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House panel looking into Reddit post about Clinton's email server

458 points by monochromatic 10y ago

danso 10y ago
The r/conspiracy thread where things unfolded: https://www.reddit.com/r/conspiracy/comments/53fw9x/bleachbit_i_may_be_facing_a_very_interesting/ https://www.reddit.com/r/conspiracy/comments/53fw9x/bleachbi... One of several archived copies of the r/exchangeserver thread, "Remove or replace to/from address on archived emails?" (the user stonetear deleted his account during the r/conspiracy thread): http://archive.is/FXcao http://archive.is/FXcao
- mhomde 10y ago
  Just when you thought this election couldn't get any weirder... there's a major scoop about Clinton on r/conspiracy
  - skylan_q 10y ago
    weirder you have to admit, (fears of things going one way or another set aside) it's been pretty entertaining.
    - deleted 10y ago
      [deleted]
    - WalterSear 10y ago
      As it will remain until a bleary, hungover morning in November.
  - nostromo 10y ago
    Hillary attacking the Pepe the Frog meme was the point at which I had to pinch myself to wake up.
    - Zpalmtree 10y ago
      M E M E M A G I C
    - gjolund 10y ago
      Don't Tread on Meme!
  - manachar 10y ago
    Even a broken clock is right twice a day.
    - gjolund 10y ago
      They have been right several times in the past couple months. /r/conspiracy and /r/the_donald have been pretty prophetic.
- Steeeve 10y ago
  Actually, it started at /r/the_donald, but was promptly removed for violating reddit's doxxing policy. Since then it's been spammed in a variety of low traffic subreddits in an effort to make it relevant news. Personally, I find it had to trust anything that comes out of reddit's political forums, as they are incredibly unreliable sources of information. (this included) The /r/exchangeserver communities top post of all time as of yesterday had 50 upvotes. The top post from 2 years ago had 25 and 13 comments. But somehow I'm supposed to believe that the best technical resource this guy could think of when faced with this investigation was reddit? Umm... No. I don't believe it for a second.
wNk6A23YB 10y ago
Of course they are. The House Kangaroo Court caucus is so out of ideas they're indulging the Alex Jones set. At some point the US government needs to look into recouping the costs of all this frivolous investigation from the Republican party or the congressmen themselves.
Mendenhall 10y ago
What amazes me besides him using familiar handle is that even after the investigation he left all those reddit posts up. Then he decides to try and delete them now after they are found.
- pg_is_a_butt 10y ago
  fun fact, your cell phone provider doesn't scan your text messages for "keywords" until you try to delete them... maybe he thought reddit worked the same way.
- Gargoyle 10y ago
  Deleting them now is just stupid panic. They've been found, they've been archived, they've been reported. The only thing deleting them does is make him look guilty as hell even if he's done nothing wrong at all.
  - eli 10y ago
    Or didn't think it was a big deal but was tired of redditors blowing up his inbox
  - imjustsaying 10y ago
    The guy never had any idea what he was doing. He made a help thread about how to find and replace text.
- skrowl 10y ago
  What amazes me is that a reddit user found it but somehow all of the FBI investigators didn't.
  - brianwawok 10y ago
    You are amazed a group of 100 million people knew something 6 guys in an office did not?
    - 10y ago
Normal_gaussian 10y ago
Interesting. Does anyone know if there is any form of signing the outlook data exports / live datastore that would prevent easy external programmatic replacement?
protomyth 10y ago
Regardless of your politics or beliefs of what happened, I think a simple bit of advice is truth: If you are going to run an e-mail server in difficult circumstances then hire a System Administrator who does not need to post obviously problematic questions to Reddit.
- gjolund 10y ago
  You get what you pay for.
  - deleted 10y ago
    [deleted]
- EpicEng 10y ago
  Under a freaking user name that can be easily traced back to them. I mean, seriously?
  - imron 10y ago
    And this is why the NSA collecting all data on everyone should have people worried. Sure, it's just pictures of your cat and 'my life is boring, they can spy on me all they want because they won't find anything interesting" And then 2 years later your post on an internet forums about your missing dog helps tie you the destruction of evidence.
    - EpicEng 10y ago
      I mean, yeah, but first and foremost you should probably strive to avoid committing felonies.
      - imron 10y ago
        I agree 100% with that too! The point is that even if you are posting innocuous things, it builds up a profile that can identify you in ways you do not expect. This example was for something serious. Who knows what the next example will be like.
xenadu02 10y ago
> "As a PST file or exported MSG files, this could be done though, yes? > The issue is that these emails involve the private email address of someone you'd recognize, and we're trying to replace it with a placeholder address as to not expose it." From the way it reads it looks like he is asking how to bulk remove an email address from the archived messages so when they are turned over they don't contain the redacted email address. I assume it would be embarrassing and/or problematic to share the email addresses of various ambassadors and other government officials in public records. You could also read something nefarious into it if you want. This whole fishing expedition is hilarious and transparently political. The Bush administration ran private email servers to avoid FOIA requests, then nuked millions of saved emails when his term was up to avoid handing them over. I didn't see any huge circus or massive outcry about that. The idea that we should be able to immediately read all the correspondence written by any public official also seems silly... it just encourages public officials not to use email. People are allowed to have private conversations. A reasonable compromise might be a time limit... say emails are held sealed for X years after leaving office, then made public?
- danso 10y ago
  The removal of private email addresses should be left to the State Department who was in charge of releasing those emails. In the emails released so far, Clinton's actual address has been removed from the To: field (physically, as in it was whited-out) as is at least one name from the From: field http://graphics.wsj.com/hillary-clinton-email-documents/pdfs/C05797218.pdf http://graphics.wsj.com/hillary-clinton-email-documents/pdfs... But I could see this as a result of incompetency, that is, the IT person didn't realize that it's not up to him to redact addresses, the State Dept. could do it. I know that sounds naive but we're talking about an IT person who posted this question on Reddit using an account easily connected to him, so, incompetency is inherent in the scenario. edit: Apparently, there is a Slashdot user named "StoneTear" who has been posting since 2002 and has made reference about working in government and knows about their data retention policies. So that mostly rules out the possibility of IT-guy-is-just-the-Senator's-nephew-in-law-who-got-asked-because-to-do-IT-because-no-one-else-was-around: https://news.slashdot.org/story/16/09/19/2239234/computer-specialist-who-deleted-clinton-emails-may-have-asked-reddit-for-tips https://news.slashdot.org/story/16/09/19/2239234/computer-sp...
