back to article A single typo may have tipped US election Trump's way

A single typo from a Clinton campaign aide gave Russian hackers access to a decade's worth of emails, some 60,000 in total, owned by Clinton campaign chairman John Podesta. Clinton campaign aide Charles Delavan wrote in an email to one of Podesta's aides. later published by Wikileaks, that Podesta must "immediately" change his …

  1. MacroRodent

    Simple attach was effective

    It is interesting how the Gmail security feature of sending an email warning about accesses from unusual locations was subverted by the phishers. I have got some of those when travelling, but now I don't remember if the real ones contain a link to Gmail account information change. If they do, Google should consider removing it, and informing users that they should enter Gmail by explicitly writing the Gmail URL instead.

    1. Version 1.0 Silver badge

      Re: Simple attach was effective

      A lot of services appear to have no idea how easy they make it to spoof their emails - I see Google and LinkedIn spoofs regularly and my health provider (BlueCross) just loves to send me messages every week telling me to click on the link to see the latest information in my account with them. Occasionally we get emails from the Bank with an HTML attachment that they want us to open to complete their security procedures - last time I checked these were legitimate however I have the mail server configured to strip all risky attachments so no one here ever sees them.

      Basic Security - yea, we've heard of it.

      1. Tom 7

        Re: Simple attach was effective

        "A lot of services appear to have no idea how easy they make it to spoof their emails" and most of them seem to be completely unaware that the PDF they get you to print, sign and send back can be spoofed too.

      2. BillG
        Facepalm

        What Did We Learn?

        A single typo may have tipped US election Trump's way. DNC figure John Podesta told to follow phishing link, instead of link to enable 2FA

        Yes, if it wasn't for that typo, we never would have learned that:

        The Dem's primary was rigged against Sanders all along so that Hillary would win,

        That the DNC was anti-Semitic,

        That CNN gave Hillary the questions to a debate in advance,

        A White House celebration of gay pride was actually a scheme to reward wealthy DNC donors,

        How the biggest donors to Hillary's campaign were promised Federal board positions,

        The Chariman of the DNC demanded that an anti-Clinton newscaster on MSNBC be fired

        et cetera, et cetera...

        If it wasn't for the hack, the truth would have remained buried.

        1. Rattus Rattus

          Re: What Did We Learn?

          "The Dem's primary was rigged against Sanders all along so that Hillary would win"

          Now THAT is something someone should be in jail over. Not only was it a subversion of the electoral process, Sanders was the only candidate worth a damn out of everyone who stepped up on both sides.

        2. Just Enough

          Re: What Did We Learn?

          "Yes, if it wasn't for that typo, we never would have learned that:"

          Perhaps true, but rather missing the bigger picture. The purpose of these hacks was not to reveal what was rotten in Hillary's campaign, it was a process to manipulate and discredit the US election. Yet people are too busy accusing each other about the details to see that they're still playing their part in the process, exactly as planned. Those behind the hacks don't care that their activities have come to light, indeed that just helps the intended aim. Some people don't believe any of it? Even better! Dischord and distrust rules. Poke the puppets with a stick and watch them turn on each other!

          Hillary has been a power-hungry puppet, who put her personal ambitions above her party's. Trump has been a useful idiot, too full of himself to appreciate his own very real limitations. Someone, somewhere, is laughing themselves to sleep each night at the pair of them. The joke's on you, America, and as long as you focus on the wrong things, it keeps getting funnier.

          1. codejunky Silver badge

            Re: What Did We Learn?

            @ Just Enough

            "The joke's on you, America, and as long as you focus on the wrong things, it keeps getting funnier."

            The problem with the election seemed to be choice. I was quite happy for trump to win, not because I think he will be any good, but because it might help fix US politics. The republicans offered what was referred to as a clown car because they offered choice and in the end trump was effectively independent. The democrats offered hillary, 1 extremist and 3 nobodies (if I remember the count right). Nobody popular would run against her as she was the parties choice regardless.

            I get the feeling the last couple of presidents (Bush and Obama) and the democratic party sealed the fate for mainstream politicians this time around.

    2. David Shaw

      this NYT story is plausible, but there exists an equally plausible counternarrative?

      as I dont work for the NSA, who are the only people outside of the KGB who actually know what happened, I can only read widely on this "phish or not" story. . .

      Interestingly, the UK's former ambassador to Uzbekistan has reported that *HE* brought these emails over to JulianAss.(TM), having found them behind a tree in Election-Land.

      http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-4034038/Ex-British-ambassador-WikiLeaks-operative-claims-Russia-did-NOT-provide-Clinton-emails-handed-D-C-park-intermediary-disgusted-Democratic-insiders.html

      Well, isn't the great game complicated!

      I'm normally pro Craig for his manifest integrity, but as I said, the secret squirrels on both sides know what actually happened, will they bother sharing with the internet using citizens or the voting citizens or the rest of the world?

      typo's aside, have a great festive season, if you can

  2. Blotto Silver badge
    Coat

    So phishing / hacking wouldn't have been an issue if they used Hilary's server?

    1. Voland's right hand Silver badge

      Funnily enough - yes

      A well set up email server accessed via a proper client (especially one which is not configured to launch browser on links straight away) is generally better than any webmail.

    2. Hollerithevo

      Yep

      Which is why Clinton and her predecessors all used their own servers.

      1. Crazy Operations Guy

        Re: Yep

        "Which is why Clinton and her predecessors all used their own servers."

        I always wondered why everyone was going after Hillary for using a private server and not the State Departments incompetent IT organization that drives people to use personal email systems.

        I understand that the primary driver was that BlackBerry only supports a single email account per device, but an organization like the US Government would have enough power to get RIM to change it, or to write their own system. They had the capability to fix the issue long before it became such a massive problem. But that seems to be how the government does stuff...

        I work for a medium/large company, and even we got Microsoft to add a feature into Exchange to accommodate our email setup, the US government would've been able to just breathe a word and it'd be done.

        1. Michael Thibault
          Mushroom

          Re: Yep

          >I always wondered why everyone was going after Hillary for using a private server...

          Not because a private server would shield those emails from Freedom of Information act requests and, thus, public scrutiny?

          1. Naselus

            Re: Yep

            "Not because a private server would shield those emails from Freedom of Information act requests and, thus, public scrutiny?"

            Funnily enough, no. Which is actually perfectly obvious if you think about it. Most of her email is going to and from other State officials... who's email is still FOI-able. So her havingt her own server would make no difference whatsoever. Much of the rest is confidential... which means it's not subject to FOI.

