Sarah Palin: hacked by Anonymous

[xor]

Re: Sarah Palin: hacked by Anonymous

Wikileaks isn't loading at the moment. odd.

This is an interesting issue. Apparently, Palin had previously used a yahoo address to conduct government business, and was aware of the possible problems with that. Now, a similarly named address is cracked, and revealed to be mostly personal, correct?

I'm kind of wondering why a personal email account would be named 'gov.palin' in the first place. 'gov' is for government/governor. This, plus the accusations of the use of a yahoo account for govt. business, and it's not hard to see how people might think this account was doing the same thing.

In this case, it's clearly illegal to crack into the account to check on your own. Theoretically, an internal investigation might be able to get a warrant to check the account, and arguably that should have happened anyway. So, is it ethical to break into a system for potentially well-intentioned reasons? Some would say yes, others no.

In this case, Palin is not only a private citizen, she is also a member of government, and subject to a certain loss of privacy due to the transparency laws. There are systems in place to enforce these laws. Do citizens have a right to double-check this enforcement? If people honestly believed that this account was being used illegitimately, and it wasn't being investigated, would it be ethical for someone, such as a private investigator, to check for themselves?

The story as I've read it so far is that some tool unknowingly cracked her account and didn't know what they had. Then just released the account info a public forum. Getting my news from across the pond so it may not be accurate.

In the end we will no doubt just have more tool reports at places like Defcon trying to do MSNBC style got-ya stories. The bad thing about this the cameras are getting very small. Just saw a Swann gum stick video/dvr/wireless camera for $119 at Microcenter.

Thorn I think there is outrage. I'm outraged by the crime. I'm outraged by the medias reporting of it. I'm outraged by her staff and the people dully sworn to protect her, who failed. But more importantly I'm outraged that we the "greatest nation on the planet" have to chose from a much of idiots for our leaders also. This isn't like the first time this happened. They should give candidates and their families computer security 101 before putting them in front of a camera. I sense a buck to be made here. :-)

Man I loath hypocrisy in all it's forms. Did you see the daughters baby daddies myspace page; OMG. There's a marriage that is going to 5 last minutes.

Of course the fact that the account has been hacked taints the information from a legal perspective. Now yahoo will have to spend millions of dollars to proof that their imaging backups haven't been violated. Then of course the backups will become part of the public record and it will all come out in the end. Also, technically it's not her data anyway. The minute she started using yahoo's services it became their data. I think we need Jurist right about now. :-)

As her defense attorney I would be attacking the validity of data right now. How was it stored. did it leave the country, what networks did it travel over, were they secured ...etc.

xor

[xor]

Re: Sarah Palin: hacked by Anonymous

Palin's password was "popcorn"

Man that's what I call rubbing salt into the wounds.

xor

[YenTheFirst]

Re: Sarah Palin: hacked by Anonymous

Wikileaks isn't loading at the moment. odd.

This is an interesting issue. Apparently, Palin had previously used a yahoo address to conduct government business, and was aware of the possible problems with that. Now, a similarly named address is cracked, and revealed to be mostly personal, correct?

I'm kind of wondering why a personal email account would be named 'gov.palin' in the first place. 'gov' is for government/governor. This, plus the accusations of the use of a yahoo account for govt. business, and it's not hard to see how people might think this account was doing the same thing.

In this case, it's clearly illegal to crack into the account to check on your own. Theoretically, an internal investigation might be able to get a warrant to check the account, and arguably that should have happened anyway. So, is it ethical to break into a system for potentially well-intentioned reasons? Some would say yes, others no.

In this case, Palin is not only a private citizen, she is also a member of government, and subject to a certain loss of privacy due to the transparency laws. There are systems in place to enforce these laws. Do citizens have a right to double-check this enforcement? If people honestly believed that this account was being used illegitimately, and it wasn't being investigated, would it be ethical for someone, such as a private investigator, to check for themselves?

[bascule]

Re: Sarah Palin: hacked by Anonymous

Palin's password was "popcorn"

[converge]

Re: Sarah Palin: hacked by Anonymous

My only response to this is disappointment.

If you're going to commit a crime, at least deliver something like an email that she's bangin McCain, or that Obama is really the father of her daughters child, or that she never liked Alaska .. or.. fucking something. This is just lame.

*note: this is not an endorsement of computer crime, but complete dismay over the lack of news this actually is.

I'm sure she's not the first public official with a web email account that got compromised in the last month. .. I mean, what's next.. ZOMG I GOTZ SPYWAREZ ON HER IEz!

[Thorn]

Re: Sarah Palin: hacked by Anonymous

Sure it's funny to laugh at the follies of politicians. That, IMO, is the only positive thing about any politician, but I have to agree with Streaker in asking the question "where is the outrage?" The thing that really bothers me about this is that we as a community are again held up as the bad guys, and it's right in the middle of the biggest show on earth. The press, and therefore the public, just see "hackers" have done something rather than "criminals."