ksubedi 10y ago
I got this from reddit but someone made a wordpress page with 4 years of his account history : https://paulcombetta.wordpress.com https://paulcombetta.wordpress.com
- harryf 10y ago
  There's enough personal information in there to confirm his identity - a picture of him with that dog would already be enough.
iamdave 10y ago
This is interesting. I was up drinking beer with a friend until 5am this morning talking about the very phenomenon of breaking news coming from social media and sites such as Reddit. He pointed to the Boston bombing and Dallas shooter situations as reasons why the press should "just ignore" social media; his entire argument boiled down to 'bad data exists along side good data, therefore throw it all out" I didn't necessarily disagree that there are moments where we got it wrong, for sure. I tried arguing that using those events as a point of reference for insulating journalism a bit better was probably a good idea; you know "first step to overcoming a problem is admitting you have one" and he was having none of it. Maybe this story will do the trick. Really curious to see where this goes taking some points from that debate.
- adamrezich 10y ago
  The Boston Marathon bombing fiasco was the result of reddit trying to deduce stuff in the real world based on photos and video and the like. This is reddit trying to deduce information based on reddit posts, on reddit. I think that's an important distinction.
  - meowface 10y ago
    It also definitely wasn't just reddit. Tons of people on 4chan, Twitter, and various forums were all looking into that "suspect".
  - iamdave 10y ago
    I think so too, and that's a distinction that I tried in our debate to bring up. Broadly, my entire argument was around the use of social media, or at least the existence of social media bringing many new points of reference when looking at historical events in ways we didn't have before, and that if one wanted to, they could go and mine tweets, shares, likes, reddit posts from a fixed point in time and look at sentiment. Well, because some sentiments were wrong (in his opinion because people like Kim Kardashian are allowed to tweet), the whole notion needed to be thrown out. So I agree, it's an important distinction-though that distinction is inherently part of the "riddle" so-to-speak.
- 10y ago
gjolund 10y ago
This is pretty huge. It establishes intent.
jimmywanger 10y ago
The actual facts aside, this makes her appear far less electable, as her campaign camp looks like it's being run by a bunch of clowns. Just from a PR perspective, this could not have come at a worse time. The collapse at the 9/11 memorial, the "basket of deplorables", and the mention of the Pepe meme on her official website. Right after a couple of muslim terror attacks, some evidence surfaces purporting that she tried to cover up email indiscretions? Most people do believe that where there's smoke, there's fire. And this cluster of events can't be good.
- imron 10y ago
  > as her campaign camp looks like it's being run by a bunch of ~~clowns~~ as her campaign camp looks like it's being run by a bunch of criminals who delete incriminating evidence. FTFY
  - jimmywanger 10y ago
    > being run by a bunch of criminals who delete incriminating evidence. I have no problems accepting the fact that politicians might hire crooks to do some things that are extra legal. The fact that they're incompetent criminals who get caught and who don't understand the internet, that worries me.
    - sillysaurus3 10y ago
      Can you help me understand your point of view?
      - jimmywanger 10y ago
        It might be kind of silly, but I think that the US government has to do a lot of shady things to ensure that we have a high standard of living and more of our share of natural resources. Look up the origin of the term "banana republic" if you don't believe me. Or just look through how many things we did in South/Central America due to the doctrine of manifest destiny. So if we have to do something bad to ensure a steady supply of oil at a reasonable price, sure. I can accept that. But we should be discerning enough to figure out who to hire, and how to GET AWAY WITH IT to avoid repercussions. If you're the president, there's a lot more at stake here than your campaign - we're talking about full blown war.
peteretep 10y ago
> Citation needed if you're > going to "correct the record." This is not Reddit, and it is not a place for accusing people of being paid shills. Please desist.
- Tinyyy 10y ago
  Why is this getting down voted? There's no place for these accusations on HN. Using them to silence discussions is very arrogant because you're implying that people disagreeing with you are not capable of independent thought.
  - throwaway2016b 10y ago
    Is it? HN has a history of patently obvious shills and downvote brigades policing various topics. Paul Graham and Sam Altman are publicly supporting and creating various PACs with the aim of swinging the election in favor of Hillary, to say nothing of what their hyperbolic language reveals about their loyalties. Is it really so hard to believe that there could be paid political shills operating on here? CTR pays people to spam 4chan ffs, I think they can spare a few people for a tiny site with disproportionate influence like HN.
    - saboot 10y ago
      > Is it really so hard to believe that there could be paid political shills operating on here? Yes > CTR pays people to spam 4chan [Citation Needed]
- deleted 10y ago
  [deleted]
- mkopinsky 10y ago
  Where did he accuse anyone of that? All he asked for is a citation.
  - Tinyyy 10y ago
    http://correctrecord.org/about/ http://correctrecord.org/about/ >Correct The Record is a strategic research and rapid response team designed to defend Hillary Clinton from baseless attacks.
CamperBob2 10y ago
Long-shot speculation: I wonder if the Democrats have decided that Hillary is going to lose against Trump. Maybe they, and not the GOP, are throwing her under a very fast bus. Does anyone know what happens in the unlikely event that Clinton is placed under indictment before the election? Does Kaine move up the ticket? Does the DNC pick someone else entirely? What options do the electors have?
- spinlock 10y ago
  Same thing that will happen with Trump although whatever that is isn't very clear. Though, I think it's a long shot that you indite clinton over this. She should be insulated. Trump, on the other hand, has been indited for TrumpU
  - skylan_q 10y ago
    National security issues brought into question vs. possible scam. Different issues. One disqualifies handling of sensitive info and public records, the other, trust in being ethical.
    - 794CD01 10y ago
      More relevantly, both disqualifying.