            Clinton's use of the private server was bad, since she wasn't authorized to do it. But honestly, I don't think there's any real evidence to suggest she was doing it to dodge FOI. Certainly not as much evidence as there is to suggest Trump was in cahoots with Putin, anyway.

            1. Michael Thibault

              Re: Yep

              >Most

              not

              >no difference whatsoever.

              and

              >But honestly, I don't think there's any real evidence to suggest she was doing it to dodge FOI.

              What, in fact, would 'real evidence' of such a motive look like or sound like?

    3. Rich 11

      So phishing / hacking wouldn't have been an issue if they used Hilary's server?

      The results could perhaps in this instance have been different, but the basic flaw still lay between the chair and the keyboard.

    4. Naselus

      You think you're joking, but actually, since the State Department was comprehensively compromised over two years ago (to the point John Kerry and his team literally had to set up Gmail accounts) while almost no-one knew about the Clinton server, one of the great ironies of this whole thing has long been that her private server was much, much more secure than the official government channels during the period it was in use.

      And yes, I say that even though it was still running Server 2003.

  3. Allan George Dyer
    Facepalm

    legitimate/illegitimate

    There is a reason why sailors stopped using larboard/starboard.

    Legitimate/Bastard would be a readily-recognisable terminology.

    1. This post has been deleted by its author

      1. O RLY

        Re: legitimate/illegitimate

        @Symon,

        As an interesting aside, "Inflammable" came first (late 16th, early 17th century). "Flammable" came about and gained popularity some ~200 years after inflammable joined the English language because of the confusion about the prefix in- meaning "not" in most cases and meaning "in" or "into" in the case of inflammable.

    2. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      Re: legitimate/illegitimate

      Even avoiding words that can be confused by simple typos isn't enough to stop this sort of thing - in this case I suspect he may have omitted the word "not" which I find ludicrously easy to do. I also often write "now" instead of "not" and vice versa.

      Obviously the more important the message is the more likely I am to bugger it up.

      Email can be a terrible way to communicate.

      1. Version 1.0 Silver badge

        Re: legitimate/illegitimate

        It was probably auto suggest that screwed him.

        1. Wensleydale Cheese

          Re: legitimate/illegitimate

          It was probably auto suggest that screwed him.

          There's a special place in Hull reserved for the inventor of auto-correct.

      2. Jonathan Richards 1

        Re: legitimate/illegitimate

        It takes a little time, but if everyone re-read what they had just written before committing the message, fewer mistakes would be made [1]. I'm a bit too far the other way in this respect: I will now click 'Preview', check for spelling mistakes, repunctuate, 'Preview' again ...

        [1] ... and add footnotes. The trick in proofreading your own work is to dis-remember what it was that you *think* you have written (because that's what your brain will see, half the time). Advancing age is a great help :)

        [2] repunctuate seems not to have been a real word... until now.

        1. This post has been deleted by its author

          1. Tom 38

            Re: legitimate/illegitimate

            You missed the [2] link to the footnote in the main text.

            If only he had re-read it first.

      3. Anonymous Blowhard

        Re: legitimate/illegitimate

        "Even avoiding words that can be confused by simple typos isn't enough to stop this sort of thing"

        How about just using simpler words to start with? But I think that politicians and lawyers are trained to be as vague as possible in all forms of communication...

        1. Eddy Ito

          Re: legitimate/illegitimate

          Well if he meant to type illegitimate then he also used the wrong indefinite article as it would be "an illegitimate email" not "a illegitimate email". Meh, I suppose it comes down to how good the self bastardize auto-correct feature is.

        2. Lotaresco

          Re: legitimate/illegitimate

          "How about just using simpler words to start with?"

          Even that can go horribly wrong. I know an electrician who was lucky to escape with his eyesight and nothing worse than bad sunburn after a miscommunication. He locked off an electrical panel to allow him to work on some HV (and high current) equipment. Power leads disconnected but naked and dangling a little too close to each other. But no problem because he had everything locked off. This was in the days before electricians had personal locks and locks tended to be keyed alike.

          Someone called out to him "Can I turn the power on?" and he shouted back some simple words "I'm working above you. DO NOT TURN THE POWER ON." Sadly all the other guy heard was "... TURN THE POWER ON." The arc copper-plated his face and specs and gave him sunburn on the face and hands.

          1. Michael Thibault
            Facepalm

            Re: legitimate/illegitimate

            >all the other guy heard was "... TURN THE POWER ON."

            "Still, a man, he hears what he wants to hear, and disregards the rest". Sadly, slapping has probably slipped from the palette of available responses forever.

          2. Aodhhan

            Re: legitimate/illegitimate

            Sort of like Hillary hearing the word, "ignore" at the start of every government regulation.

          3. aaaa

            Re: legitimate/illegitimate

            "How about just using simpler words to start with?"

            Someone called out to him "Can I turn the power on?" and he shouted back some simple words "I'm working above you. DO NOT TURN THE POWER ON."

            That's the opposite of simple. Simple would have been NO! except I worked in electronics for years and never heard that word from a tradesman - the technical parlance is F**K OFF.

            But back to the main subject. The reply about the phishing email was way too complex, he should have gone with you're fired, clear and to the point, difficult to misconstrue.

      4. Dagg Silver badge
        Trollface

        Re: legitimate/illegitimate

        Email can be a terrible way to communicate.

        Still better than something like slack

  4. P. Lee
    Facepalm

    Nothing to hide, nothing to fear, eh?

    Wassat? You don't think its right that privacy has been invaded?

    I see its quickly turned into a government & politician-only protection issue:

    >“This cannot become a partisan issue," the senators wrote in the joint statement. "The stakes are too high for our country."

    Does it really take some Russian hackers to bring into focus what the US gov does routinely?

  5. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    This:

    " now all-but confirmed to be the handiwork of Russian hackers "

    So, its everything but proven???

    So the speculation, hyperboly and likely, lies have decreed "Must be the ruskies". "We cant prove it but we know it is."

    Well in a court of law, gut feelings count for fuck all, eveidence is where its at. Now, put up or shut up.

    1. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      Re: This:

      Which is the difference between the CIA and FBI.

      1. scarletherring

        Re: This:

        Actually, no, not as I understand it. They both conclude Russia(n state backed hacking outfits) were responsible -- they just disagree on motive. The CIA has said it was definitely to help Trump, the FBI is saying they wanted to delegitimize the election process.

