Live data from Hacker News

No Thank You, Mr. Pecker

medium.com

451–460 of 783 posts

Re: No Thank You, Mr. Pecker

#451
post #440
post #437

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Didn't he pay off a former pornstar tons of money to stay quiet about having sex with him? Doesn't seem implausible when he's already paid millions in hush money to keep embarassing personal info from leaking.

So then blackmailing seems to be a viable strategy! Merely pointing at the contradiction.

Actually... yes. If you got some (obviously very narcisstic) person that's known to have paid (a lot) of hush money, then that person likely is a viable target for blackmail.

Re: No Thank You, Mr. Pecker

#452
post #285

It seems like a lot of people are not reading between the lines of this post. Bezos apparently believes that he was hacked by either the US or Saudi government and that now one or both of those governments are using the National Enquirer as an attack dog against him. That accusation is much bigger than any other piece of this story. EDIT: Here [1] is a reporter from the Washington Post backing that up. The Bezos' cam…

More interesting context: both David Pecker and AMI have cooperation deals with Mueller, and have admitted to killing stories about Trump during the election.

Re: No Thank You, Mr. Pecker

#453
post #421
post #285

It seems like a lot of people are not reading between the lines of this post. Bezos apparently believes that he was hacked by either the US or Saudi government and that now one or both of those governments are using the National Enquirer as an attack dog against him. That accusation is much bigger than any other piece of this story. EDIT: Here [1] is a reporter from the Washington Post backing that up. The Bezos' cam…

I really doubt that it was done by a US government entity. Trump is the president and all, but to hack and release (by a third party) the personal information if a citizen (not suspected or related to any crime) seems to me to be something that even Trump or his supporters can't do, the intelligence agencies just wouldn't do it in my opinion. The Saudis seem like a much more likely party to do it in my opinion, mostl…

What usually happens in these kind of things is mistress or partner shares images with friends and someone looks to profit or take vengeance behalf of cheated friend. I'm baffled nobody brings this up.

Re: No Thank You, Mr. Pecker

#454
post #418

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Given the open rows Trump had with the FBI and the CIA, that these agencies are filled with democrats and even republican sympathisers who think Trump should be impeached, and that an abuse of power is the very raison d’etre of the impeachment procedure, I don’t see how he would get to give such an order without the whole world knowing about it. Doesn’t pass the smell test. Foreign agency, different story. But there…

Replied to a different comment - but the same question applies here. Are you sure that they are a single entity, where people are of uniform opinion? And every single person follows law to the letter of it? Trump could request this task unofficially from someone as a 'favour' - the agency as a whole might not have access to the request.

In the second case, one might hope that those entities will check their audit logs and make sure no-one used the tools of the state for their own end.

Re: No Thank You, Mr. Pecker

#455
post #421

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I really doubt that it was done by a US government entity. Trump is the president and all, but to hack and release (by a third party) the personal information if a citizen (not suspected or related to any crime) seems to me to be something that even Trump or his supporters can't do, the intelligence agencies just wouldn't do it in my opinion. The Saudis seem like a much more likely party to do it in my opinion, mostl…

>>Trump is the president and all, but to hack and release (by a third party) the personal information if a citizen (not suspected or related to any crime) seems to me to be something that even Trump or his supporters can't doTrump is the president and all, but to hack and release (by a third party) the personal information if a citizen (not suspected or related to any crime) seems to me to be something that even Trum…

There's a chance I'm mostly just being hopeful, and you're right in both that Trump would totally support doing something like that, and that the intelligence agencies aren't a single entity.

>>For me it checks out - leaking informations sounds like something that Trump or his supporters would do. Why would not they, if they have the option to? Per the intelligence agencies - are you sure that they are a single entity, where people are of uniform opinion? And every single person follows law to the letter of it? There is the example that those services employed Snowden - if the services were so organised as to avoid such hacks, we would not have heard of Snowden.

But from my experience in other government entities, I believe that doing something like hacking into someone's phone, would require approval and support from high enough officials in those organizations, and so far it seems that these organization do still seem to remain professional and not involved in political actions by the president.

I agree that there might be (and I'm assuming there are) private Trump supporters in those agencies, that for example, would do 'a Snowden' and release classified and private information that they shouldn't. But that information first needs to gathered, and I don't think Jeff Bezos has done something to warrant previous gathering of information about him. (If information about Trump for example is released this way, it would seem more likely to me, because we know they collected that information while thinking he might be a spy).

But once again, I hope I'm not just being hopefully optimistic in my trust of 'the system'.

Re: No Thank You, Mr. Pecker

#456
post #365
post #285

It seems like a lot of people are not reading between the lines of this post. Bezos apparently believes that he was hacked by either the US or Saudi government and that now one or both of those governments are using the National Enquirer as an attack dog against him. That accusation is much bigger than any other piece of this story. EDIT: Here [1] is a reporter from the Washington Post backing that up. The Bezos' cam…

It really puts this tweet from POTUS last month in a crazy new context: "So sorry to hear the news about Jeff Bozo being taken down by a competitor whose reporting, I understand, is far more accurate than the reporting in his lobbyist newspaper, the Amazon Washington Post. Hopefully the paper will soon be placed in better & more responsible hands!" https://twitter.com/realdonaldtrump/status/10846274519830732... Stran…

Strange and terrifying.

Re: No Thank You, Mr. Pecker

#458
post #409

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> "Just blackmail the richest man on the planet, that will totally work!" Given the number of people and media who seem to be convinced without a doubt that Trump is being blackmailed by Russia...

We're talking about billionaires here, not Trump.

Who is of of them. So what's your point?

Re: No Thank You, Mr. Pecker

#459
post #421

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I really doubt that it was done by a US government entity. Trump is the president and all, but to hack and release (by a third party) the personal information if a citizen (not suspected or related to any crime) seems to me to be something that even Trump or his supporters can't do, the intelligence agencies just wouldn't do it in my opinion. The Saudis seem like a much more likely party to do it in my opinion, mostl…

>>Trump is the president and all, but to hack and release (by a third party) the personal information if a citizen (not suspected or related to any crime) seems to me to be something that even Trump or his supporters can't doTrump is the president and all, but to hack and release (by a third party) the personal information if a citizen (not suspected or related to any crime) seems to me to be something that even Trum…

It's somewhat plausible that an NSA employee might leak Bezos's nudes, it is not plausible that a US agency would hack his phone.

Re: No Thank You, Mr. Pecker

#460

The astonishingly un-subtle words of the lawyer involved surprised me: "That said, if your client agrees to cease and desist such defamatory behavior, we are willing to engage in constructive conversations regarding the texts and photos which we have in our possession." Is there any way that this could pass a professional ethics review? After reading more about him [1], I have to wonder: why this person still allowed…

The quoted portion was authored by Jon P. Fine (who actually worked for well over a decade at Amazon before ending up as General Counsel for AMI); Marty Singer represents Bezos in this case and the quoted portion is addressed at him.
Post reply on HN