Using Private Email, Hillary Clinton Thwarted Record Requests • Hacker News Board

Re: Using Private Email, Hillary Clinton Thwarted Record Requests

#151

Post by joezydeco » Wed, Mar 04, 2015, 5:32 PM UTC

danielweber wrote: post #94

joezydeco wrote: post #22

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Cuomo's case seems even more egregious. He's allowing the destruction of government emails while a federal corruption investigation is going on: http://www.ibtimes.com/amid-federal-corruption-probe-andrew-...

Given that's black-letter illegal, I think that article isn't being quite accurate. You can have and create a document-deletion policy, no problem. But -- and I've had this drilled into me at multiple employers, because it's really important -- once you are told by legal that an investigation is under way, you don't delete them, no matter what, until legal tells you otherwise. You take active steps to preserve them i…

Why would anyone want to delete emails, period? Anything government-related, HRC's emails included, should be archived ten ways to Sunday and kept forever.

Re: Using Private Email, Hillary Clinton Thwarted Record Requests

#152

Post by freehunter » Wed, Mar 04, 2015, 5:50 PM UTC

jrs235 wrote: post #119

freehunter wrote: post #89

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In any other workplace, this would be called data leakage. This is why many companies use web filtering software to block other email providers.

Which is why employees should not use corporate resources (equipment, networks, time) to conduct personal business/affairs.

It's true. Some companies disallow it altogether. Everywhere else, it's just a bad idea (he says, typing this comment on his work laptop).

However, the answer is not to bring your personal equipment onto the corporate network. Which sucks because if you need to get something taken care of between 8 and 5, how are you going to manage that? Your options are limited if you don't have a guest network at work.

Re: Using Private Email, Hillary Clinton Thwarted Record Requests

#153

Post by loumf » Wed, Mar 04, 2015, 5:55 PM UTC

cmcpgh wrote: post #129

uxp wrote: post #51

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm sure they are. A dig on the current domain returns "clintonemail.com.inbound10.mxlogic.net." as one of the mail records, which has 4 A records, each which point to servers registered in Englewood, CO. Note that MXLogic is a managed email service provided by McAfee.

MXLogic is a spam filtering system - I've used it with clients before. It will filter and then re-send emails to whatever system you choose. The email isn't "hosted" at MXLogic unless you tell it to archive email for you. Its typical config is to block spam/viruses and send along.

AP now claims the MX was Google and then changed to MXLogic.

Given that and what you say, the most likely scenario IMO is that she was getting too much spam and asked whoever was taking care of her IT to do something. They decided to front-end her email with MXLogic and it's still going to Google (but of course, we don't know for sure).

If so, the whole premise of the article (Some people use Google, but Clinton built her own server) is false.

Meanwhile, the AP thinks that Clinton's MX choices have to do with her feelings about China.

http://bigstory.ap.org/article/b78ba433af3a45209668f745158d9...

In November 2012, without explanation, Clinton's private email account was reconfigured to use Google's servers as a backup in case her own personal email server failed, according to Internet records. That is significant because Clinton publicly supported Google's accusations in June 2011 that China's government had tried to break into the Google mail accounts of senior U.S. government officials. It was one of the first instances of a major American corporation openly accusing a foreign government of hacking.

Re: Using Private Email, Hillary Clinton Thwarted Record Requests

#154

Post by jrs235 » Wed, Mar 04, 2015, 6:24 PM UTC

freehunter wrote: post #152

jrs235 wrote: post #119

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Which is why employees should not use corporate resources (equipment, networks, time) to conduct personal business/affairs.

It's true. Some companies disallow it altogether. Everywhere else, it's just a bad idea (he says, typing this comment on his work laptop). However, the answer is not to bring your personal equipment onto the corporate network. Which sucks because if you need to get something taken care of between 8 and 5, how are you going to manage that? Your options are limited if you don't have a guest network at work.

Yup. (As I type this on my work computer too). It sucks. The limited options are go someplace over lunch to get it done, take PTO if your employer is inflexible, or find a new employer.

Your personal, private, and confidential dealings while using employer provided equipment, networks, and time are anything but those things.

Re: Using Private Email, Hillary Clinton Thwarted Record Requests

#155

Post by danielweber » Wed, Mar 04, 2015, 6:56 PM UTC

dragonwriter wrote: post #149

danielweber wrote: post #131

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Undoubtedly emails are records. This has been established in previous scandals from both parties that failed to retain them as required. In the corporate world, if there were a legal requirement for compliance, the auditor would verify that all work email is going over work servers, and then review the policies in place on those servers. You could technically let a special employee run their own server, but then that…

> In the corporate world, if there were a legal requirement for compliance, the auditor would verify that all work email is going over work servers Legal compliance audits that I have been involved in tend to go beyond what is unquestionably prohibited by the law and also seek to identify and eliminate activities which might arguably violate the law (and thus create legal risk) including, but not limited to, those wh…

As to #3, quoting from the article, as of 2009 (emphasis mine):

> agencies that allow employees to send and receive official electronic mail messages using a system not operated by the agency must ensure that federal records sent or received on such systems are preserved in the appropriate agency record-keeping system.

How did they ensure this? As a few news stories, including the linked article, have reported, they would have been immune from FOIA requests.