        1. Anonymous Coward
          Anonymous Coward

          Re: This:

          > the FBI is saying they wanted to delegitimize the election process.

          The Democrat and Republican parties did a fine job of that. As did the Whigs and Tories before them.

        2. Naselus

          Re: This:

          "They both conclude Russia(n state backed hacking outfits) were responsible -- they just disagree on motive."

          This.

          Which, I might point out, I've been saying for weeks, including the stuff on Cozy bear and Fancy bear. Resulting in downvotes from all the Trump supporters on the forum (which translates into about 3).

          Proving it's the Russians isn't actually hard. The techniques are consistent with known Russian actions from Ukraine and Georgia; the threat sources are recognizably from Russian sources, and there's Russian in the code used. It took the non-partisan external infosec company the DNC hired about a day to figure out the source was Russia. This is not difficult and not controversial.

          Determining motive is the sole difficulty - did they want ot elect Trump, or did they just want to cause chaos? Given that Hillary is a dangerous super-hawk who would likely have engaged in an aggressive containment strategy, while Trump appears to admire Putin and is trying to appoint one of Putin's buddies to run the State department, and all the Russian leaks targeted one side in the election exclusively, there's a lot of weight behind the CIA's assessment.

          The alternative, of course, is simply that the Russians figured (along with everyone else) that Clinton had it in the bag and so were just trying to de-legitimize her, and Trump was so unlikely to win that it wasn't worth trying ot damage him.

        3. Jess

          Re: help Trump / delegitimize the election process.

          So Hilary gets 2.8 million more votes, but loses the election and it's either the Russian trying to make the election look illegitimate or it's their fault Trump won?

          1. torgo

            Re: help Trump / delegitimize the election process.

            No, she loses the election because the current rules use the electoral college system as the basis of electing a US President. The popular vote count is (for the moment) simply an interesting statistic.

            I'm wondering: if emails that the DNC (and the RNC) are so important and valuable, whey are they on the servers of a public company (Google/Gmail)?

        4. Michael Thibault
          Paris Hilton

          Re: This:

          > The CIA has said it was definitely to help Trump, the FBI is saying they wanted to delegitimize the election process.

          And both of these instances of press-tadigitation require that we ignore the role played by Wikileaks in actually bringing light to the lucre of the hacking effort(s): how do accounts from each of these two agencies convincingly explain that Wikileaks would necessarily have published the trove(s) delivered to it? Why did the hackers not just fake the emails (or even create new documents) so salacious-yet-plausible that their near-certain publication by Wikileaks or similar would have had the lady in Washington scrambling to get out a denial?

          The slipper don't fit in either case.

        5. Moosh

          Re: This:

          I don't blame them for trying to aid Trump when Hillary was openly calling for direct armed conflict with Russia in Syria.

    2. Anonymous Coward
      Meh

      Re: This:

      Well in a court of law, gut feelings count for fuck all, eveidence is where its at. Now, put up or shut up.

      Courts of law are really bad places to prove anything except the blindingly obvious. That's why the scientific community use peer review and debate as to how to interpret observable facts, rather than having two adversaries use rhetoric to persuade a technically ignorant jury that they are right and the other is wrong. Courts are particularly awful at handling complicated issues like this which involve many very detailed and technical points.

      1. Anonymous Coward
        Anonymous Coward

        Re: This:

        The CIA has said it was definitely to help Trump, the FBI is saying they wanted to delegitimize the election process.

        Neither. The less stable and more inward problem bound is USA, the more room has Володька to maneuver. It is a classic destabilization, not deligitimization exercise. Played by the book and the USAisian political critters are being skillfully moved by a chess grandmaster on the board of life without even noticing.

        I am seriously surprised that Gill Stein has not pulled out of her sleeve a list of 100 people in each state which did not vote, but had absentee vote cast for someone on their behalf. "Leaked to her" - wikileaks style.

        It will fit the overall pattern of making sure everyone in USA is at everyone's throat.

        1. John Brown (no body) Silver badge

          Re: This:

          "It will fit the overall pattern of making sure everyone in USA is at everyone's throat."

          From the outside, looking in, that's what US politics seems to be for at least the last couple of decades. People who voted for the "loser" claiming that the "winner" is not "their" President etc.

          Whether it's corrupted already or corrupted by hackers, Russian or not, doesn't really seem all that relevant, the average US voter seems to have little concept of how the democratic voting process works. Maybe it's all this "no one left behind" and "everyone's a winner" driven into them from childhood that makes them totally unprepared for a competition where there can be only one winner. Not that that is unique to the USA, but that's where it seems to be the most obvious.

    3. Jonathan Richards 1
      Unhappy

      Gut feelings === FA

      Ah, but this is the post-truth world, where we are tired of experts, and irritated by facts. Expect more insane court decisions shortly!

      I considered the Joke icon, but this one is more appropriate =>

    4. Platypus

      Re: This:

      So all of those accusations against Hillary, or the claim that there were millions of illegal immigrants voting, should also be ignored until proven, right? Ditto with your accusation of lying. But you're missing one important thing: some information is dangerous to disclose. The evidence has been given to those whose need to know exceeded the risk of that disclosure, which does not include you. It takes a tremendous ego for someone to believe they are the sole arbiter of truth, and that they personally must be convinced of a statement's truth before others are allowed to consider it. Nobody's being thrown in jail based on rumor. It's OK for people to claim and believe what a preponderance of evidence - both public and vetted but not disclosed by our elected representatives - suggests.

    5. This post has been deleted by its author

  6. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    A single typo may have tipped US election Trump's way

    >> A single typo may have tipped US election Trump's way

    It may also not have tipped the US election Trump's way.

    Trump won.

    Get over it.

    1. Ken Hagan Gold badge

      Re: A single typo may have tipped US election Trump's way

      Was anyone actually swayed by whatever revelations followed these hacks? Hasn't it been fairly obvious for about a year what sort of people the two candidates were?

      Come back if you find evidence that someone actually fiddled with the voting machines. Until then, shut up because nothing else that people are talking about counts as "hacking likely to affect the vote".

      1. Anonymous Coward
        Anonymous Coward

        Re: A single typo may have tipped US election Trump's way

        No one (sensible) is saying that the Russians hacked the voting machines, that's just a false flag campaign. What they're actually being accused of is hacking the DNC/Democratic party/Hillary's campaign and selectively releasing the information they stole with the aim of influencing the election results.

