5 ms·

For people thinking that he should have known better on a technical basis, maybe but remember that during the time in question he was a 64-68 year old man (= gr

For people thinking that he should have known better on a technical basis, maybe but remember that during the time in question he was a 64-68 year old man (= graduated college around the time Unix was being rewritten in C) who's never worked in a technical field. By the time most of these capabilities existed Manafort had been management/executive for years or decades. That's not to say that he couldn't have learned were he interested, but his daily life had very little intersection with this kind of thing until he spiraled into a hole of debt, at which point "do I trust this person" ranked a lot higher than "how are this person's technical skills?"

mbell 9y ago
Do you really need a technical background or some sort of college training to find the File > Save As > PDF option?
- braderhart 9y ago
  Haha.. I don't buy into it either. Something is fishy about the story, or maybe this is a secret plea deal with a behind the scenes type negotiation process to trick other conspirators into providing more evidence.
  - s73v3r_ 9y ago
    You don't buy that many people are quite bad with computers?
    - braderhart 9y ago
      When it is your job to hide your financial activities, then no not really.
      - s73v3r_ 9y ago
        You've never worked tech support, have you?
      - JumpCrisscross 9y ago
        > When it is your job to hide your financial activities "On February 11, 2011, another trader, Trader E, wrote to Trader C: 'shall we spoof.' Trader C responded: 'sure.' ... Even the most minimalist 2018-era bank compliance program would at least teach traders not to use the word 'spoof' in a recorded electronic chat, but a decade ago our primitive forebears did not quite understand the problem." https://www.bloomberg.com/view/articles/2018-01-31/sergeant-spoof-s-time-has-passed https://www.bloomberg.com/view/articles/2018-01-31/sergeant-...
      - KirinDave 9y ago
        Why can't people be bad at their jobs? I'm having trouble buying any other explanation than, "This absurdly overcomplicated workflow introduced by conventional office software not designed to cover its tracks didn't cover its own tracks" as plausible.
  - matt4077 9y ago
    So, you’re saying this team of six government prosecutors signing the indictment, each of whom would be disbarred and prosecuted for knowingly lying to the court, are willing to take those risks for... what exactly? Getting a single conviction that won’t even get them a raise?
- criley2 9y ago
  Using File -> Save As -> PDF requires several skills Window management in Windows GUI: 1. Usage of File Menu and/or Ribbon Menu 2. Knowledge of Word's PDF integration File System knowledge: 1. What a "file" is 2. What "file formats" are 3. What a PDF is 4. That a word document can be saved or printed as a PDF Etc etc etc I work with non-technical folks all the time and printing/saving as PDF comes up often. Usually in most cases I can install a PDF printer and let them "print to PDF" and they can understand it, but before they know the process, they look at me like I'm speaking Latin when I try to describe what files are, what PDFs are, what conversion is, what the file menu is used for, etc.
  - fencepost 9y ago
    You beat me to it. HN readers who don't work with non-technical users may not realize just how lost and unable to explore many people are, particularly when they didn't grow up with computers. There's also a huge problem with "dialog blindness." If you have an understanding of how "computers" (hardware, OS, apps, websites, doesn't matter it's all the same mystery box) work then you can explore with less fear. I deal with people in their 20s and 30s who don't grasp that a "scanner XYZ not found" error may mean that they should look for a way to select a scanner. Many of my older end users are clearly using a lot of software entirely by rote, though it's definitely not limited to them.
    - pbhjpbhj 9y ago
      "Didn't grow up with computers" (have contact with computers during compulsory education) in the West is likely people over 50. Can probably go to 55-58 for people who have degrees; ie people who used computers during Uni education. If you're older you've probably had 20 years with computers in the workplace save for some niches, seems long enough to learn to use a simple point-click menu.
      - talmand 9y ago
        There's a great deal of assumptions in that comment.
      - 9y ago
- deleted 9y ago
  [deleted]
- rhino369 9y ago
  Does word have save as PDF option if you haven't bought acrobat?
jdavis703 9y ago
Not sending a written paper trail should be covered in Criminal Surivial Strategies 101. Whether it's telegraph, snail mail, email or WhatsApp, this is just sloppy criminal work. For example Steven Cohen avoided an insider trading conviction by making sure nothing bad ever had his name on it. If you needed to discuss something secret, you talked to him in person. Background: https://www.google.com/amp/s/amp.ft.com/content/efda2ca2-ec69-11e6-930f-061b01e23655 https://www.google.com/amp/s/amp.ft.com/content/efda2ca2-ec6...
- trendia 9y ago
  Link is dead for non FT subscribers. (Or at least for those who the FT thinks would pay for a subscription)
- enraged_camel 9y ago
  E-mail especially is very easy to discover. The "e" in "e-mail" stands for "evidence." :)
- talmand 9y ago
  It's likely people such as that don't even realize they are creating a paper trail. "Paper trail? There was no paper! How could there be a trail!?"
- gscott 9y ago
  Even though Manafort was associated with foreign government figures it took being associated with the U.S President to be investigated. It didn't matter before... having a paper trail was ok, no one cared.
Zigurd 9y ago
He was working with first tier Russian oligarchs who hold a lot of his debt. They could have readily afforded to provide him with a moonlighting troll bot coder to keep his tradecraft sharp.