      - pessimizer 10y ago
        There's no qualification to be POTUS other than your age and whether you were born American.
        001sky 10y ago
        well there are other laws (eg violations of certain statutes that some accuse clinton of breeching) but there is no per se morality test in terms of ideas. The latter is a fundamental pillar of separation of powers.
- 10y ago
carsongross 10y ago
Reddit and the chans: the journalists we need, but not the ones we deserve.
- deleted 10y ago
  [deleted]
- puppetmaster3 10y ago
  Funny. I wonder if corporate media will bring up this story.
takeda 10y ago
And she still will be elected, because this year we had to have joke candidates on both sides. I guess it's probably the best time to vote 3rd party.
- mindcrime 10y ago
  I honestly can't understand how anybody is considering voting for Clinton or Trump. If this world was anything close to reasonable, Gary Johnson would win in a landslide. shrug
  - deleted 10y ago
    [deleted]
  - losvedir 10y ago
    As a Gary Johnson supporter myself, I freely admit that he has some extreme policies that can turn off a lot of voters. But what really frustrates me is how many people I've heard from that do prefer him but are afraid to vote for him because of the spoiler effect. I keep (wishful thinking) envisioning a scenario where he gets just enough votes that all of a sudden everyone on the fence realizes that maybe he could win and joins in, and then he launches ahead Wishful thinking and politics aside: there's a term for that phenomenon on the tip of my tongue, but I can't quite place it. Can anyone think of one? Where there's a slow growth until you get just enough of something and then it takes off?
    - mindcrime 10y ago
      But what really frustrates me is how many people I've heard from that do prefer him but are afraid to vote for him because of the spoiler effect. Yeah, I know what you mean. It's just that this time around, BOTH "major party" choices are SO bad, that you look at it and think "who cares whether Gigantic Douche or Turd Sandwich wins?" Ya know?
    - soemoea 10y ago
      Isn't this called a tipping point?
bpchaps 10y ago
I highly recommend that many others use FOIA to gather communication records of their elected officials. About a month ago I received this pdf [1] (1700+ pages of email records) of Chicago's office of the mayor after about three months of resistance. Prior to that, it took a year and a half and a law suit to receive one week's worth of Chicago's mayor's logs [2] through Chicago's IT department. To my knowledge, prior to this work, records in volume have been impossible to get due to asinine rejections. The amount or resistance (and holy shit was there a lot) led me to run several chains of FOIA requests to gather bulk communication records. Of note in the call records are many private investigator calls. I haven't had much chance to go through the email records and could use some help if anybody's interested. [1] https://spaces.hightail.com/receive/oFwvr/fi-29853345-5f15-4a34-9ba0-67ecf8c0d193/fv-3251eaf6-fb70-46d4-9f26-f85221c13317/DOIT%20--%20domain%20name%20log.pdf https://spaces.hightail.com/receive/oFwvr/fi-29853345-5f15-4... [2] https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1hgG79eIr8MbkjYrCvcTRN8n876KL8aXYYu5it8Lg0g8/edit https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1hgG79eIr8MbkjYrCvcTR... (four, mostly unstructured sheets)
mark_l_watson 10y ago
I am getting even unhappier with the democratic national committee ranking members who did what they could to sabotage Sander's run for the nomination. Just my opinion, but as a democrat I think Sanders would have such an easier time winning the general election. I would like to see a major magazine do a "public shaming" article on the leading DNC actors who acted unfairly and non-ethically. I would like history to trash these people because they deserve it.
GirlsCanCode 10y ago
Reddit, shamefully, deleted the posts and deleted threads about it instead of turning them over to Law Enforcement.
CptJamesCook 10y ago
"The Reddit message was sent on July 23, 2014, according to an archive of the page saved by other users. The day before, the Benghazi Committee had reached an agreement with the State Department on the production of related records"
PKop 10y ago
You're literally repeating clinton talking points. Do you think you're contributing to the discussion amongst people that in no way believe any of the garbage you just wrote?
- dang 10y ago
  Please take care to remain civil when commenting here. We detached this comment from https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=12536216 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=12536216 and marked it off-topic.
alecco 10y ago
The original HN post got flagged and removed from HN homepage. https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=12533757 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=12533757 250 points (more than this post at the moment)
- Mao_Zedang 10y ago
  Be nice to see an explanation from our moderating overlords
  - dang 10y ago
    You mean your moderating servants? At the time, there were multiple posts of the same story competing for attention, so a mod marked all but one as a dupe. But then that surviving one got heavily flagged. We reduced them at one point (https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=12534542 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=12534542) but the flags kept coming. I think what's going on here (and what I just told the other moderators) is that this is one of those times when our standard practices around things like dupes and downweights—e.g. for political controversies—don't apply. This doesn't happen very often, perhaps once every couple weeks. In such cases the community will is unmistakeable, the story will keep coming up until it gets an airing, and our job is to let that happen. I like it much better when we call these right from the beginning, but what are the odds that an r/conspiracy Hillary investigation would turn into a solid HN thread? Too small for the human eye, and no set of moderation rules can operate at that fine a grain.
    - douche 10y ago
      This happens with every single story that touches on this subject. Over the course of the summer it's happened time after time - the flag brigade gets almost all of them. After the flag-killed story today was reset, it still never showed up on the main page, despite hundreds of votes, although it did show up on /classic.
      - dang 10y ago
        Sure; nearly all those stories are off topic for HN: https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html I assume this one's different because of the Reddit connection.
Dagwoodie 10y ago
I have yet to see a single example of Trump's racism. It's an oft repeated cliche that has yet to be demonstrated by anyone. As much of a "clown" as trump might be, half of his labels are completely pulled out of thin air.
- douche 10y ago
  It's one of those blanket cliches that gets applied reflexively. For a not insignificant sliver of the population, "Republican" == "racist" is an axiom, all evidence for, against, or sideways be damned.