        1. Version 1.0 Silver badge

          Re: A single typo may have tipped US election Trump's way

          The statistic does point to issues with the voting machines but that's nothing new - the electronic voting issues have been around for about 15 years now.

          Voting in the US is rather like going to church, you stand in line, perform a small ritual (press a button / get a wafer) and then you believe - and leave.

      2. Anonymous Coward
        Anonymous Coward

        Re: A single typo may have tipped US election Trump's way

        Come back if you find evidence that someone actually fiddled with the voting machines. Until then, shut up because nothing else that people are talking about counts as "hacking likely to affect the vote".

        The mechanics of US voting have been vulnerable for years (as in well before George W Bush was elected, another campaign with problems). That is not even an assertion, that is a fact but the data is always quickly buried. If you follow the work of Dr Rebecca Mercuri (who has been researching this for decades) you'll soon start wondering how anyone can claim any voting result legitimate, but (not entirely unsurprising) the winners have never been very willing to clean all of this up.

        As for Trump having won legitimately or not, that is actually not the point. The point is that you don't know that of EITHER candidate, but the very fact that Trump has loudly objected against an exercise that could confirm his legitimacy suggests that his camp seems to be uncomfortable with anyone checking out the hard facts which makes me wonder why (they protest doth too much an all that).

        I suspect that any deeper research will have as much chance of getting funded as the study of high building collapse when a large object flies into them containing lots of aviation fuel: none whatsoever.

        1. John Brown (no body) Silver badge

          Re: A single typo may have tipped US election Trump's way

          "the very fact that Trump has loudly objected against an exercise that could confirm his legitimacy suggests that his camp seems to be uncomfortable with anyone checking out the hard facts which makes me wonder why"

          Especially since he's on record as claiming that the whole system was rigged against him and "when" he lost, he'd be demanding an investigation into the whole process. Out of his own mouth, he never expected to win due to the "corrupt and rigged political system". And now that he's won, suddenly it's all fair and above board and no, really, we don't need to investigate at all, honest!

      3. Trilkhai

        Re: A single typo may have tipped US election Trump's way

        @Ken Hagan — Yes, two segments of the population were swayed:

        1) A (mostly very young) subgroup of Bernie supporters who voted against Clinton in protest over the DNC sabotaging their candidate.

        2) Moderates who were disturbed either by the DNC's sabotage of Sanders and/or by the (inaccurate) claims regarding Clinton's use of the email server.

        I've been investigating the voting machine issue, as all of the Hart eSlates in my county locked up whenever we tried to config them the morning of the election… Based on the reports, something was definitely going on nationwide (e.g. improbable numbers of machines failing to record votes for President or recording it for the wrong candidate) but the states/counties don't appear to want to investigate. The Palmer Report has a lot of eyebrow–raising information up, if you care to look.

        1. Ken Hagan Gold badge

          Re: A single typo may have tipped US election Trump's way

          "The Palmer Report has a lot of eyebrow–raising information up, if you care to look."

          Just had a look and, yes, *that's* the sort of thing that, if proven, would justify all the talk about rigging the election. That's where people should focus their attention. The wikileaks stuff just looked like mud being flung in a dirty campaign and I find it really hard to believe that it swayed enough people to make a difference.

      4. ASH71

        Re: A single typo may have tipped US election Trump's way

        37% of Detroit's voting machines had more votes recorded then voters in the booth

      5. ShadowDragon8685

        Re: A single typo may have tipped US election Trump's way

        Unfortunately, an awful lot of people were.

        For some reason, scandal stuck to Hillary, even when it shouldn't have; the emails server thing was a non-thing that should have been dismissed half-way in.

        Meanwhile, scandal refused to stick to Trump, even when recorded proof of him saying horrifically sexist things, advocating outright war crimes on national TV, and more, were out there.

        Well, I hope everyone's happy. You were so afraid of "crooked Hillary" that you let Donald J. Drumpf become president. You were played like a fiddle, and now we've elected a maniac with a literal narcissistic personality disorder to the White House, all to the tune of "ehhh, the emails, I don't trust her."

    2. scarletherring

      Re: A single typo may have tipped US election Trump's way

      You mean like how conservatives got over Obama having won? Like not at all, even after 8 years?

      1. Anonymous Coward
        Anonymous Coward

        Re: A single typo may have tipped US election Trump's way

        > You mean like how conservatives got over Obama having won? Like not at all, even after 8 years?

        Speak for yourself. I got over it on day one. I voted for McCain but I was hopeful that Obama would actually improve race relations, end the War on Terror, close gitmo, rein in NSA, or at least pass a health insurance reform bill that wasn't absolutely horrific.

        NOW, of course, we can honestly say he was pretty much the worst* president ever. So far...

        *At least Nixon got us out of Vietnam.

        1. Rich 11

          Re: A single typo may have tipped US election Trump's way

          NOW, of course, we can honestly say he was pretty much the worst* president ever. So far...

          Which of those situations did he actively make worse? A dead Bin Laden counts for something, I think. And the affordable healthcare bill was gutted by the Republicans and turned into a laughable mess by them (when they weren't too busy shouting about death panels and other nonsense). You could call him ineffective, perhaps, but not the worst president yet (a review of history more than 40 years old might help you there).

          1. Anonymous Coward
            Anonymous Coward

            Re: A single typo may have tipped US election Trump's way

            He was catastrophically ineffective.

            He was inexperienced. He lacked the necessary leadership qualities and/or political influence.

            Worse than the presidents preceeding the Civil War, World Wars, and Great Depression? That depends on the ultimate consequences of Obama's inaction. Ironically, history will only forgive him if Trump makes America great again.

            1. Anonymous Coward
              Anonymous Coward

              Re: A single typo may have tipped US election Trump's way

              He was catastrophically ineffective.

              Well, the Republicans did say they'd block him every which way, and they did. So if you want to complain about ineffectiveness you should certainly not start with Obama..

              1. Anonymous Coward
                Anonymous Coward

                Re: A single typo may have tipped US election Trump's way

                "if you want to complain about ineffectiveness you should certainly not start with Obama"

                Actually, you should start with Obama. In the US electoral system, the populace votes for the entire lower house (House of Representatives) in the Congress every two years. After two years of unchecked Obama, US citizens - at least those that bothered to vote - decided to elect a Republican lower house.

                The upper house (Senate) is elected on staggered terms, approximately 1/3 every 2 years. By the time Obama reached his last two years, US citizens put Republicans in control of the Senate as well.

