Carter, the pseudonym for the other analyst, showed that the content of the Guccifer files was at some point cut and pasted into Microsoft Word templates that used the Russian language. Carter laid out all the available evidence and his answers to numerous critics in a long post earlier this month.
A New Report Raises Big Questions About Last Year's DNC Hack
The Nation reports:
Former NSA experts say it wasn't a hack at all, but a leak—an inside job by someone with access to the DNC's system.
[...] On the evening of July 5, 2016, 1,976 megabytes of data were downloaded from the DNC's server. The operation took 87 seconds. This yields a transfer rate of 22.7 megabytes per second. These statistics are matters of record and essential to disproving the hack theory. No Internet service provider, such as a hacker would have had to use in mid-2016, was capable of downloading data at this speed.
[...] "A speed of 22.7 megabytes [per second] is simply unobtainable, especially if we are talking about a transoceanic data transfer," Folden said. "Based on the data we now have, what we've been calling a hack is impossible." Last week Forensicator reported on a speed test he conducted more recently. It tightens the case considerably. "Transfer rates of 23 MB/s (Mega Bytes per second) are not just highly unlikely, but effectively impossible to accomplish when communicating over the Internet at any significant distance," he wrote. "Further, local copy speeds are measured, demonstrating that 23 MB/s is a typical transfer rate when using a USB–2 flash device (thumb drive)."
[...] "It's clear," another forensics investigator wrote, "that metadata was deliberately altered and documents were deliberately pasted into a Russianified [W]ord document with Russian language settings and style headings."
[...] By any balanced reckoning, the official case purporting to assign a systematic hacking effort to Russia, the events of mid-June and July 5 last year being the foundation of this case, is shabby to the point taxpayers should ask for their money back.
[...] Editor's note: After publication, the Democratic National Committee contacted The Nation with a response, writing, "U.S. intelligence agencies have concluded the Russian government hacked the DNC in an attempt to interfere in the election. Any suggestion otherwise is false and is just another conspiracy theory like those pushed by Trump and his administration. It's unfortunate that The Nation has decided to join the conspiracy theorists to push this narrative."
(Score: 3, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday August 15 2017, @07:15PM (7 children)
Many things you said are dubious, but this particularly stands out.
One thing you certainly understand is that in the US politics is one giant game of quid quo pro. Politicians work their way up through cronyism, backdoor deals, and something for something. This game doesn't end when one politician does. For instance one of Obama's final acts was to attempt to force through the controversial TPP treaty which was essentially going to be the king of corporate handouts. Even though he was leaving office, his cronyism didn't end. Of course not. He's now getting paid $400,000 to give a speech on Wall Street. Nobody thinks he has anything to say that's worth $400k as they asked valuable questions like what he missed about the White House and he reminisced over aesthetics. It's just cleanly laundered payments for services rendered.
This system is enormously beneficial to both the politicians in office, with more than half of congress now being millionaires, and for the corporations that toss relative table scraps to have national level laws hand crafted for them, if not by them. Trump is an enormous threat to this system. He acted like a jack ass, said all the wrong things, ran a poorly funded campaign, suffered 24/7 attacks from all the corporate media including towards the end even Fox News. And he won. He's not going to be bending over backwards for campaign donations. He doesn't care about the Sanator from Alabama's pork project. He's not aiming to get paid off with $400k speeches after office.
In the eyes of both the politicians and corporations that benefit from the status quo, Trump needs to be destroyed. And they can't wait for a controversy. Somehow he was, inexplicably, resonating with people. You need a controversy - now. That controversy is Russia. It has numerous benefits, but two stand out. The first is that Trump has extensive business interests and connections. He's connected to just about everybody in Russia by a few degrees of separation. They'll be able to constantly dig up 'something' and all that matters is keeping the headlines rolling, people never see the goal posts constantly shifting. The other is something even more overt. It's clear that Trump's 'machismo' is one of the things that clearly resonated with people. Putin is somebody that can be easily portrayed into dominating Trump - turning Trump into his bitch. Read this [bbc.com] BBC article keeping this in mind. Compare the infographics, the image selections, selected quotes, absolutely everything. That is straight up propaganda and it's only possible thanks to our Russian conspiracies that have built up this relationship.
(Score: 3, Insightful) by vux984 on Wednesday August 16 2017, @02:02AM (4 children)
Nobody thinks most celebrities have anything particularly valuable to say; its about 'prestige' and 'relevance'. The value is in the 'rarity of the goods' relative to the demand. Obama is in high demand for speaking engagements as a relatively popular former US president. There aren't a lot of those around, and only exactly one who is the 'most recent'. So yeah, Obama is a bigger get than G.W. Bush, or Jimmy Carter; and he costs more. This isn't clever money laundering, this is just basic economics and what the market will bear.