- yolesaber 10y ago
  Trump was sued repeatedly in the 70s for racially prejudiced housing policies. In the 80s he was accused of racist employment practices in his casinos. In this election he has repeatedly retweeted and positively engaged with white supremacists on twitter. He has retweeted (false) racially-charged statistics. http://www.nytimes.com/2016/07/24/opinion/sunday/is-donald-trump-a-racist.html?_r=0 http://www.nytimes.com/2016/07/24/opinion/sunday/is-donald-t...
  - Dagwoodie 10y ago
    I sympathize with the alleged prejudiced housing policies, if they are in fact true. I don't get the outrage about tweets. The tweets that got re-tweeted weren't racist in the least, is the guy or gal in charge of his Twitter account (I assume it's not him, i'll give you that) supposed to look at the history of every tweeter to see if tweets they come across are from racists? If anything, one of the staffers doing the retweet screwed up and didn't vet the messenger, but that's hardly a blemish on Trump other than "lesson learned, vet your tweets better." Edit: Some of the tweets he's re-tweeted are pretty questionable, i'll give you that much. I only saw a couple before, one about Jeb Bush which one article had as it's prime example so I was pretty confused.
- maxerickson 10y ago
  How do you characterize his remarks about Ghazala Khan maybe not being allowed to speak?
deleted 10y ago
[deleted]
- deleted 10y ago
  [deleted]
colemickens 10y ago
What's wrong with HRC calling white supremacists and nationalists deplorable? (edit: I'll proudly take downvotes for calling a spade a spade.)
- hiram112 10y ago
  Because she's trying to assign guilt by association. I'm sure most people that support white supremacy are, in fact, Trump supporters. Does that logically make all Trump supporters white supremacists? And what is wrong with a bit of Nationalism? I personally feel globalization has most been a clever campaign to allow large business to play wage arbitrage. The current division of wealth in the US supports my idea.
  - tootie 10y ago
    White nationalists support him more than any other Republican candidate and it's largely because he panders to them with thinly veiled or occasionally overt racism.
    - deleted 10y ago
      [deleted]
    - adamrezich 10y ago
      I think everyone who supports a Republican candidate supports Trump more than any other Republican candidate at the moment, seeing as how, y'know, the party picked him to represent them in this election. This doesn't prove anything?
      - colemickens 10y ago
        Other than the fact that dozens of prominent Republicans have rejected him? Including former Republican Presidents of the United States... who have come out and said they will vote for HRC, and that they do so because they can't bring themselves to vote for a tyrannical monster?
throwaway2016b 10y ago
Meanwhile there is a picture of Hillary embracing a KKK member that the corrupt media refuses to mention. The kingmakers don't give a good goddamn about racism, except as a convenient narrative for purges. The 21st century equivalent of accusations of communism. https://i.sli.mg/FdqTAx.jpg https://i.sli.mg/FdqTAx.jpg https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Robert_Byrd https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Robert_Byrd “It is almost impossible to imagine the United States Senate without Robert Byrd. He was not just its longest serving member, he was its heart and soul. From my first day in the Senate, I sought out his guidance, and he was always generous with his time and his wisdom.” -- Hillary Clinton
- zimzam 10y ago
  By the end of his career Robert Byrd was a repentant, former KKK member. Trump is being embraced by current, active KKK members. It is obtuse to pretend there's no difference between the two. From your own Wikipedia link: "In his last autobiography, Byrd explained that he was a KKK member because he "was sorely afflicted with tunnel vision — a jejune and immature outlook — seeing only what I wanted to see because I thought the Klan could provide an outlet for my talents and ambitions."[23] Byrd also said, in 2005, "I know now I was wrong. Intolerance had no place in America. I apologized a thousand times ... and I don't mind apologizing over and over again. I can't erase what happened."[13]"
  - throwaway2016b 10y ago
    >By the end of his career Robert Byrd was a repentant, former KKK member. So is David Duke, that didn't stop them from trying to get Trump to "denounce" him, and he didn't even know the guy. >user: zimzam >created: 4 minutes ago Thank you for Correcting The Record.
  - hueving 10y ago
    >Trump is being embraced by current, active KKK members. Being embraced by and embracing are very different things. There are statistically going to be child rapists that support both candidates, does that make them both child rapists?
- 10y ago
DigitalSea 10y ago
Even with proof, nothing will come of this. Sadly it seems the rules are different for anyone in power to get away with questionable choices and decisions. It has to be more than coincidental that Hillary Clinton has this much controversy surrounding her, some might say it's just conspiracy theory fodder, but let's be honest: she has obviously done some shady things, to the point where they can't even be adequately covered up anymore. I don't want Clinton or Trump to be the next POTUS. I think they're both inadequate for the position.
tez598 10y ago
http://www.domeseo.com/%E0%B8%AA%E0%B8%AD%E0%B8%99-seo/ http://www.domeseo.com/%E0%B8%AA%E0%B8%AD%E0%B8%99-seo/
tez598 10y ago
http://www.domeseo.com/%E0%B8%AA%E0%B8%AD%E0%B8%99-seo/ http://www.domeseo.com/%E0%B8%AA%E0%B8%AD%E0%B8%99-seo/
jlj 10y ago
"Combetta appeared under subpoena in a committee hearing last week on the alleged destruction of evidence, but both he and colleague Bill Thornton exercised their Fifth Amendment right not to testify." Actually it's the Fifth Amendment protection against self incrimination.
syphilis2 10y ago
The US News and World Report article is also a nice primer on this issue. http://www.usnews.com/news/articles/2016-09-19/paul-combetta-computer-specialist-who-deleted-hillary-clinton-emails-may-have-asked-reddit-for-tips http://www.usnews.com/news/articles/2016-09-19/paul-combetta... I have not seen this reported on by any major US news media. (FOX, CNN, MSNBC, ABC, CBS, NBC, NPR, PBS) Other than The Hill, US News, various right-wing sources, and VICE I don't see anyone writing about this. It reminds me of the first hour or two after Hillary's episode at the 9/11 event where the only major news source reporting was Fox News. Is this something people are interested in? Is there an obligation to report on this nationally?
- mikeburrelljr 10y ago
  Fox News has now picked this up: "Clinton email wiper appears to have asked online how to hide 'VIP' info" http://www.foxnews.com/politics/2016/09/20/clinton-email-wiper-appears-to-have-asked-online-how-to-hide-vip-info.html http://www.foxnews.com/politics/2016/09/20/clinton-email-wip...
stonetear 10y ago
This is what I get for not logging out of reddit at work.