                And in the election just past, Republicans retained control of both houses. Obama was clearly less-trusted by the populace in the only poll that counts - voting - despite his "approval rating."

          2. StudeJeff

            Re: A single typo may have tipped US election Trump's way

            He had as much to do with getting Bin Laden as Richard Nixon did with putting us on the Moon.

            That awful 0bamaCare bill was hardly "gutted by the Republicans", in fact the Republicans had virtually no say on it and none of them voted for the thing.

            He's not just the worst President yet, he's the worst leader North America has had since your own King George III, and look how THAT turned out!

      2. ASH71

        Re: A single typo may have tipped US election Trump's way

        I remember those Riots, safe spaces, safety pins, classes crying in grief and the Hacking Russians and the Leaks from the RNC when the RNC rigged the primary.

    3. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      Re: Get over it.

      Or resist, agitate, organise and fight back. You know, if you've got a moral compass and a backbone.

  7. Chet Mannly

    Their election chances were damaged because the truth got revealed...

    The russkies may or may not have stolen the data, but ultimately all that happened was the public saw some of the dodgy things the Democrats were doing. Don't want the public to find out that you did dodgy things? Don't do dodgy things in the first place...

    The whole "russians rigged the election" line is a red herring to distract from that IMO.

    1. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      Re: Their election chances were damaged because the truth got revealed...

      Oh FFS get off your high horse, ok maybe the wording should be more precise "the Russians deliberately hacked the DNC/Democratic party/Hillary's campaign then released damaging information with the aim of influencing the election", is that better?

      1. codejunky Silver badge

        Re: Their election chances were damaged because the truth got revealed...

        @AC

        I keep coming back to something someone said (probably a comedian) that to lose to Trump you must be really unpopular. For everything he said and did he still won.

      2. bombastic bob Silver badge
        Pint

        Re: Their election chances were damaged because the truth got revealed...

        "then released damaging information with the aim of influencing the election"

        I'm glad they did it. After all, it's apparently ALL TRUE [what was revealed] and shining the light on these idiots was something OUR MEDIA was supposed to have done. So if Russia did it...

        THANK YOU!!! (and you guys deserve a beer)

    2. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      Re: Their election chances were damaged because the truth got revealed...

      They also hacked the RNC, but didn't release those emails.

      I'm sure that's because there was nothing interesting in those emails right?

      1. Ken Hagan Gold badge

        Re: Their election chances were damaged because the truth got revealed...

        "They also hacked the RNC, but didn't release those emails."

        That's probably because the RNC emails didn't contain any background material about Trump. Certainly the appearance from the East side of the pond is that the Republicans were as surprised as the rest of us with his performance in the primaries and responded simply by not bothering to field a candidate this time around. We've ended up with an Independent winning. Is that the first time this has happened?

    3. Tejekion

      Re: Their election chances were damaged because the truth got revealed...

      Amen to that! Besides. I don't see why the Democrats are complaining about being hacked so much when the news media was all but hacking into Trump's past, trying to find every little dirty thing they could find to bring Trump down.

      They even started talking about how he doesn't mention his rebellious daughter, not to mention his wife's past. In other words after the 50 or so years of wrong doing from Hillary, that the Russians DIDN'T hack, that was already known, Trump was criticized widely by the media, for being much less up a tripe bastard, than Hillary was a lying tart b1tch!

      And no, I did NOT preview this first!

      1. Anonymous Coward
        Devil

        Re: Their election chances were damaged because the truth got revealed...

        I love how the Dems are blaming Vladimir Putin for [revealing] their own corruption and incompetence.

        Such hubris, it makes House of Cards look quaint.

  8. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    The messenger, shoot him.

    Imagine a scenario where emails were uncovered and what was found was honest dealings, hard work, fair play, good intention and a mixed diet.

    The issue was not the hack, the issue was the content.

    1. Version 1.0 Silver badge

      Re: The messenger, shoot him.

      To a degree yes - but the contents were one-sided (does anyone honestly believe that the republicans are pure as driven snow?) and there were continuous comments from the republicans indicating that the knew about the contents of the mail hack before the incident was public.

      Add to this Trumps accusations of hacking when he thought he was going to lose the election and his complete denial since the election.

    2. sabroni Silver badge

      Re: The issue was not the hack, the issue was the content.

      No, the issue is the fact that only one party was hacked. Neither of them should be allowed secrets.

  9. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    Two things the anti Trump brigade ignore in all this.

    1) they are the ones most likely to read wikileaks, the country people have better things to do with their time.

    2) the leaked emails were played down in the MSM.

    Considering those two points, what are they making all this fuss about? Is it just bad sportsmanship, or are the Russians trying to change the outcome of the vote because Clinton would start WW3 which is good for the arms industry?

    1. John H Woods Silver badge

      @Ivan4

      "Considering those two points, what are they making all this fuss about?" --- Ivan4

      Are you serious? Even if I knew for certain that the interference had no influence on an important election in my country, I'd still think it was somewhat troubling that a foreign power had interfered with it. If I thought it had had an effect, even if it was a win for my party, I would have even more of a problem with it.

      Maybe I'm just old-fashioned.

      1. eldakka

        Re: @Ivan4

        " I'd still think it was somewhat troubling that a foreign power had interfered with it."

        Why is that? I would be extremely surprised if any election in any country, EVER, has not had some measure of at least attempted interference/influence from a foreign power. It's BAU for most governments.

        The US is constantly sending money, arms, technical know how to the parties in foreign countries that they'd prefer to win.

        The UK, Russians, Chinese, Japanese, Germans, French, Israel, Saudi Arabia, Iran, Iraq, Syria, Brazil, Australia, Indonesia, and the list goes on.

        They all attempt to interfere in the elections (or other processes if they don't hold open elections) or running or appointments of governments of foreign countries that they hold an interest in. It's just another aspect of the Great Game.

        Frankly what we have here is a case of throwing stones in glass houses.

        1. John H Woods Silver badge

          Re: @Ivan4

          "

          'I'd still think it was somewhat troubling that a foreign power had interfered with it.'

          Why is that? I would be extremely surprised if any election in any country, EVER, has not had some measure of at least attempted interference/influence from a foreign power. It's BAU for most governments." -- eldakka

          Hey, I wasn't born yesterday; I didn't say I'd still think it was somewhat troubling that a foreign power had attempted to interfere with it.

          1. NotBob

            Re: @Ivan4

            It's not just BAU, it's a business itself. Look at the massive donations from foreign governments, perhaps best captured in the "pay to play" Clinton Foundation...

