Category Archives: Cyber War

More Hillary Emails are Missing Regarding her Server

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State Department can’t find emails of top Clinton IT staffer

The FBI has taken possession of Bryan Pagliano’s computer system.

Politico: The State Department has told Senate investigators it cannot find backup copies of emails sent by Bryan Pagliano, the top Hillary Clinton IT staffer who maintained her email server but has asserted his Fifth Amendment right and refused to answer questions on the matter.

State officials told the Senate Judiciary Committee in a recent closed-door meeting that they could not locate what’s known as a “.pst file” for Pagliano’s work during Clinton’s tenure, which would have included copies of the tech expert’s emails, according to a letter Chairman Chuck Grassley sent to Secretary of State John Kerry that was obtained by POLITICO.

The department also told the committee the FBI has taken possession of Pagliano’s government computer system, where traces of the messages are most likely to be found, according to the letter.

Grassley, an Iowa Republican, has been considering whether to grant Pagliano immunity in exchange for testimony on who approved Clinton’s private email setup and whether anyone raised any objections to the system. The controversy over her decision to bypass a government email address, which would have made her messages easier for reporters and the public to obtain, has dogged the presidential hopeful for much of the year, though it has subsided in recent weeks.

Pagliano — who worked for Clinton’s 2008 presidential campaign, then followed her to the State Department — has refused to discuss Clinton’s email arrangement or his role in it, invoking his right against self-incrimination before the House Benghazi Committee earlier this fall.

Clinton had personally paid Pagliano to maintain her home-made server, which is also currently in the FBI’s possession. The agency has been investigating whether classified material was ever put at risk because she used her own server instead of the standard State email system. The State Department has designated about 1,000 of her emails as classified documents, which would never have been allowed on such a private system. Clinton’s representatives maintain that the emails were not classified at the time they were sent.

Pagliano’s lawyer could not be reached for comment.

Grassley had requested Pagliano’s emails to help inform his decision whether to grant Pagliano immunity.

“Given that the committee is unable to obtain [Pagliano’s] testimony at this time, I am seeking copies of his official State Department emails relevant to the Committee’s inquiry before proceeding to consider whether it might be appropriate to grant him immunity and compel his testimony,” Grassley’s letter states. It notes that such emails are a “top priority” in a list of several outstanding Clinton-related inquiries the panel has sent to the department.

The State Department said that while it has located a backup for emails Pagliano sent after Clinton left State, officials cannot find the file for the backup covering work he did while she was still there.

“The Department has located a .pst from Mr. Pagliano’s recent work at the Department as a contractor, but the files are from after Secretary Clinton left the State Department. We have not yet located a .pst that covers the time period of Secretary Clinton’s tenure,” said Alec Gerlach, a State Department spokesman. “We are continuing to search for Mr. Pagliano’s emails which the Department may have otherwise retained. We will, of course, share emails responsive to Senator Grassley’s requests if we locate them.”

State, like many federal agencies, did not have a systematic email archiving system for years. When the server issue first arose in the spring, State acknowledged that it did not automatically archive the email traffic of senior employees — relying on them to make their own backups, or “.pst,” if needed. Under current rules, federal employees are responsible for ensuring their official emails are saved.

State has not asked Pagliano whether he has any official emails in his possession, as it has with other top Clinton staffers who used personal email for work. It is unclear if Pagliano’s Fifth Amendment rights would protect him from turning over such messages.

Grassley encouraged State to continue searching for Pagliano’s emails by looking at the back-up email files of other State employees he may have emailed about the Clinton server. He letter seeks “a full and detailed written explanation of why it failed to maintain an archive, copy, or backup of Mr. Pagliano’s email file,” among other requests related to the IT staffer’s emails.

While State hasn’t been able to meet Grassley’s requests so far, his letter did offer some rare praise for the department, commending Kerry and State for what Grassley called a “recent increase in cooperation and focus on the committee’s request.” The letter says Judiciary has prioritized 22 requests for information and received seven “fully complete responses” and nine “partially complete responses.”