458 points by monochromatic 10y ago

danso 10y ago

The r/conspiracy thread where things unfolded: https://www.reddit.com/r/conspiracy/comments/53fw9x/bleachbit_i_may_be_facing_a_very_interesting/ https://www.reddit.com/r/conspiracy/comments/53fw9x/bleachbi... One of several archived copies of the r/exchangeserver thread, "Remove or replace to/from address on archived emails?" (the user stonetear deleted his account during the r/conspiracy thread): http://archive.is/FXcao http://archive.is/FXcao

mhomde 10y ago
Just when you thought this election couldn't get any weirder... there's a major scoop about Clinton on r/conspiracy
- skylan_q 10y ago
  weirder you have to admit, (fears of things going one way or another set aside) it's been pretty entertaining.
  - deleted 10y ago
    [deleted]
  - WalterSear 10y ago
    As it will remain until a bleary, hungover morning in November.
- nostromo 10y ago
  Hillary attacking the Pepe the Frog meme was the point at which I had to pinch myself to wake up.
  - Zpalmtree 10y ago
    M E M E M A G I C
  - gjolund 10y ago
    Don't Tread on Meme!
- manachar 10y ago
  Even a broken clock is right twice a day.
  - gjolund 10y ago
    They have been right several times in the past couple months. /r/conspiracy and /r/the_donald have been pretty prophetic.
Steeeve 10y ago
Actually, it started at /r/the_donald, but was promptly removed for violating reddit's doxxing policy. Since then it's been spammed in a variety of low traffic subreddits in an effort to make it relevant news. Personally, I find it had to trust anything that comes out of reddit's political forums, as they are incredibly unreliable sources of information. (this included) The /r/exchangeserver communities top post of all time as of yesterday had 50 upvotes. The top post from 2 years ago had 25 and 13 comments. But somehow I'm supposed to believe that the best technical resource this guy could think of when faced with this investigation was reddit? Umm... No. I don't believe it for a second.

wNk6A23YB 10y ago

Of course they are. The House Kangaroo Court caucus is so out of ideas they're indulging the Alex Jones set. At some point the US government needs to look into recouping the costs of all this frivolous investigation from the Republican party or the congressmen themselves.

Mendenhall 10y ago

What amazes me besides him using familiar handle is that even after the investigation he left all those reddit posts up. Then he decides to try and delete them now after they are found.

pg_is_a_butt 10y ago
fun fact, your cell phone provider doesn't scan your text messages for "keywords" until you try to delete them... maybe he thought reddit worked the same way.
Gargoyle 10y ago
Deleting them now is just stupid panic. They've been found, they've been archived, they've been reported. The only thing deleting them does is make him look guilty as hell even if he's done nothing wrong at all.
- eli 10y ago
  Or didn't think it was a big deal but was tired of redditors blowing up his inbox
- imjustsaying 10y ago
  The guy never had any idea what he was doing. He made a help thread about how to find and replace text.
skrowl 10y ago
What amazes me is that a reddit user found it but somehow all of the FBI investigators didn't.
- brianwawok 10y ago
  You are amazed a group of 100 million people knew something 6 guys in an office did not?
  - 10y ago

Normal_gaussian 10y ago

Interesting. Does anyone know if there is any form of signing the outlook data exports / live datastore that would prevent easy external programmatic replacement?

protomyth 10y ago

Regardless of your politics or beliefs of what happened, I think a simple bit of advice is truth: If you are going to run an e-mail server in difficult circumstances then hire a System Administrator who does not need to post obviously problematic questions to Reddit.

gjolund 10y ago
You get what you pay for.
- deleted 10y ago
  [deleted]
EpicEng 10y ago
Under a freaking user name that can be easily traced back to them. I mean, seriously?
- imron 10y ago
  And this is why the NSA collecting all data on everyone should have people worried. Sure, it's just pictures of your cat and 'my life is boring, they can spy on me all they want because they won't find anything interesting" And then 2 years later your post on an internet forums about your missing dog helps tie you the destruction of evidence.
  - EpicEng 10y ago
    I mean, yeah, but first and foremost you should probably strive to avoid committing felonies.
    - imron 10y ago
      I agree 100% with that too! The point is that even if you are posting innocuous things, it builds up a profile that can identify you in ways you do not expect. This example was for something serious. Who knows what the next example will be like.

xenadu02 10y ago

> "As a PST file or exported MSG files, this could be done though, yes? > The issue is that these emails involve the private email address of someone you'd recognize, and we're trying to replace it with a placeholder address as to not expose it." From the way it reads it looks like he is asking how to bulk remove an email address from the archived messages so when they are turned over they don't contain the redacted email address. I assume it would be embarrassing and/or problematic to share the email addresses of various ambassadors and other government officials in public records. You could also read something nefarious into it if you want. This whole fishing expedition is hilarious and transparently political. The Bush administration ran private email servers to avoid FOIA requests, then nuked millions of saved emails when his term was up to avoid handing them over. I didn't see any huge circus or massive outcry about that. The idea that we should be able to immediately read all the correspondence written by any public official also seems silly... it just encourages public officials not to use email. People are allowed to have private conversations. A reasonable compromise might be a time limit... say emails are held sealed for X years after leaving office, then made public?

danso 10y ago
The removal of private email addresses should be left to the State Department who was in charge of releasing those emails. In the emails released so far, Clinton's actual address has been removed from the To: field (physically, as in it was whited-out) as is at least one name from the From: field http://graphics.wsj.com/hillary-clinton-email-documents/pdfs/C05797218.pdf http://graphics.wsj.com/hillary-clinton-email-documents/pdfs... But I could see this as a result of incompetency, that is, the IT person didn't realize that it's not up to him to redact addresses, the State Dept. could do it. I know that sounds naive but we're talking about an IT person who posted this question on Reddit using an account easily connected to him, so, incompetency is inherent in the scenario. edit: Apparently, there is a Slashdot user named "StoneTear" who has been posting since 2002 and has made reference about working in government and knows about their data retention policies. So that mostly rules out the possibility of IT-guy-is-just-the-Senator's-nephew-in-law-who-got-asked-because-to-do-IT-because-no-one-else-was-around: https://news.slashdot.org/story/16/09/19/2239234/computer-specialist-who-deleted-clinton-emails-may-have-asked-reddit-for-tips https://news.slashdot.org/story/16/09/19/2239234/computer-sp...