Here's another from http://www.politico.com/story/2015/03/hillary-clinton-used-p...

> The fact that Clinton’s emails were not a part of official State Department records until recently means many of them would not have been located in response to Freedom of Information Act requests, subpoenas or other document searches conducted over the past six years

Re: Using Private Email, Hillary Clinton Thwarted Record Requests

#156

Post by danielweber » Wed, Mar 04, 2015, 7:06 PM UTC

sukilot wrote: post #145

danielweber wrote: post #94

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Given that's black-letter illegal, I think that article isn't being quite accurate. You can have and create a document-deletion policy, no problem. But -- and I've had this drilled into me at multiple employers, because it's really important -- once you are told by legal that an investigation is under way, you don't delete them, no matter what, until legal tells you otherwise. You take active steps to preserve them i…

When the penalty for destroying evidence is less than the penalty for what the evidence proves... Did you know that people flush drugs down the toilet when cops knock on the door, in clear violation of the law?

IANAL but last time I went through compliance training, it was suggested that I could be personally criminally liable if my boss tells me to delete emails that I know have a legal hold on them.

I've also only seen this story in IBT, not elsewhere, and they carefully don't say that these records are part of the investigation, just that an investigation is happening and that emails are being deleted -- leaving it to the reader to connect the dots that don't necessarily exist.

Re: Using Private Email, Hillary Clinton Thwarted Record Requests

#157

Post by danielweber » Wed, Mar 04, 2015, 7:12 PM UTC

mkempe wrote: post #100

sanderjd wrote: post #63

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yeah, the reporting on it hasn't been great, because the details aren't the story, the story is the name "Hillary Clinton". I'm very curious about the details of how this stuff works for all officials. Are there rules? What are they? Who do they apply to? Are there actual laws? If so, what are they? But "An Investigation Into Government Email Policy" would never be run on its own.

Why do you think General Petraeus just pleaded guilty in court? because of "rules" or "laws"? did Hillary Clinton send and store classified material with her non-government email account? will the law apply to her the way it has been applied to Petraeus?

You can get clearance to store classified information at your home. For the vast majority of people it's nonsensical, but the Secretary of State is one of the few for whom I can see it without much trouble.

But this issue isn't (yet) about handling of classified material; it's about government oversight.

Re: Using Private Email, Hillary Clinton Thwarted Record Requests

#158

Post by danielweber » Wed, Mar 04, 2015, 7:14 PM UTC

Vula_Design wrote: post #83

LostInTheWoods2 wrote: post #78

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"The problem is, how do you stop it?" You stop it by holding people accountable for their actions. I manage to keep my work e-mail separate from my private e-mail, it's not hard.

Yes, but that is self regulation. I think the point here is that, short of having convenient Romanian hackers break into the personal accounts of high ranking officials from time to time to update us, the state and the public have no way of knowing if they are using personal accounts for some of their communication. The only way to get around this would be to actively monitor all web activity by these officials to en…

Various news reports say that Clinton literally did not have a state.gov address, so everyone she communicated with professionally for 4 years, including people at State, knew that she was communicating with her personal account. Not all of them were reporting to her, either.

Re: Using Private Email, Hillary Clinton Thwarted Record Requests

#159

Post by danielweber » Wed, Mar 04, 2015, 7:18 PM UTC

Bedon292 wrote: post #88

joshstrange wrote: post #48

From what I understand she is not the first secretary of state to do this (All her predecessors did as well) and the laws that require them to keep emails and/or use provided email were passed AFTER she held the position. I'll agree it's a bad practice but can we fault her for doing that same thing as the people before her when there was no law/rule/regulation to do otherwise?

This of course should not have been the case, but does seem to be. All of her predecessors appear to have used their personal emails as well. Kerry is the first one to use an official email. She left office at the beginning of 2013, while the official policy banning personal email went into effect at the end of 2013. http://www.thedailybeast.com/articles/2015/03/03/hillary-ema...

Careful when you say "the policy of banning personal email went into effect in 2013," because it might suggest to the casual reader that there weren't other requirements being violated. Such as the 2009 law that required the State Department to ensure that, regardless of which email system employees were using, that all emails were being retained properly.

Re: Using Private Email, Hillary Clinton Thwarted Record Requests

#160

Post by danielweber » Wed, Mar 04, 2015, 7:25 PM UTC

revelation wrote: post #36

Wissmania wrote: post #33

How is this supposed to be a scandal exactly? The issue seems to be that she could of hid something in her personal emails by not turning everything over. But couldn't any official have just used their gov email for "official business" and use their personal email for stuff they want to hide? Doesn't every politician actually do this? The fact that Clinton is letting personal correspondence mix with government corres…

Well yes, if we are discussing why it's illegal to use personal email for this kind of communication, you can't make the assumption that it's legal to use the personal email for hiding stuff and arrive at the conclusion there is no scandal. That's circular logic.

This "it could have been worse" is weird. The point of requirements to use official channels is two-fold:

1. It maintains an archive that can be used for accountability.

2. Anyone communicating with not-that-account can potentially flip to the watchdogs, making it harder to use unofficial communications.

I'm not so naive to think that those unofficial communications don't happen. I expect that most campaigns have used them for dirty laundry. It doesn't mean we get rid of the channels we can see.