Author Archives: Denise Simon

bin Qumu of Benghazi Attack Captured in Libya

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Libyan army arrests former bin Laden driver Abu Sufian bin ...

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bin Qumu was in Afghanistan in the 80’s, then Sudan in the 90’s and back to Libya and Afghanistan and back to Libya. In 2011, he was working to overthrow Qaddafi, which is precisely what Hillary was trying to do. Heck, the Hillary operation hired bin Qumu. For interesting read, click here to read his GITMO file. That pesky left wing radical law group, The Center for Constitutional Rights that represented several GITMO detainees, published a statement in 2011 that bin Qumu was a harmless man.

Fox News’ Benghazi Special & the Continuing Cover-up ...

Osama Bin Laden’s driver who was linked to 2012 Benghazi attack that killed a US diplomat ‘is captured in Libya’, 11 years after he was released from Guantanamo

  • Reports: Libya National Army have captured a ‘high-ranking al-Qaeda’ operative
  • Suspect found in Derna is named as Ansar al-Sharia leader Abu Sufian Bin Qumu
  • Bin Qumu was once personal driver to al-Qaeda founder Osama Bin Laden
  • He has links to the diplomatic compound attack by gunmen that killed US envoy Chris Stevens and three other Americans in Benghazi in 2012

Reports have emerged that the Libyan army has arrested Abu Sufian Bin Qumu, a leader of an Islamist militia group and former driver of Osama Bin Laden.

He was reportedly captured in raids in ‘one of the last strongholds’ of extremist groups in Derna.

Bin Qumu had purported links to attacks in Benghazi that killed US diplomat Chris Stevens in 2012.

It is believed Bin Qumu was arrested after his group ran out of ammunition at a hideout in Derna, according to Al Arabiya.

The 59-year-old is considered a high-ranking operative of al-Qaeda based on his associations with the terrorist group around the time it was founded.

He was said to be the personal driver to Osama Bin Laden in Sudan where the al-Qaeda leader lived for three years during the 1990s. But Bin Qumu denies this.

Washington Post reported he fought alongside the Taliban against US forces in Afghanistan before he was detained at Guantanamo Bay after being captured in Pakistan.

The US military characterised him as a ‘medium to high’ risk to national security while he was in US custody and he refused to cooperate with authorities and explain his past associations with Islamic extremists.

He was extradited to Libya in 2007 where he served jail time before being released by Muammar Gaddafi.

Bin Qama returned to Derna to establish the Ansar al-Sharia extremist group, who advocate the implementation of Sharia law across Syria.

It was also suggested by Washington Post that the Islamic faction’s militiamen were present during the Benghazi attacks in 2012.

Last year, Ahmed Abu Khattala was on trial in the US capital as the suspected mastermind of the attacks on a diplomatic compound in the Libyan city that killed four Americans.

It resulted in the death of Chris Stevens — the first US Ambassador killed by violence overseas since 1979.

Al Arabiya said Bin Qama, despite being a leader of Ansar al-Sharia, no longer played a prominent role in the group.

He is set to be questioned by the Libyan National Army according to reports.

 

Former CIA Engineer Charged with Giving Hacking Tools to WikiLeaks

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Ex-CIA engineer charged with massive leak to WikiLeaks

A former CIA computer engineer has been indicted on charges he masterminded what appears to be the largest leak of classified information in the spy agency’s history.

Joshua Schulte, 29, was charged in a new grand jury indictment with providing WikiLeaks with a massive trove of U.S. government hacking tools that the online publisher posted in March 2017, the Justice Department announced on Monday.

Schulte was previously facing child pornography charges in federal court in New York, but the indictment broadens the case to accuse him of illegally gathering classified information, damaging CIA computers, lying to investigators and numerous other offenses.

In January, attorneys involved in the child porn case revealed in court that Schulte was the target of a major investigation into WikiLeaks’ release of a CIA collection known as “Vault 7.”

The Justice Department’snews release announcing Schulte’s indictment does not mention WikiLeaks by name, signaling that it has not been charged in the case. There was no mention of any other individuals being charged.