      2. Tejekion

        Re: @Ivan4

        Or maybe you're just an idiot. Hillary winning the election was never about you, or any of the voters for that matter. It was about Jezebel, the whore of Babylon, that sits on many waters, aka Hillary being the anointed one, to finalize the global elite's plans to destroy America from within, and usher in the NWO initiative. An initiative, that you would have soon found out wouldn't have been any good for most Americans at all.

        So sit there, and continue to bitch, whine and moan about your side not winning all you want. But for my part, I am rather happy to see all the questionable cabinet picks that Trump's making. At least I can be confident that there will still be a United States of America around long enough for him to govern over the next four years. And who knows, maybe he will instill enough fear in Washington D.C. to straighten things out.

        1. Alistair

          @tejekion

          Those "questionable" cabinet picks are your "NWO team".

          He IS draining the swamp. Just makes it easier to see the reptiles.

      3. Dagg Silver badge
        Big Brother

        Re: @Ivan4

        I'd still think it was somewhat troubling that a foreign power had interfered with it.

        Try the New Zealand election just after NZ went nuclear free in the 1980, strangest NZ election ever, way more like a US election with mud slinging character assassination etc. The US got the government changed from labour to national but even the nationals were not up to reversing the nuclear stance. Next election everything was back to normal.

        So what goes around comes around... Ha Ha

  10. Amos1

    "a illegitimate" - Utter BS and CYA'ing

    No one would write a sentence that way. "This is a illegitimate email". Seriously? More MSM cover-up for clowns in jobs beyond their competencies.

  11. C Montgomery Burns

    So the email stating it was "legitimate" was widely derided as being stupid. And that's because it's a "typo" and not a stupid mistake? Some large helping of benefit of the doubt is being heaped here. Seems the more sensible explanation is that Delevan was duped by the phishing mail too.

    Setting that aside though, the "Russians" didn't create the very real, very damaging information that was there.

    1. Naselus

      In fairness, he apparently received the forwarded mail at 4am while he was on holiday, and responded before turning over and going back to sleep. Though yes, I honestly don't really buy the 'I was trying to type illegitimate' excuse; why not do what every other IT guy in the last twenty years has done and use the word 'spam,'?

  12. SeymourHolz

    El Reg getting in on the Fake News action

    Neither the type-o nor Podesta's gullibility had any impact on the election.

    The content of the eMails and the exposed character of Hillary's team is what did it.

    Let's dispel the myth that anything except the corrupt character of Hillary's campaign cost her the election. Hillary's corruption is exactly what cost her the election.

    1. noboard

      Re: El Reg getting in on the Fake News action

      Couldn't have put it better myself. If the democrats had put Bernie forward, we wouldn't be having this discussion as he'd have romped home. The democrats went with Hillary as she'd do very little about all the problems in the US and make sure the money kept flowing up.

      I also like the way the democrats harped on about the sanctity of the election and how Trump should honour the outcome of the vote and his comments are dividing the country. Then they lose and they're saying exactly the same things as Trump, showing themselves to be just as shitty as Trump. The difference being Trump has never tried to hide it and that's why he won, people decided they'd rather have a corrupt businessman who has never tried to hide it, over a corrupt politician who pretends she's a saint. No matter who won, they were all fucked.

      1. Tejekion

        Re: El Reg getting in on the Fake News action

        I upvoted you for the first part of your comment, but would like to add, that I feel a lot less fucked with Trump in office, than I would have with a Clinton presidency. I feel, that now a lot of people that aren't working, but should be, will be forced to do so, and that the Repubs are going to bleed what's left of the middle class to death financially. but that trumps(pun intended), Hillary, and the global elite bleeding us to death literally. The shit plan of re-wilding most of America, forcing everyone into big cities, and putting most of the country off limits reminds me too much of the scene in World War Z, where the zombies were lured into the football stadium, and then nuked.

        I received some very critical news, first from a coworker, then from several articles on the internet, where it was said to pay attention to what's being put out in movies and television shows, because in some way, it's either happened, is happening, or will happen in the future.

        One example...Star Wars. If I remember correctly, was basically a futuristic retelling of MacBeth.

  13. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    Even if Russian intelligence is involved, is there is news here?

    Hmmm, rival nations use underhanded or covert means to gain access to data and influence political developments in other nations! Who'da thunk it!!

    I'm pretty sure that everybody larger than Luxembourg tries to do this in one manner or another. The real problem in this case was that the leaks showed that the Democratic Party has a problem with democracy.

  14. dalethorn

    But you can't confirm this disinformation, because Podesta is missing, like Jimmy Hoffa. Also Eric Braverman, the former CEO of the Clinton Foundation. Are you suggesting that Russians got them too?

  15. Anonymous Coward
    Coat

    Well..

    Lets just say that the Russians did 'hack' those emails - and we know that to be true, without a question totally did it! (though anyone with half a bit of common sense knows this is all bull)

    Did they actually leak anything that wasnt factual, an can be proven so?

    .....Yeah! that's what I thought!

    So lets get away from this 'Russians hiding in every hole' nonsense and lets get back to this 'Criminal Activity' which apparently doesnt exist.. by people obviously looking too hard *sarc*

  16. inmypjs Silver badge

    Anyone using gmail

    for anything serious is frankly an idiot.

    "People sending email to any of Google's 425 million Gmail users have no "reasonable expectation" that their communications are confidential, the internet giant has said in a court filing."

  17. Paul Hovnanian Silver badge
    Alert

    One typo? Really?

    Given the tone of urgency of the rest of the Devlan e-mail, I'd have followed through with the instructions. Perhaps questioned the use of the word "legitimate" and maybe replied to verify his concerns.

    Maybe they need a PANIC! emoticon.

  18. Alan Esworthy

    "...may have tipped..."

    Yes, and El Reg's editors may have been abducted by space aliens and replaced with exoskeletal silicon based lifeforms wearing disguises.

    "May have..." is not news, nor is it informative.

    1. Lotaresco
      Coat

      Re: "...may have tipped..."

      ""May have..." is not news, nor is it informative."

      "You may have syphilis" is both informative and newsworthy if the patient receiving the news is the Pope.

  19. JJKing
    IT Angle

    IMO

    The CIA has said it was definitely to help Trump, the FBI is saying they wanted to delegitimize the election process.

    Well Comey certainly didn’t help the course of the election with his pollution of the process and the supposed emails that “may” have been found on Weiner’s computer.

    It may also not have tipped the US election Trump's way.

