Why Clinton's private email server was such a security fail

[LiberalArkie]

http://www.wired.com/2015/03/clintons-email-server-vulnerable/


FOR A SECRETARY of state, running your own email server might be a clever—if controversial—way to keep your conversations hidden from journalists and their pesky Freedom of Information Act requests. But ask a few security experts, and the consensus is that it’s not a very smart way to keep those conversations hidden from hackers.

On Monday, the New York Times revealed that former secretary of state and future presidential candidate Hillary Clinton used a private email account rather than her official State.gov email address while serving in the State Department. And this was no Gmail or Yahoo! Mail account: On Wednesday the AP reported that Clinton actually ran a private mail server in her home during her entire tenure leading the State Department, hosting her email at the domain Clintonemail.com.

Much of the criticism of that in-house email strategy has centered on its violation of the federal government’s record-keeping and transparency rules. But as the controversy continues to swirl, the security community is focused on a different issue: the possibility that an unofficial, unprotected server held the communications of America’s top foreign affairs official for four years, leaving all of it potentially vulnerable to state-sponsored hackers.

“Although the American people didn’t know about this, it’s almost certain that foreign intelligence agencies did, just as the NSA knows which Indian and Spanish officials use Gmail and Yahoo accounts,” says Chris Soghoian, the lead technologist for the American Civil Liberties Union. “She’s not the first official to use private email and not the last. But there are serious security issue associated with these kinds of services…When you build your house outside the security fence, you’re on your own, and that’s what seems to have happened here.”

Snip..

[Renew Deal]

1. Yes, too bad it wasn't on a government server for the CIA to break into

They probably did anyway. Considering the current security environment, it's probably no less secure. Nothing is truly safe. In theory it could be more secure because a tiny amount of predictable traffic should be hitting it.

[DURHAM D]

2. Who needs the Spooks when you have Private Manning?

She stole and released 250,000 State Department cables.

I wonder if the State Department still has to use the DOD for their communications.

[NM_Birder]

3. If the Clinton Foundation

paid for the server and/or equipment this could turn real, real bad.

If this turns out to actually be true, not that she used private e-mail, ....but that she maintained top level security information on her own private server, outside the umbrella of national security,....... it could be the most deliberate self inflicted would the party will suffer for a long long time. There has to be something not said, she couldn't have been this ignorant to the consequences and the fact that it would eventually be known.

If it is true, kiss her campaign good bye, it will only be a matter of time before PO is ravaged for it, and in all likely hood, she will have handed over the presidency to the GOP in 2016.

The private e-mails are not the issue, the private server off the system with top level security information is. If the Clinton Foundation paid for the server and maintenance of it, she may have crippled that too.

We'll see. This would be "that time" for some of that total transparency we've been told we have, not holding my breath though. I look forward to the day when somebody will just honestly explain what the hell is going on, and explain the whole story, not just selected pieces.

[Rex]

4. I'll worry about this, after I see the FBI finally go after Dick Cheney and Dubya for destroying

evidence of torture condoned by his administration.

"WASHINGTON — At least four top White House lawyers took part in discussions with the Central Intelligence Agency between 2003 and 2005 about whether to destroy videotapes showing the secret interrogations of two operatives from Al Qaeda, according to current and former administration and intelligence officials.

The accounts indicate that the involvement of White House officials in the discussions before the destruction of the tapes in November 2005 was more extensive than Bush administration officials have acknowledged.

Those who took part, the officials said, included Alberto R. Gonzales, who served as White House counsel until early 2005; David S. Addington, who was the counsel to Vice President Dick Cheney and is now his chief of staff; John B. Bellinger III, who until January 2005 was the senior lawyer at the National Security Council; and Harriet E. Miers, who succeeded Mr. Gonzales as White House counsel."

All high level politicians, all in on destroying evidence of war crimes.

[DanTex]

5. Because the government's data is so secure. Not like they've ever suffered massive leaks or anything

like that.

[DesMoinesDem]

6. No, no, no. Those experts have it all wrong. Her personal email server was MORE secure

than the State Department. I learned it right here on DU. And the biggest threat to here email wasn't state sponsored hackers, it's people like Snowden at the NSA or hackers at the FBI. They are the true threat. I learned it at DU so it must be true.

[Renew Deal]

7. There have been more leaks from Manning, Snowden, the CIA, NSA than there have been from Clinton

That's just a matter of fact.

[DesMoinesDem]

8. Proof that all government employees need to setup their own email servers at their house.

That will protect them from the greatest threat: government employees. As an added bonus they bypass all FOIA. Later on they can cherry pick some emails to archive. It sounds like a good plan to me.