Attorneys for Schulte did not immediately respond to requests for comment.

The new charges make Schulte the fourth individual to face charges related to classified leaks since President Donald Trump took office and vowed a crackdown on leaks.

Last June, a National Security Agency contractor, Reality Winner, was arrested on charges of leaking to the online publication The Intercept a top secret report on the techniques that Russian government agents allegedly used to target computers of state election officials. She has pleaded not guilty and has been held without bail. Her trial is set for October.

In March, an FBI agent based in Minneapolis, Terry Albury, was charged with a leak to The Intercept of the FBI’s procedures for handling informants. He was also accused of retaining classified information at his home. He pleaded guilty to both charges and is free awaiting sentencing.

Earlier this month, the longtime head of security for the Senate Intelligence Committee, James Wolfe, was indicted on three felony counts of lying during the course of an FBI investigation into unauthorized disclosures of classified information. He was not charged with any leaks, but the indictment contends that he provided confidential committee information to at least one reporter. Wolfe pleaded not guilty to the charges last week. No trial date has been set.

Joshua Schulte named as suspect in 'Vault 7' leak of CIA ... photo

Criminal complaint found here.

*** More background detail:

Joshua Adam Schulte, the former CIA worker suspected of passing the agency’s hacking secrets to WikiLeaks, previously posted the source code for an internal CIA tool to his account on the public code-sharing site GitHub, The Daily Beast has learned.

That potential red flag was apparently missed by the spy agency just months after Edward Snowden walked out of the National Security Agency with a thumb drive of secrets in 2013. A spokesman for the CIA declined to comment.

Schulte, 29, worked at the CIA from 2010 to 2016. He was raided by the FBI on March 23, 2017, roughly two weeks after Julian Assange began releasing 8,000 CIA files under the rubric “Vault 7.” The files had been copied from an internal agency wiki sometime in 2016, and contained documentation and some source code for the hacking tools used by the CIA’s intrusion teams when conducting foreign surveillance.

When FBI agents examined Schulte’s hard drive, they found only a single classified document, but allegedly turned up 10,000 images of child pornography. Today Schulte is being held in a federal holding facility in Manhattan on one count each of possessing, receiving, and transporting child porn. He has not been charged with the Vault 7 leak, but, in January the FBI was still investigating him as the suspect.

Until now it’s been unclear how the FBI became suspicious of Schulte in the first place. In a statement to The Washington Post, which broke the story of the arrest, Schulte said the bureau went after him because he’d reported managerial incompetence to the CIA’s inspector general and then left the agency in 2016. “Due to these unfortunate coincidences, the FBI ultimately made the snap judgment that I was guilty of the leaks and targeted me.”

Prosecutor Matthew Larouch said at a January court appearance that “the government immediately had enough evidence to establish that [Schulte] was a target of that investigation,” but didn’t elaborate on the evidence.

Schulte has hosted 11 of his own coding projects on GitHub over the years. In the fall of 2013, he uploaded a robust software development tool he’d developed called OSB Project Wizard, described this way: “Create all types of projects following OSB build guidelines.” The OSB abbreviation went unexplained.

Here Comes a 6th Branch of the Military, Space Force

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It has been a concept that has been floated for several months. The Pentagon and the Air Force are actually asking for this. The United States is vulnerable in this frontier which is but one reason for Space X. Consider what is in space: navigation, guided missiles, warning systems and satellites for drones, naval ships, communications and more.

Key Speakers At The 32nd Space Symposium | Getty Images

Russia and China are increasing their space operations and General John Hyten of U.S. Strategic Command has warned of the vulnerabilities for quite some time. China and Russia both have laser weapons designed to damage our systems. Boeing, Northrop Grumman and Lockheed Martin as well as Raytheon on poised to be recipients of Pentagon dollars and the future programs.

Steve Isakowitz, CEO of The Aerospace Corporation says ‘we are approaching a point where Star Wars is not just a movie.’