Penn and Teller cost more to perform at your party than your average magician too; Beyonce costs more than another band -- they aren't 10's of 1000s of times better, even though they are 10s of 1000s of times more expensive than a lot of perfectly good alternatives.
He's far to busy selling double priced memberships at Maralago right now.
(Score: 1, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday August 16 2017, @03:50AM (3 children)
Who do you think is paying Obama to speak? Some entertainment business? These are not institutions that have celebrities speak. Obama's first payday was with Cantor Fitzgerald. An organization I'm certain neither of us had heard of yet.
It took about 3 seconds to verify [housingwire.com] the hypothesis. Cantor Fitzgerald massively profited off not only the mortgage crisis but even engaged in securities fraud defrauding the government. And the only repercussion they seem to have suffered was some low level trader getting to play fallguy, while Obama now gets paid $400k from them to tell them how pretty the view at the Whitehouse was. Funny how that works, isn't it?
Feel free to research each and every place he gives a speech. With $400k fees there's going to be connections right back to quid quo pro. And since I expect you think this is political. It's not, well it's at least not partisan. Like you mention this goes well back. The first president to really start raking in the overt "fees" was Ford, the unelected president who served three years after replacing and then of course also immediately pardoning Nixon. A beacon of integrity that perhaps set the stage for today's politics or at least politicians.
(Score: 2) by vux984 on Thursday August 17 2017, @12:58AM (2 children)
To discover what? That people likely to book a speaker have some reason to like the speaker? Oh boy, you are really on to something there. The contractors that Trump stiffed on payments didn't invite Trump to the company picnic to speak? Shocking! The company that landed the contract to make Ivanka brand shoes did invite him to speak? Equally shocking. It can't just be normal human relationships and normal business operation -- It must be corruption!! I'm still not convinced there is anything remotely salacious about it.
Everyone who has ever been asked to give a keynote has some 'positive connection' to the organization that asked them. What else would you expect? Or turn it upside down -- if that positive connection didn't exist, why would the organization want them as a keynote speaker? You can't simply jump to the conclusion that its some sort of quasi money laundering scheme to payback for illegal favors or something. That's crazy talk.
(Score: 2) by urza9814 on Friday August 18 2017, @12:24PM (1 child)
It can be both. That's why these kinds of relationships are explicitly banned (at least for the underlings) by most corporate and government employment rules. If I buy a product from IBM, have a good talk with the sales guy, and he takes me out to dinner, I'd lose my job. Doesn't matter if we're just hanging out, doesn't matter if we aren't discussing work, doesn't matter if it doesn't affect my decision in any way, it still looks like it could be a bribe so I'd lose my job. So a dinner is a potential bribe, but a check for $400k is just "normal business operation"...this is why our country is fucked.
(Score: 2) by vux984 on Friday August 18 2017, @11:50PM
The issue here is that this would be like you buying a product from IBM and developing a rapport with the sales rep. Then 2 years late you know that rep is looking to make a move and you've been impressed with him, so you decide to hire him. Now that's a potential bribe too right, he OBVIOUSLY has been screwing over IBM on your behalf for years, and NOW your paying him back with a nice job. This was a all a long con, right?
Neither he, nor you can ever be hired the other in the future! In fact, it applies to anyone you have a professional relationship with... your entire personal network... you can't use it for anything ever because any move you make is possibly a bribe. If it gets you a job or you use it to find a good employee or service provider or even a client... its all dirty quid pro quo.
The world doesn't work like that. Corruption is real, but we can't just assume it... there has to be real evidence, of X for Y. The simple hindsight that you bought a product from Jason the salesreap at IBM and then years later hired Jason for a regional sales position at your company is not sufficient.
(Score: 2) by hemocyanin on Wednesday August 16 2017, @04:09AM
(Score: 3, Insightful) by tonyPick on Wednesday August 16 2017, @08:29AM
Which is why you travel back in time to 2015 to start manufacturing an detailed evidence trail for a complex conspiracy most of which you don't disclose pre-election? Of something his campaign just happens to be trying to set up anyway? Despite a string of open confessions of "dubious" behaviour (and remembering that the historic bar for actually impeaching presidents was "not telling the absolute truth"?)
Seriously? Because if you wanted to make something up then it isn't like you'd be short of targets that get directly to Trump personally, making the hacking story a particularly idiotic choice since the only direct connections to him so far have been a direct result of his own post-election screwups.