ksubedi 10y ago

I got this from reddit but someone made a wordpress page with 4 years of his account history : https://paulcombetta.wordpress.com https://paulcombetta.wordpress.com

harryf 10y ago
There's enough personal information in there to confirm his identity - a picture of him with that dog would already be enough.

iamdave 10y ago

This is interesting. I was up drinking beer with a friend until 5am this morning talking about the very phenomenon of breaking news coming from social media and sites such as Reddit. He pointed to the Boston bombing and Dallas shooter situations as reasons why the press should "just ignore" social media; his entire argument boiled down to 'bad data exists along side good data, therefore throw it all out" I didn't necessarily disagree that there are moments where we got it wrong, for sure. I tried arguing that using those events as a point of reference for insulating journalism a bit better was probably a good idea; you know "first step to overcoming a problem is admitting you have one" and he was having none of it. Maybe this story will do the trick. Really curious to see where this goes taking some points from that debate.

adamrezich 10y ago
The Boston Marathon bombing fiasco was the result of reddit trying to deduce stuff in the real world based on photos and video and the like. This is reddit trying to deduce information based on reddit posts, on reddit. I think that's an important distinction.
- meowface 10y ago
  It also definitely wasn't just reddit. Tons of people on 4chan, Twitter, and various forums were all looking into that "suspect".
- iamdave 10y ago
  I think so too, and that's a distinction that I tried in our debate to bring up. Broadly, my entire argument was around the use of social media, or at least the existence of social media bringing many new points of reference when looking at historical events in ways we didn't have before, and that if one wanted to, they could go and mine tweets, shares, likes, reddit posts from a fixed point in time and look at sentiment. Well, because some sentiments were wrong (in his opinion because people like Kim Kardashian are allowed to tweet), the whole notion needed to be thrown out. So I agree, it's an important distinction-though that distinction is inherently part of the "riddle" so-to-speak.
10y ago

gjolund 10y ago

This is pretty huge. It establishes intent.

jimmywanger 10y ago

The actual facts aside, this makes her appear far less electable, as her campaign camp looks like it's being run by a bunch of clowns. Just from a PR perspective, this could not have come at a worse time. The collapse at the 9/11 memorial, the "basket of deplorables", and the mention of the Pepe meme on her official website. Right after a couple of muslim terror attacks, some evidence surfaces purporting that she tried to cover up email indiscretions? Most people do believe that where there's smoke, there's fire. And this cluster of events can't be good.

imron 10y ago
> as her campaign camp looks like it's being run by a bunch of ~~clowns~~ as her campaign camp looks like it's being run by a bunch of criminals who delete incriminating evidence. FTFY
- jimmywanger 10y ago
  > being run by a bunch of criminals who delete incriminating evidence. I have no problems accepting the fact that politicians might hire crooks to do some things that are extra legal. The fact that they're incompetent criminals who get caught and who don't understand the internet, that worries me.
  - sillysaurus3 10y ago
    Can you help me understand your point of view?
    - jimmywanger 10y ago
      It might be kind of silly, but I think that the US government has to do a lot of shady things to ensure that we have a high standard of living and more of our share of natural resources. Look up the origin of the term "banana republic" if you don't believe me. Or just look through how many things we did in South/Central America due to the doctrine of manifest destiny. So if we have to do something bad to ensure a steady supply of oil at a reasonable price, sure. I can accept that. But we should be discerning enough to figure out who to hire, and how to GET AWAY WITH IT to avoid repercussions. If you're the president, there's a lot more at stake here than your campaign - we're talking about full blown war.

peteretep 10y ago

> Citation needed if you're > going to "correct the record." This is not Reddit, and it is not a place for accusing people of being paid shills. Please desist.

Tinyyy 10y ago
Why is this getting down voted? There's no place for these accusations on HN. Using them to silence discussions is very arrogant because you're implying that people disagreeing with you are not capable of independent thought.
- throwaway2016b 10y ago
  Is it? HN has a history of patently obvious shills and downvote brigades policing various topics. Paul Graham and Sam Altman are publicly supporting and creating various PACs with the aim of swinging the election in favor of Hillary, to say nothing of what their hyperbolic language reveals about their loyalties. Is it really so hard to believe that there could be paid political shills operating on here? CTR pays people to spam 4chan ffs, I think they can spare a few people for a tiny site with disproportionate influence like HN.
  - saboot 10y ago
    > Is it really so hard to believe that there could be paid political shills operating on here? Yes > CTR pays people to spam 4chan [Citation Needed]
deleted 10y ago
[deleted]
mkopinsky 10y ago
Where did he accuse anyone of that? All he asked for is a citation.
- Tinyyy 10y ago
  http://correctrecord.org/about/ http://correctrecord.org/about/ >Correct The Record is a strategic research and rapid response team designed to defend Hillary Clinton from baseless attacks.