    Trump won.

    Get over it.

    AC (why is it that Drumpf supporters seem to always hide behind the AC mask when posting in favour of that Orange id10t) there are 2,800,000 more votes that Clinton got and these people might disagree who really won. Like a lot of other things in his personal and business life, Drumpf just slimed his way through this election. What’s the bet he gets impeached and can’t even finish the term. A snake changes its’ skin but underneath its’ new skin is exactly the same as the old.

    If it looks corrupt, smells corrupt and acts corrupt, guess what, it IS corrupt.

    Don't want the public to find out that you did dodgy things? Don't do dodgy things in the first place...

    You mean like don’t grab women by the pussy, you mean like don’t treat your charity like a personal piggy bank, like don’t get caught being an ignorant racist or like don’t pay taxes, get caught doing it and then say you’re smart for not paying any. This is not to mention the plethora of lies he has told, denies saying them even when confronted by video evidence to the contrary.

    All the Orange id10t has done is Make America Hate Again.

    1. Alistair
      Windows

      Re: IMO

      @JJKing

      I'll agree with your final comment (Make America Hate Again) -

      Thing is JJ, Hillary certainly happens to be missing the halo to offset the horns that mess of hair hides.

    2. Naselus
      Joke

      Re: IMO

      "why is it that Drumpf supporters seem to always hide behind the AC mask when posting in favour of that Orange id10t"

      Otherwise it's too easy to spot their Russian IP addresses.

  20. Bob Dole (tm)
    Thumb Down

    Let's be clear..

    Let's be clear here. The Russian involvement (if it actually exists) wasn't why Hillary lost. It was that she is the epitome of Washington bullshit and people are tired of it.

    Those people, btw, were ones most of the polls discounted as unlikely to vote. She lost the election a long time ago. It was just a matter of the votes finally being tallied and the people no longer being ignored.

  21. Sil

    Not an assertion by the US intelligence agencies

    This isn't an assertion by the US intelligence agencies.

    This is only an assertion by the CIA.

    The FBI does not agree, for lack of proof. Same for the ODNI.

    1. Naselus

      Re: Not an assertion by the US intelligence agencies

      "This isn't an assertion by the US intelligence agencies."

      Again (as we keep having to point out), all the intelligence agencies are agreed the Russians hacked the DNC. The only disputes are over motive, which the FBI refuses to speculate on. The CIA's job is largely speculating on motives.

      The thing is, both the DNC and RNC were hacked by the Chinese in 2008 (they weren't even particularly subtle about it), so both campaigns really ought to have known this was coming.

  22. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    WTF?

    So, the key question in all of this is: which should we use, 'flammable' or 'inflammable'?!?

    #confused.

  23. Anonymous Coward
    Devil

    pfh!

    "with his pollution of the process"

    you mean.. doing his job?!

    "AC (why is it that Drumpf supporters seem to always hide behind the AC mask when posting in favour of that Orange id10t)"

    because your posting you home address and phone number?!?...

    "there are 2,800,000 more votes that Clinton got and these people might disagree who really won. "

    Well unfortunately that's not how the US does things, oh and if we are going on about the 'popular vote' MORE than half the US didnt vote, so NO ONE got the popular vote.

    Out of those who DID vote, more than half DIDNT Vote for Hillary.

    But hey, just throw the way the U.S counts votes, because all it will result in is the smaller states wondering why they should stay in..

    "A snake changes its’ skin but underneath its’ new skin is exactly the same as the old.

    If it looks corrupt, smells corrupt and acts corrupt, guess what, it IS corrupt."

    *lmao* Yeah that's why you shouldnt vote for Hillary.. They bring up things about trump from about 10 years ago, mean while Hillarys crew is playing whack-a-mole *lol*

    " you mean like don’t treat your charity like a personal piggy bank, like don’t get caught being an ignorant racist or like don’t pay taxes, get caught doing it and then say you’re smart for not paying any. This is not to mention the plethora of lies he has told, denies saying them even when confronted by video evidence to the contrary."

    *RATFLMAO* And they say Americans have no sense of irony.

  24. Erik4872

    It's not "hacking" it's "social engineering"

    The one thing that I hope this teaches people is that using public email services for anything important is a really dumb idea. So many of these hacking stories actually turn out to be phishing attacks or social engineering, targeting a technically ignorant yet very powerful individual. I've seen this happen in corporate environments. Executives just ask their assistants to handle everything, and as we've seen here, the assistant just forwards the request to IT.

    Any corporate exec or politician who is still using hotmail, AOL or Gmail to conduct business is probably still of the mindset that they can't securely get their email from anywhere. iPhone and Android both support secure connections to corporate email accounts -- so 2FA means that you'd have to steal the user's phone to do your hacking. Hopefully both sides of the aisle will take this as a lesson and do some serious hiring on their IT teams to fix this.

  25. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    I don't understand

    Why, if he meant to say illegitimate, didn’t he just say ignore it and whatever you do don't click the link rather than the urgent request to change the password immediately? Am I missing something?

  26. TVU Silver badge

    A single typo may have tipped US election Trump's way

    I don't think it did but there was one crucial intervention that did have a significant effect which showed up in the polling and that the Clinton campaign never fully recovered from.

    That was the intervention by FBI Director John Comey in his letter to members of Congress telling them that his agents had reopened investigations into emails found on Hillary Clinton’s private server. Even though he subsequently cleared Clinton of any wrongdoing, the (great electoral) damage was already done.

  27. Anonymous Coward
    Facepalm

    Retrospective ass covering waffle.

    I recall reading that it was Guccifer that originally hacked Clintons server, as it was setup with little or no security. A so called specialist also failed to purge the email as a script was incorrectly implimented. I don't think you can be a specialist and have to ask Reddit for technical advice.

    1. Naselus

      Re: Retrospective ass covering waffle.

      You almost certainly didn't, since Guccifer never hacked Clinton's server. He revealed it existed by hacking Sidney Blumenthal's email, but had no access to Clinton's - and was, in fact, not even much of a hacker, simply guessing at passwords based on publicly-available information and very poor security practices.

      Confusingly, there was an entity called 'Guccifer 2.0' involved too, who definitely was a professional hacking crew. He claimed to be Romanian, but couldn't actually speak the language and so used Google Translate (very obviously) when challenged in his native tongue; he also used a Russian-language version of MS Word to draw up documents for some reason. Can't imagine why someone might use that, unless... just possibly... he was a Russian?