Seems, Ronald Reagan had great vision. And in 2001, former Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld also expressed significant concerns on space systems being attacked by an adversarial country. Read more here.

U.S. Army Research, Development and Engineering Command

As part of the National Defense Strategy, the Air Force asked for an 8% increase in space funding. Watch out too, as Boeing and Apple are examining the option of building a parallel internet in space.

President Donald Trump announced Monday that he is directing the Department of Defense to create a new “space force” to become the sixth branch of the U.S. military.

“My administration is reclaiming America’s heritage as the world’s greatest spacefaring nation,” Trump said at a meeting of the National Space Council, with Vice President Mike Pence standing by him. “The essence of the American character is to explore new horizons and to tame new frontiers, but our destiny beyond the Earth is not only a matter of national identity but a matter of national security, so important for our military.”

“When it comes to defending America, it is not enough to merely have an American presence in space; we must have American dominance in space, so important,” Trump said. “Very importantly, I am hereby directing the Department of Defense and Pentagon to immediately begin the process necessary to establish a space force as the sixth branch of the Armed Forces.”

Trump said the Air Force and future Space Force would be “separate, but equal.”

Trump ordered Gen. Joseph Dunford, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, to begin implementing the directive.

Trump has previously spoken about creating a space force, but this is the first concrete move, at least publicly, in that direction. The Air Force is currently responsible for space warfare, with the Air Force Space Command in charge of operating and protecting military satellites.

The National Aeronautics and Space Administration is responsible for the country’s civilian space program. Budget cuts in recent have resulted in fewer Americans going into space, leading some observers to call for the U.S. to explore space in a way not done since before the space shuttle came into existence.

How About the Chinese Interfering with Voting in America?

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The super PAC Women Vote got a $5.4 million contribution in the form of stock in Chinese tech company Baidu. (notice the date too, seems like foreign interference to me)

In 2016, Women Vote raised almost $38 million and spent just over that. In 2018, they are in the $5 million range, so they need some help right? The political action committee, Women Vote was launched by Emily’s List. Ellen Malcolm is the Founder and Chairman of the Board of Emily’s List and her operation(s) are comprised of top leaders, entrepreneurs and activists committed to pro-choice democratic women according to the website. Another Board member is Lisa Jackson. You remember her right? She was head of the EPA during the Obama administration that too used an alias and non-government emails to conduct official government business. Another Board member is Laura Ricketts. She is the owner of the Chicago Cubs and is a member of the Democratic National Committee’s Executive Committee and was the co-chair of the DNC Finance Committee’s LGBT Leadership Council. Add in Maria Teresa Kumar. She is the founding President and CEO of VOTO Latino. She also serves on the Board of Planned Parenthood, the Latino Leaders Network.

Heck there are many progressive liberals on the Board of Emily’s List. Travel over to the site and check it out.

If you have had some weird messages as a Skype user from Baidu…here is the deal. It is a Chinese multinational technology company. Baidu is a top developer of Artificial Intelligence and highly aligned with China president Xi Jinping. What is interesting is Baidu is under a holding company based in the Cayman Islands. The company is also traded on NASDAQ.

According to Wikipedia, there is some shady history with Baidu.

Domain name redirection attack

On January 12, 2010, Baidu.com’s DNS records in the United States were altered such that browsers to baidu.com were redirected to a website purporting to be the Iranian Cyber Army, thought to be behind the attack on Twitter during the 2009 Iranian election protests, making the proper site unusable for four hours.[23] Internet users were met with a page saying “This site has been attacked by Iranian Cyber Army“.[24] Chinese hackers later responded by attacking Iranian websites and leaving messages.[25] Baidu later launched legal action against Register.com for gross negligence after it was revealed that Register.com’s technical support staff changed the email address for Baidu.com on the request of an unnamed individual, despite failing security verification procedures. Once the address had been changed, the individual was able to use the forgotten password feature to have Baidu’s domain passwords sent directly to them, allowing them to accomplish the domain hijacking.[26][27]