CamperBob2 10y ago

Long-shot speculation: I wonder if the Democrats have decided that Hillary is going to lose against Trump. Maybe they, and not the GOP, are throwing her under a very fast bus. Does anyone know what happens in the unlikely event that Clinton is placed under indictment before the election? Does Kaine move up the ticket? Does the DNC pick someone else entirely? What options do the electors have?

spinlock 10y ago
Same thing that will happen with Trump although whatever that is isn't very clear. Though, I think it's a long shot that you indite clinton over this. She should be insulated. Trump, on the other hand, has been indited for TrumpU
- skylan_q 10y ago
  National security issues brought into question vs. possible scam. Different issues. One disqualifies handling of sensitive info and public records, the other, trust in being ethical.
  - 794CD01 10y ago
    More relevantly, both disqualifying.
    - pessimizer 10y ago
      There's no qualification to be POTUS other than your age and whether you were born American.
      - 001sky 10y ago
        well there are other laws (eg violations of certain statutes that some accuse clinton of breeching) but there is no per se morality test in terms of ideas. The latter is a fundamental pillar of separation of powers.
10y ago

carsongross 10y ago

Reddit and the chans: the journalists we need, but not the ones we deserve.

deleted 10y ago
[deleted]
puppetmaster3 10y ago
Funny. I wonder if corporate media will bring up this story.

takeda 10y ago

And she still will be elected, because this year we had to have joke candidates on both sides. I guess it's probably the best time to vote 3rd party.

mindcrime 10y ago
I honestly can't understand how anybody is considering voting for Clinton or Trump. If this world was anything close to reasonable, Gary Johnson would win in a landslide. shrug
- deleted 10y ago
  [deleted]
- losvedir 10y ago
  As a Gary Johnson supporter myself, I freely admit that he has some extreme policies that can turn off a lot of voters. But what really frustrates me is how many people I've heard from that do prefer him but are afraid to vote for him because of the spoiler effect. I keep (wishful thinking) envisioning a scenario where he gets just enough votes that all of a sudden everyone on the fence realizes that maybe he could win and joins in, and then he launches ahead Wishful thinking and politics aside: there's a term for that phenomenon on the tip of my tongue, but I can't quite place it. Can anyone think of one? Where there's a slow growth until you get just enough of something and then it takes off?
  - mindcrime 10y ago
    But what really frustrates me is how many people I've heard from that do prefer him but are afraid to vote for him because of the spoiler effect. Yeah, I know what you mean. It's just that this time around, BOTH "major party" choices are SO bad, that you look at it and think "who cares whether Gigantic Douche or Turd Sandwich wins?" Ya know?
  - soemoea 10y ago
    Isn't this called a tipping point?

bpchaps 10y ago

I highly recommend that many others use FOIA to gather communication records of their elected officials. About a month ago I received this pdf [1] (1700+ pages of email records) of Chicago's office of the mayor after about three months of resistance. Prior to that, it took a year and a half and a law suit to receive one week's worth of Chicago's mayor's logs [2] through Chicago's IT department. To my knowledge, prior to this work, records in volume have been impossible to get due to asinine rejections. The amount or resistance (and holy shit was there a lot) led me to run several chains of FOIA requests to gather bulk communication records. Of note in the call records are many private investigator calls. I haven't had much chance to go through the email records and could use some help if anybody's interested. [1] https://spaces.hightail.com/receive/oFwvr/fi-29853345-5f15-4a34-9ba0-67ecf8c0d193/fv-3251eaf6-fb70-46d4-9f26-f85221c13317/DOIT%20--%20domain%20name%20log.pdf https://spaces.hightail.com/receive/oFwvr/fi-29853345-5f15-4... [2] https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1hgG79eIr8MbkjYrCvcTRN8n876KL8aXYYu5it8Lg0g8/edit https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1hgG79eIr8MbkjYrCvcTR... (four, mostly unstructured sheets)

mark_l_watson 10y ago

I am getting even unhappier with the democratic national committee ranking members who did what they could to sabotage Sander's run for the nomination. Just my opinion, but as a democrat I think Sanders would have such an easier time winning the general election. I would like to see a major magazine do a "public shaming" article on the leading DNC actors who acted unfairly and non-ethically. I would like history to trash these people because they deserve it.

GirlsCanCode 10y ago

Reddit, shamefully, deleted the posts and deleted threads about it instead of turning them over to Law Enforcement.

CptJamesCook 10y ago

"The Reddit message was sent on July 23, 2014, according to an archive of the page saved by other users. The day before, the Benghazi Committee had reached an agreement with the State Department on the production of related records"

PKop 10y ago

You're literally repeating clinton talking points. Do you think you're contributing to the discussion amongst people that in no way believe any of the garbage you just wrote?

dang 10y ago
Please take care to remain civil when commenting here. We detached this comment from https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=12536216 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=12536216 and marked it off-topic.

alecco 10y ago

The original HN post got flagged and removed from HN homepage. https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=12533757 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=12533757 250 points (more than this post at the moment)

Mao_Zedang 10y ago
Be nice to see an explanation from our moderating overlords
- dang 10y ago
  You mean your moderating servants? At the time, there were multiple posts of the same story competing for attention, so a mod marked all but one as a dupe. But then that surviving one got heavily flagged. We reduced them at one point (https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=12534542 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=12534542) but the flags kept coming. I think what's going on here (and what I just told the other moderators) is that this is one of those times when our standard practices around things like dupes and downweights—e.g. for political controversies—don't apply. This doesn't happen very often, perhaps once every couple weeks. In such cases the community will is unmistakeable, the story will keep coming up until it gets an airing, and our job is to let that happen. I like it much better when we call these right from the beginning, but what are the odds that an r/conspiracy Hillary investigation would turn into a solid HN thread? Too small for the human eye, and no set of moderation rules can operate at that fine a grain.
  - douche 10y ago
    This happens with every single story that touches on this subject. Over the course of the summer it's happened time after time - the flag brigade gets almost all of them. After the flag-killed story today was reset, it still never showed up on the main page, despite hundreds of votes, although it did show up on /classic.
    - dang 10y ago
      Sure; nearly all those stories are off topic for HN: https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html I assume this one's different because of the Reddit connection.