mbell 9y ago

Do you really need a technical background or some sort of college training to find the File > Save As > PDF option?

braderhart 9y ago
Haha.. I don't buy into it either. Something is fishy about the story, or maybe this is a secret plea deal with a behind the scenes type negotiation process to trick other conspirators into providing more evidence.
- s73v3r_ 9y ago
  You don't buy that many people are quite bad with computers?
  - braderhart 9y ago
    When it is your job to hide your financial activities, then no not really.
    - s73v3r_ 9y ago
      You've never worked tech support, have you?
    - JumpCrisscross 9y ago
      > When it is your job to hide your financial activities "On February 11, 2011, another trader, Trader E, wrote to Trader C: 'shall we spoof.' Trader C responded: 'sure.' ... Even the most minimalist 2018-era bank compliance program would at least teach traders not to use the word 'spoof' in a recorded electronic chat, but a decade ago our primitive forebears did not quite understand the problem." https://www.bloomberg.com/view/articles/2018-01-31/sergeant-spoof-s-time-has-passed https://www.bloomberg.com/view/articles/2018-01-31/sergeant-...
    - KirinDave 9y ago
      Why can't people be bad at their jobs? I'm having trouble buying any other explanation than, "This absurdly overcomplicated workflow introduced by conventional office software not designed to cover its tracks didn't cover its own tracks" as plausible.
- matt4077 9y ago
  So, you’re saying this team of six government prosecutors signing the indictment, each of whom would be disbarred and prosecuted for knowingly lying to the court, are willing to take those risks for... what exactly? Getting a single conviction that won’t even get them a raise?
criley2 9y ago
Using File -> Save As -> PDF requires several skills Window management in Windows GUI: 1. Usage of File Menu and/or Ribbon Menu 2. Knowledge of Word's PDF integration File System knowledge: 1. What a "file" is 2. What "file formats" are 3. What a PDF is 4. That a word document can be saved or printed as a PDF Etc etc etc I work with non-technical folks all the time and printing/saving as PDF comes up often. Usually in most cases I can install a PDF printer and let them "print to PDF" and they can understand it, but before they know the process, they look at me like I'm speaking Latin when I try to describe what files are, what PDFs are, what conversion is, what the file menu is used for, etc.
- fencepost 9y ago
  You beat me to it. HN readers who don't work with non-technical users may not realize just how lost and unable to explore many people are, particularly when they didn't grow up with computers. There's also a huge problem with "dialog blindness." If you have an understanding of how "computers" (hardware, OS, apps, websites, doesn't matter it's all the same mystery box) work then you can explore with less fear. I deal with people in their 20s and 30s who don't grasp that a "scanner XYZ not found" error may mean that they should look for a way to select a scanner. Many of my older end users are clearly using a lot of software entirely by rote, though it's definitely not limited to them.
  - pbhjpbhj 9y ago
    "Didn't grow up with computers" (have contact with computers during compulsory education) in the West is likely people over 50. Can probably go to 55-58 for people who have degrees; ie people who used computers during Uni education. If you're older you've probably had 20 years with computers in the workplace save for some niches, seems long enough to learn to use a simple point-click menu.
    - talmand 9y ago
      There's a great deal of assumptions in that comment.
    - 9y ago
deleted 9y ago
[deleted]
rhino369 9y ago
Does word have save as PDF option if you haven't bought acrobat?

jdavis703 9y ago

Not sending a written paper trail should be covered in Criminal Surivial Strategies 101. Whether it's telegraph, snail mail, email or WhatsApp, this is just sloppy criminal work. For example Steven Cohen avoided an insider trading conviction by making sure nothing bad ever had his name on it. If you needed to discuss something secret, you talked to him in person. Background: https://www.google.com/amp/s/amp.ft.com/content/efda2ca2-ec69-11e6-930f-061b01e23655 https://www.google.com/amp/s/amp.ft.com/content/efda2ca2-ec6...

trendia 9y ago
Link is dead for non FT subscribers. (Or at least for those who the FT thinks would pay for a subscription)
enraged_camel 9y ago
E-mail especially is very easy to discover. The "e" in "e-mail" stands for "evidence." :)
talmand 9y ago
It's likely people such as that don't even realize they are creating a paper trail. "Paper trail? There was no paper! How could there be a trail!?"
gscott 9y ago
Even though Manafort was associated with foreign government figures it took being associated with the U.S President to be investigated. It didn't matter before... having a paper trail was ok, no one cared.

Zigurd 9y ago

He was working with first tier Russian oligarchs who hold a lot of his debt. They could have readily afforded to provide him with a moonlighting troll bot coder to keep his tradecraft sharp.