Baidu workers arrested

On August 6, 2012, the BBC reported that three employees of Baidu were arrested on suspicion that they accepted bribes. The bribes were allegedly paid for deleting posts from the forum service. Four people were fired in connection with these arrests.[28]

91 Wireless acquisition

On July 16, 2013, Baidu announced its intention to purchase 91 Wireless from NetDragon. 91 Wireless is best known for its app store, but it has been reported that the app store faces piracy and other legal issues.[29] On August 14, 2013, Baidu announced that its wholly owned subsidiary Baidu (Hong Kong) Limited has signed a definitive merger agreement to acquire 91 Wireless Web-soft Limited from NetDragon Web-soft Inc.[30] for 1.85 billion dollars in what was reported to be the biggest deal ever in China’s IT sector.[31]

There is more like the death of a student from cancer while working at headquarters.

Pretty weird that a Chinese tech company is getting involved with women voting and a political action committee right?

 

Former FBI McCabe Sues Government

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In September of 2017, a lawsuit was filed to obtain records under FOIA in a request to obtain documents regarding Andrew McCabe’s conflicts of interests.

Then in February of 2018, the Office of Inspector General issued a 39 page report complete with allegations relating to the former Deputy Director Andrew McCabe. The investigation included evidence of McCabe’s lying and failure to adhere to policies and practices regarding media contacts.

Since that time, McCabe went to crowd-funding to pay for his legal fees as he pursues legal protection as well as a lawsuit against the FBI and the Department of Justice.

Five things to watch: Acting FBI Director Andrew McCabe ... photo

He has officially sued both. The complaint is found here.

A lawyer for fired former FBI Deputy Director Andrew McCabe is suing the FBI, the Justice Department and its inspector general for refusing to turn over documents related to McCabe’s termination.

McCabe, who worked at the FBI in various roles for more than 20 years, was dismissed only hours before his planned retirement in March, for what the Justice Department called a “lack of candor.”

The firing stripped McCabe and his family of their health care benefits and delayed his ability to collect a federal pension, which he otherwise would have been able to draw on his 50th birthday.

McCabe’s lawyer, David Snyder, maintains in a new lawsuit that the dismissal violated federal law and departed from rules and policies. But he said authorities have refused to turn over materials related to McCabe’s disciplinary process.

“Those requests have been denied by some of the same high-ranking officials who were involved in, or responsible for, the investigation, adjudication, and/or dismissal of Mr. McCabe,” the legal complaint said.

McCabe’s legal team at the Boies Schiller firm has sued to demand the information under the Freedom of Information Act. They’re arguing the documents could help them build a larger case against the Justice Department for wrongful termination and due process violations.

“We don’t create secret law in this country,” Snyder told NPR in an interview.

McCabe has been the subject of political attacks by President Trump and Republican supporters since the 2016 presidential campaign. McCabe’s wife, Jill, ran for the state legislature in Virginia as a Democrat and accepted campaign contributions via then-Gov. Terry McAuliffe, a longtime Clinton loyalist.

Jill McCabe lost her election and the FBI and Justice Department said she and Andrew observed the relevant ethics requirements, but Trump and allies called it an obvious conflict of interest.

Shortly after McCabe’s ouster at the FBI, Trump wrote on Twitter that it was a “great day for democracy.”

Word comes of McCabe’s legal case as the inspector general, Michael Horowitz, prepares to release a massive 500-odd page report on the FBI and Justice Department’s handling of the Hillary Clinton email investigation during the heart of the 2016 election.

McCabe, Comey, and former DoJ leaders including then-Attorney General Loretta Lynch have been under scrutiny in connection with that report, which is expected to become public on Thursday.

Meanwhile, McCabe’s conduct is also under review for possible criminal prosecution by the U.S. Attorney’s Office in Washington, D.C., which has already interviewed McCabe’s onetime boss, former FBI chief James Comey.

The IG concluded that McCabe misled investigators.

McCabe has denied any intentional wrongdoing. Instead, he said, any lapses in his memory or mistakes in his interviews with the IG and others were mistakes derived from the chaos inside the FBI under siege from President Trump and his allies.