Dagwoodie 10y ago

I have yet to see a single example of Trump's racism. It's an oft repeated cliche that has yet to be demonstrated by anyone. As much of a "clown" as trump might be, half of his labels are completely pulled out of thin air.

douche 10y ago
It's one of those blanket cliches that gets applied reflexively. For a not insignificant sliver of the population, "Republican" == "racist" is an axiom, all evidence for, against, or sideways be damned.
yolesaber 10y ago
Trump was sued repeatedly in the 70s for racially prejudiced housing policies. In the 80s he was accused of racist employment practices in his casinos. In this election he has repeatedly retweeted and positively engaged with white supremacists on twitter. He has retweeted (false) racially-charged statistics. http://www.nytimes.com/2016/07/24/opinion/sunday/is-donald-trump-a-racist.html?_r=0 http://www.nytimes.com/2016/07/24/opinion/sunday/is-donald-t...
- Dagwoodie 10y ago
  I sympathize with the alleged prejudiced housing policies, if they are in fact true. I don't get the outrage about tweets. The tweets that got re-tweeted weren't racist in the least, is the guy or gal in charge of his Twitter account (I assume it's not him, i'll give you that) supposed to look at the history of every tweeter to see if tweets they come across are from racists? If anything, one of the staffers doing the retweet screwed up and didn't vet the messenger, but that's hardly a blemish on Trump other than "lesson learned, vet your tweets better." Edit: Some of the tweets he's re-tweeted are pretty questionable, i'll give you that much. I only saw a couple before, one about Jeb Bush which one article had as it's prime example so I was pretty confused.
maxerickson 10y ago
How do you characterize his remarks about Ghazala Khan maybe not being allowed to speak?

deleted 10y ago

[deleted]

deleted 10y ago
[deleted]

colemickens 10y ago

What's wrong with HRC calling white supremacists and nationalists deplorable? (edit: I'll proudly take downvotes for calling a spade a spade.)

hiram112 10y ago
Because she's trying to assign guilt by association. I'm sure most people that support white supremacy are, in fact, Trump supporters. Does that logically make all Trump supporters white supremacists? And what is wrong with a bit of Nationalism? I personally feel globalization has most been a clever campaign to allow large business to play wage arbitrage. The current division of wealth in the US supports my idea.
- tootie 10y ago
  White nationalists support him more than any other Republican candidate and it's largely because he panders to them with thinly veiled or occasionally overt racism.
  - deleted 10y ago
    [deleted]
  - adamrezich 10y ago
    I think everyone who supports a Republican candidate supports Trump more than any other Republican candidate at the moment, seeing as how, y'know, the party picked him to represent them in this election. This doesn't prove anything?
    - colemickens 10y ago
      Other than the fact that dozens of prominent Republicans have rejected him? Including former Republican Presidents of the United States... who have come out and said they will vote for HRC, and that they do so because they can't bring themselves to vote for a tyrannical monster?

throwaway2016b 10y ago

Meanwhile there is a picture of Hillary embracing a KKK member that the corrupt media refuses to mention. The kingmakers don't give a good goddamn about racism, except as a convenient narrative for purges. The 21st century equivalent of accusations of communism. https://i.sli.mg/FdqTAx.jpg https://i.sli.mg/FdqTAx.jpg https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Robert_Byrd https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Robert_Byrd “It is almost impossible to imagine the United States Senate without Robert Byrd. He was not just its longest serving member, he was its heart and soul. From my first day in the Senate, I sought out his guidance, and he was always generous with his time and his wisdom.” -- Hillary Clinton

zimzam 10y ago
By the end of his career Robert Byrd was a repentant, former KKK member. Trump is being embraced by current, active KKK members. It is obtuse to pretend there's no difference between the two. From your own Wikipedia link: "In his last autobiography, Byrd explained that he was a KKK member because he "was sorely afflicted with tunnel vision — a jejune and immature outlook — seeing only what I wanted to see because I thought the Klan could provide an outlet for my talents and ambitions."[23] Byrd also said, in 2005, "I know now I was wrong. Intolerance had no place in America. I apologized a thousand times ... and I don't mind apologizing over and over again. I can't erase what happened."[13]"
- throwaway2016b 10y ago
  >By the end of his career Robert Byrd was a repentant, former KKK member. So is David Duke, that didn't stop them from trying to get Trump to "denounce" him, and he didn't even know the guy. >user: zimzam >created: 4 minutes ago Thank you for Correcting The Record.
- hueving 10y ago
  >Trump is being embraced by current, active KKK members. Being embraced by and embracing are very different things. There are statistically going to be child rapists that support both candidates, does that make them both child rapists?
10y ago

DigitalSea 10y ago

Even with proof, nothing will come of this. Sadly it seems the rules are different for anyone in power to get away with questionable choices and decisions. It has to be more than coincidental that Hillary Clinton has this much controversy surrounding her, some might say it's just conspiracy theory fodder, but let's be honest: she has obviously done some shady things, to the point where they can't even be adequately covered up anymore. I don't want Clinton or Trump to be the next POTUS. I think they're both inadequate for the position.

tez598 10y ago

http://www.domeseo.com/%E0%B8%AA%E0%B8%AD%E0%B8%99-seo/ http://www.domeseo.com/%E0%B8%AA%E0%B8%AD%E0%B8%99-seo/

tez598 10y ago

http://www.domeseo.com/%E0%B8%AA%E0%B8%AD%E0%B8%99-seo/ http://www.domeseo.com/%E0%B8%AA%E0%B8%AD%E0%B8%99-seo/

jlj 10y ago

"Combetta appeared under subpoena in a committee hearing last week on the alleged destruction of evidence, but both he and colleague Bill Thornton exercised their Fifth Amendment right not to testify." Actually it's the Fifth Amendment protection against self incrimination.

syphilis2 10y ago

The US News and World Report article is also a nice primer on this issue. http://www.usnews.com/news/articles/2016-09-19/paul-combetta-computer-specialist-who-deleted-hillary-clinton-emails-may-have-asked-reddit-for-tips http://www.usnews.com/news/articles/2016-09-19/paul-combetta... I have not seen this reported on by any major US news media. (FOX, CNN, MSNBC, ABC, CBS, NBC, NPR, PBS) Other than The Hill, US News, various right-wing sources, and VICE I don't see anyone writing about this. It reminds me of the first hour or two after Hillary's episode at the 9/11 event where the only major news source reporting was Fox News. Is this something people are interested in? Is there an obligation to report on this nationally?

mikeburrelljr 10y ago
Fox News has now picked this up: "Clinton email wiper appears to have asked online how to hide 'VIP' info" http://www.foxnews.com/politics/2016/09/20/clinton-email-wiper-appears-to-have-asked-online-how-to-hide-vip-info.html http://www.foxnews.com/politics/2016/09/20/clinton-email-wip...

stonetear 10y ago

This is what I get for not logging out of reddit at work.