No matter which way this story develops -whether the Palin gains sympathy as the victim, or the Democrats get to make hay of the Republicans being technology inept- in the end neither the Republicans nor the Democrats with be seen as the bad guys. We will.

[xor]

Re: Sarah Palin: hacked by Anonymous

Actually if you believe what she believes the crackers were working with god and it's all part of his plan.

I know what a pendejo; sorry couldn't resist.

xor

Actually and just to be fair I would love to see the service provider logs for McCain, Obama, as well as the other folks. I'm sure they get pounded with illegitimate login attempts.

[bascule]

Re: Sarah Palin: hacked by Anonymous

I'm sure you have a work account, do you have a personal account as well?

I have a work e-mail address which forwards to my personal account.

[streaker69]

Re: Sarah Palin: hacked by Anonymous

Bleh, that's a semantic distinction I don't typically make. You don't see me asking people who can't program in Lisp to stop calling themselves hackers.



Given that the account was obviously made after she became governor, I'd expect someone in her gubernatorial IT organization to have provided her with an account.

I'm sure she has an account with the state government up there, but from what I'm seeing in this statement, she isn't supposed to have a personal email account?

I'm sure you have a work account, do you have a personal account as well? Why should she be held to a different standard just because she's a public official. I'm sure there are hundreds of public officials that have personal email accounts across dozens of different servers that we'd look down on.

Again, where's the outrage that a crime has committed against a public official, regardless of politics, and email hosting service, a crime has been committed. That shouldn't be celebrated and a 'blame the victim' mentality shouldn't be the primary response.

If your mom's account was hacked and all her personal information ended up being posted for any pervert to use, would you blame your mom as well? What if your little sister's cell phone number was posted, because of a hack, would you blame your little sister?

[xor]

Re: Sarah Palin: hacked by Anonymous

Okie dokie. I'll make no change to it.

Isn't that like yes, we have no bananas?

xor

[TheCotMan]

Re: Sarah Palin: hacked by Anonymous

Bleh, that's a semantic distinction I don't typically make. You don't see me asking people who can't program in Lisp to stop calling themselves hackers.



Given that the account was obviously made after she became governor, I'd expect someone in her gubernatorial IT organization to have provided her with an account.

Okie dokie. I'll make no change to it.

[bascule]

Re: Sarah Palin: hacked by Anonymous

Bleh, that's a semantic distinction I don't typically make. You don't see me asking people who can't program in Lisp to stop calling themselves hackers.

It was her PERSONAL account, she may have sent email to close advisers from it, regardless, it was her personal account. Do you expect her, and her people to know everything that we know about email?

Given that the account was obviously made after she became governor, I'd expect someone in her gubernatorial IT organization to have provided her with an account.

[TheCotMan]

Re: Sarah Palin: hacked by Anonymous

If the thread creator wants the thread title changed s/hacked/cracked/ just say so.

[streaker69]

Re: Sarah Palin: hacked by Anonymous

Yes I do agree with you a crime has been committed here. But then again I don't go walking into the ghetto drunk waiving $100 bills around either. Though I may get robbed, and the police will respond, I seriously doubt they will have any sympathy for me at all. In fact they mite even be mad at me for being so careless.

What I think you are seeing from our community is the shock over the lack of common sense factor from an organization playing on a national stage level.

xor

It was her PERSONAL account, she may have sent email to close advisers from it, regardless, it was her personal account. Do you expect her, and her people to know everything that we know about email? Why would you expect them to know the dangers of using such an account, chances are, she's used it for years and never had a problem, so she inherently trusted it.

To blame her or her people for using a trusted email source is just plain silly. To say that this is at all her fault is silly.

Again, aren't you angry, that criminals under the 'hacker' name are dragging down the entire hacker community? That's what should be making you mad, especially after all the talks at Shmoocon about changing the public's view of hackers.

In your analogy the police are still required to investigate the crime that's been committed. I hope that scum that committed this crime get caught and end up in the Federal-pound-you-in-the-ass-prison.

[xor]

Re: Sarah Palin: hacked by Anonymous

From this and what I've seen previously, you're basically making the argument that she deserves it because she's using a yahoo account.

I guess women who dressed scantily in public deserve to get raped as well.

Had criminals not directly targeted her, her personal information would be safe. What if it wasn't a yahoo account, but somewhere else? Would you guys have the same opinion, or would this be a non-story here.

It doesn't really matter where her email was hosted at, her privacy was violated, a crime was committed and crimes do not deserve to be celebrated regardless of who they're committed against.

I'd feel the same way if it was Saddam Hussein's or Barrack Hussein's account, it was still a crime and the criminals shouldn't be lionized because of their target.

Yes I do agree with you a crime has been committed here. But then again I don't go walking into the ghetto drunk waiving $100 bills around either. Though I may get robbed, and the police will respond, I seriously doubt they will have any sympathy for me at all. In fact they mite even be mad at me for being so careless.

What I think you are seeing from our community is the shock over the lack of common sense factor from an organization playing on a national stage level.

xor