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Are we supposed to pretend the NSA doesn't exist and Hillary Clinton has a bunch of emails the government doesn't know about?

ctdonath 12y ago
It's not the NSA we're worried about. It's that Secretary Of State Hillary Clinton was receiving, storing, and transmitting official secrets illegally on a secret personal email server, subject to extreme risk of antagonistic foreign powers snooping that server and acquiring those secrets. One may wonder why she would arrange such a system in her own home. One may wonder if she wanted such covert foreign access to such documents, the security risks being so obvious.
sp332 12y ago
The NSA doesn't seem to share much with other agencies. So most of "the government" might not know about it.
- knotty66 12y ago
  Did you read about parallel construction? https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2013/08/dea-and-nsa-team-intelligence-laundering https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2013/08/dea-and-nsa-team-intel...
  - tedunangst 12y ago
    At this point I think everybody has read about parallel construction.
o0-0o 12y ago
The problem is not that the government doesn't know about them, it's that the PEOPLE don't know about them.
- rubiquity 12y ago
  But if the emails were sent from the government's servers the people still wouldn't know about them.
  - artmageddon 12y ago
    For all intents and purposes, yes, the people wouldn't know about it, but there's supposed to be some form of oversight into the actions of political officials, and this circumvents it.
  - joelrunyon 12y ago
    But you could (in theory), request them under a FIOA
    - Mtinie 12y ago
      I don't see a reason that you would be detered from submitting the same FIOA request for these emails. I expect the likelihood of getting a response and a set of documents sent to you would be the same as it would be if her emails were hosted through the Department of State's mail server.
      - joelrunyon 12y ago
        Because it's on a private server, not a government operated one. Gives her legal coverage.
  - nitid_name 12y ago
    If she had her own mail server, it's probably fair to assume she could have set it up as her outbound mail server and to use TLS of some sort when connecting to it.
  - pdabbadabba 12y ago
    Yes they would. They would be handed over to the National Archives as a matter of course (except the classified ones, etc.) It's still possible that they could be handed over from her personal account, but this bypasses the various controls that are supposed to be in place to ensure the fullest possible disclosure.
dublinclontarf 12y ago
Define "The Government", it's not a single uniform body, various branches and factions work with and against each other.
TheRealDunkirk 12y ago
Governmental -- i.e., public -- communications are supposed to be available for review. Certainly, the Secretary of State can legitimately claim national security issues, but using an external system just gives the appearance that Clinton would like to be able to obfuscate even-legitimate internal requests for her communication. For instance, the paper trail about Bengazi is already damning enough. I'm quite sure she'd like to avoid showing her office's internal -- and her personal -- correspondence on this issue. Unless you're suggesting that the NSA would present that communication (which I agree they have access to) in court, I think this is a non-sequitor.

ctdonath 12y ago

It's not the NSA we're worried about. It's that Secretary Of State Hillary Clinton was receiving, storing, and transmitting official secrets illegally on a secret personal email server, subject to extreme risk of antagonistic foreign powers snooping that server and acquiring those secrets. One may wonder why she would arrange such a system in her own home. One may wonder if she wanted such covert foreign access to such documents, the security risks being so obvious.

sp332 12y ago

The NSA doesn't seem to share much with other agencies. So most of "the government" might not know about it.

knotty66 12y ago
Did you read about parallel construction? https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2013/08/dea-and-nsa-team-intelligence-laundering https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2013/08/dea-and-nsa-team-intel...
- tedunangst 12y ago
  At this point I think everybody has read about parallel construction.

o0-0o 12y ago

The problem is not that the government doesn't know about them, it's that the PEOPLE don't know about them.

rubiquity 12y ago
But if the emails were sent from the government's servers the people still wouldn't know about them.
- artmageddon 12y ago
  For all intents and purposes, yes, the people wouldn't know about it, but there's supposed to be some form of oversight into the actions of political officials, and this circumvents it.
- joelrunyon 12y ago
  But you could (in theory), request them under a FIOA
  - Mtinie 12y ago
    I don't see a reason that you would be detered from submitting the same FIOA request for these emails. I expect the likelihood of getting a response and a set of documents sent to you would be the same as it would be if her emails were hosted through the Department of State's mail server.
    - joelrunyon 12y ago
      Because it's on a private server, not a government operated one. Gives her legal coverage.
- nitid_name 12y ago
  If she had her own mail server, it's probably fair to assume she could have set it up as her outbound mail server and to use TLS of some sort when connecting to it.
- pdabbadabba 12y ago
  Yes they would. They would be handed over to the National Archives as a matter of course (except the classified ones, etc.) It's still possible that they could be handed over from her personal account, but this bypasses the various controls that are supposed to be in place to ensure the fullest possible disclosure.

dublinclontarf 12y ago

Define "The Government", it's not a single uniform body, various branches and factions work with and against each other.

TheRealDunkirk 12y ago

Governmental -- i.e., public -- communications are supposed to be available for review. Certainly, the Secretary of State can legitimately claim national security issues, but using an external system just gives the appearance that Clinton would like to be able to obfuscate even-legitimate internal requests for her communication. For instance, the paper trail about Bengazi is already damning enough. I'm quite sure she'd like to avoid showing her office's internal -- and her personal -- correspondence on this issue. Unless you're suggesting that the NSA would present that communication (which I agree they have access to) in court, I think this is a non-sequitor.