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U.S. national-security leaders included me in a group chat

theatlantic.com

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Re: U.S. national-security leaders included me in a group chat

#451

Post by rafaelmn »

Animats wrote: post #447

Here's how Eisenhower dealt with a similar leak.[1] General Henry Miller made public comments about the secret date of the Allied invasion of Normandy in May 1944. He was a personal friend of Eisenhower. Eisenhower demoted him and sent him back to the US in disgrace. He wasn't court-martialed. [1] https://youtu.be/fD0IlFPTopA?t=269

I'm sorry but how in the hell is that a similar leak other than they are in the same category ?

Not justifying Trump administration but just seems like a whole different level of stakes.

Re: U.S. national-security leaders included me in a group chat

#452

Post by heyflyguy »

GVIrish wrote: post #408
ctrlp wrote: post #390

In my opinion there are at least two ways to interpret this: a) It's an unintentional opsec failure. Perhaps there was an address book collision with another intended user. Perhaps it was fat-fingered. This seems likely. b) It was an intentional leak. Perhaps overtly, perhaps covertly, by one or more of the channel members for unknown purposes. This seems less likely as there are better ways to leak with less blowbac…

Using Signal in this case is wrong and foolish full stop, and the extremely likely reason they did so is so they could escape standard government record keeping compliance (NARA). To start with, classified information is ONLY supposed to viewed in a SCIF. Secondly, it should never be loaded onto private devices. The private phones of national security leadership would be prime targets for every hostile intelligence a…

There are a ton of assumptions in here that have yet to be proven true.

Re: U.S. national-security leaders included me in a group chat

#454

Post by Buttons840 »

theoryofx wrote: post #411
anthomtb wrote: post #371

This hypocrisy reminds me of one of my former lead developers. He required everyone on the team to go through multi-person code reviews and pass an extensive CI suite before merging changes into our mainline. But him? Half that time he'd approve his own changes without review, the other half he would force-push and bypass the CI system entirely. He knew the system well and seemed to do enough local testing to avoid m…

He knew the system well and seemed to do enough local testing to avoid major breakage but still. Why have a bunch of rules and policies that you do not follow yourself? Because these rules and policies are for people that are judged to need them by the person with the authority and responsibility for making the decision. Policies like these always have a cost and (hopefully) a benefit. Presumably this lead dev judged…

As long as authority and responsibility land on the same person, I see no problem with it.

If, however, a junior develop is responsible for making a change, but has no authority to make the change, then there is a problem.

Re: U.S. national-security leaders included me in a group chat

#455

Post by Izkata »

ctrlp wrote: post #390

In my opinion there are at least two ways to interpret this: a) It's an unintentional opsec failure. Perhaps there was an address book collision with another intended user. Perhaps it was fat-fingered. This seems likely. b) It was an intentional leak. Perhaps overtly, perhaps covertly, by one or more of the channel members for unknown purposes. This seems less likely as there are better ways to leak with less blowbac…

I'd go with b: They've been talking for a while about finding information leaks, and the messages themselves seem a bit staged. They probably did it intentionally with different people, with slightly different wording, and because of which version got published they just identified a leak.

Re: U.S. national-security leaders included me in a group chat

#457

Post by joshuamerrill »

I began my career in a classified environment working on government satellite programs.

In my first week on the job, I was told, explicitly, that if I shared Classified or Controlled Unclassified information over unapproved channels, I would be reprimanded—likely fired, or less likely, prosecuted.

It was also made clear that safeguarding the nation's secrets from the carelessness of others was my responsibility, too.

It is mind-boggling that 18 people were on this thread, and none of them ever suggested that this discussion would be better served in a SCIF. To say nothing of SecDef starting the thread on Signal in the first place.

How many other such threads are active at the highest levels of government right now?

Does Chinese intelligence know?

I'm not suggesting punishment, or even prosecution, for the people involved. But the idea that this breach can occur with no accountability, consequences, or operational changes is unacceptable.

Re: U.S. national-security leaders included me in a group chat

#458

Post by bambax »

> The Signal chat group, I concluded, was almost certainly real. Having come to this realization, one that seemed nearly impossible only hours before, I removed myself from the Signal group

Why? Why not stay in the group indefinitely (or until found) and write stories sourced from a mysterious individual deep in the entrails of the Trump administration? That would have been absolutely specacular and could have resulted in a hilarious purge while the culprits searched in vain for a traitor in their ranks.

Re: U.S. national-security leaders included me in a group chat

#459

Post by jml7c5 »

Izkata wrote: post #455
ctrlp wrote: post #390

In my opinion there are at least two ways to interpret this: a) It's an unintentional opsec failure. Perhaps there was an address book collision with another intended user. Perhaps it was fat-fingered. This seems likely. b) It was an intentional leak. Perhaps overtly, perhaps covertly, by one or more of the channel members for unknown purposes. This seems less likely as there are better ways to leak with less blowbac…

I'd go with b: They've been talking for a while about finding information leaks, and the messages themselves seem a bit staged. They probably did it intentionally with different people, with slightly different wording, and because of which version got published they just identified a leak.

This doesn't make any sense. They were the ones who added the journalist to the chat. The chat wasn't covertly relayed to a journalist by one of the members.

Re: U.S. national-security leaders included me in a group chat

#460

Post by bcye »

sethammons wrote: post #413
asdff wrote: post #80

304 votes, 75 comments 3 hours after posting and this is already being thrown all the way back to 134 rank on the front page with some 2-3 day old posts. This is very clearly hacker news: a case of opsec slipup in easily the worst fashion coming straight from the SecDef (or one representing the SecDef). A shame it is probably getting flamed and downvoted over partisan reasons, although I know there are many conservat…

this site has some governors in place to prevent a flood of low quality engagement. If things rise too fast, they get pushed down a little and cool off and rise back up. No great conspiracy as I found this thread at the top of HN a day later.

Is there a place where all these rules are written? There's so much supposed meta-HN knowledge in the discussions
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