      There's basically no evidence that Clinton's private server was hacked. No-one really knew it existed. The original Guccifer revealed the server existed in 2013 (after Clinton had left State), but didn't have anything that would suggest he gained access; the Guccifer 2.0 entity released emails from the DNC and DCCC but nothing from Clinton herself, suggesting they never gained access either (they weren't actually active at the time). This isn't to say it wasn't poorly secured (it was still running Server 2003, ffs) or potentially illegal to use (soz Hil fans, but she really, genuinely did need to ask for authorization first) - but there's not real evidence of a breach, whereas the state dept itself definitely was compromised repeatedly for years.

      1. AnotherNobody

        Re: Retrospective ass covering waffle.

        So how EXACTLY did the the discovery of the Clinton email server come about then if it had not been breached by some person or group? Did she come forward and claim that she was running the server? Did the FBI discover it on their own? If it was simply a hack of another individual's email, how do we then know that the email server was insecure? You can't discern that from email headers.

        Are you attempting to tell this board that no entity or person penetrated the Clinton email server - ever?

        BTW, who among the "professional" hacking crews are not Romanian, Russian or some neighbor thereof?

        The Chinese are simply the 1000 monkeys in a room that eventually bang out War and Peace by mere happenstance, though they possess skill, it is not anything close to "Russian" skill sets.

        To attempt to simplify the hack to a round of password guessing in and of itself is simpleton in nature.

        The server may or may not have been penetrated by someone other than Guccifer, he may simply been part of the same IRC channel that another group may have been part of that actually did make penetration - who really knows and why does it even matter?

        The Russians have been in a full-fledged cyberwar (actually just war) with the US for nearly a decade and the GOV has done nothing but posturing - especially Obama... but wait, now they've made the DNC and Hillary Clinton look like morons... never mind, they did that on their own.

        NOW it is a huge concern, NOW it is front page news and only NOW is it criminal in nature?? Please!

        What IS known is that her conduct and the server was wrong in so many ways, with those that still want to argue that the wrongs may not have been worded exactly as some judge believes they should have been - doesn't change the deception and lies.

        This country is now reaping what is has been sowing for so many years. For far too long and for far too many, it's has been all about technicalities and "getting off" and seldom about respect, honor or an ethos that this country was originally founded on.

        It has become the country-wide, spoiled kid version of the Kardashians - can't wait for the big fail so we can move on...

  28. bbsimonbb

    I'm not at all convinced, and I would have liked more scepticism on your part. I'm inclined to listen to Assange, who says it was a DNC insider, or to Craig Murray, who takes an eminently Reg approach when he asks "Can you seriously imagine kremlin hackers calling themselves Cozy Bear?"

    All websites experience attacks from all over the place. All inboxes are phished. The Russian thing was a lie to get out of a tight spot before the election, that has become a campaign of not accepting the result since the election. And we were calling Trump demagogic, irresponsible. I cannot believe that a former secretary of state is juggling with world peace like this, frankly whether the Russians did it or not.

    1. Naselus

      "Craig Murray, who takes an eminently Reg approach when he asks "Can you seriously imagine kremlin hackers calling themselves Cozy Bear?""

      ... they don't. That's the name assigned to them by Western infosec experts. If you don't even have that awareness of the issue, then you probably aren't informed enough to make an assessment of the likely culprit, tbh. Much like Craig Murray, who has spent his life talking for a living, clearly isn't well enough informed to understand the problem either.

  29. PTW

    Turns out the Dems are cheating liars after all. More votes cast in 37% of Detroit precincts than they had voters.

    www.detroitnews.com/story/news/politics/2016/12/12/records-many-votes-detroits-precincts/95363314/

    And Hilary still didn't win, but it was still the Russians!

  30. aparryw

    Unconfirmed reports

    You do know that 'all but confirmed' can be more efficiently written as 'unconfirmed', Yeah

  31. Herby

    Now now...

    Let's get real. This country of mine (USA) also does influence peddling as well. Hell, we even attempt to influence elections (mostly with rhetoric, but ...). And does anyone investigate the good 'ol USA for such indiscretions? Nope.

    Recent example: Israel election a few years back. Thankfully it didn't work.

    More recent example: Brexit vote. I'll leave it to those residing in Blighty to determine which was the better result.

    1. anonymous boring coward Silver badge

      Re: Now now...

      " I'll leave it to those residing in Blighty to determine which was the better result."

      I would much, much rather have Trump for 4 years than Brexit for the rest of my life.

      1. StudeJeff

        Re: Now now...

        More likely 8 years...

    2. Tom 38

      Re: Now now...

      Let's get real. This country of mine (USA) also does influence peddling as well. Hell, we even attempt to influence elections (mostly with rhetoric, but ...).

      Ahahahaahahahahahaha! You make a funny!

  32. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    oh really? he's a moron not cumsy idiot. Even my kids would try that bull

  33. AnotherNobody

    I'm good with that...

    So the hack revealed the truth about a corrupt politician and their crew... I am good with that. It never seemed to bother anyone other than the "victim" in the past, so why is it a problem now? It is really simple, don't make a lifestyle of lying continuously and a living of being corrupt and you'll have nothing to fear. Russia or not, like them or not, how does that change the truths being told?

  34. Speeednet

    Still blaming the Russians? well I suppose it's to be expected, Obama is still blaming Bush eight years later.

  35. cactus joe

    This article sounds politicized

    "The Times story features intelligence officials, campaign insiders, and security firms laying blame at the feet of Russian president Vladimir Putin."

    These same security firms couldn't lay cyber attacks at anyone else's feet such as the Chinese. They swore that Hillary's server wasn't hacked and that hacks couldn't be attributed. Now they swear that they can attribute all the attacks over the past two years and know the motivations of the hackers.

    They also avoid all obvious alternative explanations such as the reason the Republicans weren't as victimized. That could have occured because their cyber security was better or because hackers exploited the weakest link because it offered better returns per dollar invested.

    What's more, the Republicans, assuming they are an opposition party, should insist that these now prescient analysts go back and review who attacked Hillary's server, what they got and what their motivations were. It should be less difficult than the DNC because their was less security.

    In other words, the mainstream coverage of this story leave a lot to be desired. In particular, some facts and the semantics behind the interpretations. Otherwise it seems prudent to dismiss these claims as more politically correct propaganda trying to block Trump or disable him.

  36. Alan Wilkinson

    This article doesn't make much sense. You don't need to go anywhere near the Democrats' private server to hack a Gmail account when some clown has given you the password.

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