And State, which has been bombarded by inquiries about Clinton’s email setup, seems to appreciate the recognition: “As Senator Grassley noted, the State Department has been working very closely with his staff to get him the requested information and documents, and we are making progress,” Gerlach added.

Grassley had been blocking the confirmation of about 20 of State’s Foreign Service nominees because the department hadn’t fulfilled various document requests, including those for another probe he’s conducting on the dual-employment status of top Clinton adviser Huma Abedin. Abedin advised Clinton while she was also working for a consulting company; Grassley has been asking for information about the arrangement since 2013.

Given State’s recent responsiveness, however, he recently dropped the 20 holds but maintained a block on two more high-level nominees: Brian James Egan to be a State legal adviser and David Malcolm Robinson to be assistant secretary for conflict and stabilization operations and coordinator for reconstruction and stabilization. In November, Grassley also added a third hold on another top-level Obama State Department nominee, Thomas Shannon Jr., to be undersecretary of state for political affairs.

Grassley in his recent letter, however, hinted that if State continues working with his committee at the current pace, he could be amenable to releasing his holds.

“Assuming the committee receives the additional items promised by your staff in yesterday’s meeting, I intend to take action to recognize this progress before Senators leave town for the holiday break,” he said, nodding specifically to any copies of Pagliano emails they could discover by searching other employee’s emails.

 

 

 

 

Terrifying DHS Testimony on Syrians

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DHS: We Have No Idea How Many Syrian Refugees Are In The US

A senior official at the Department of Homeland Security admitted the agency has no clue how many Syrian refugees have entered the United States in the past year, while under fire in an intense congressional hearing Thursday.

Kelli Ann Burriesci, deputy assistant secretary at DHS, told the House Oversight and Government Reform subcommittee DHS doesn’t know how many Syrians entered the United States or how many Americans left the United States for Syria in the past year, reported The Washington Free Beacon.

That answer did not please members of the National Security subcommittee, who had asked DHS to send Secretary Jeh Johnson to testify, but were sent Burriesci instead. Many of their questions went unanswered, to their apparent frustration.

“You can’t give us the number of people on expired visas?” Republican Rep. Ron DeSantis, the  subcommittee chairman, asked Burriesci. “You have staff? can they just call DHS so we get it before the hearing is over? This should not be that difficult.”

Republican Rep. Mark Meadows noted the last time DHS provided Congress with accurate numbers of visa overstays was more than two decades ago, in 1994.

“Islamic jihadists are on the march and 13 people were massacred in San Bernardino, yet DHS seems clueless about what is going on with potential threats to our security,” DeSantis said after the hearing, according to the Free Beacon. “Congress needs to plug holes in immigration programs ranging from the visa waiver program to the refugee program. The testimony by DHS today gave Americans serious cause for concern about whether our government has a handle on the threats we face.”

Forced imposition of Syrian refugees on states throughout the U.S., coupled by the recent attacks in Paris and San Bernardino, have prompted renewed scrutiny on immigration from countries with high levels of terror activity. Members of Congress have struggled to find answers and come up with quick solutions to prevent another terror attack from occurring.

Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump has proposed temporarily banning all Muslim immigration to the U.S.  About 20 percent of Democrats and 65 percent of Republicans expressed support for the proposal in a recent poll, although it has been widely denounced by the administration and members of Congress on both sides of the aisle.
Many seem disillusioned with what appears to be an administration ready to blame terror activity on anything but Islam. The San Bernardino attacks did not improve that perceived track record.

The Obama administration attempted to label the attacks as workplace violence, and a recent report indicated that the only reason the FBI held off classifying the acts as terrorism immediately is because of undue pressure from the White House.

The Variable Terror, Red Flag and Embargo Lists

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It is admitted by the General Accounting Office that flaws in watch-lists DO exists as noted by this report titled: TERRORIST WATCH LIST SCREENING

Opportunities Exist to Enhance Management Oversight, Reduce Vulnerabilities in Agency Screening Processes, and Expand Use of the List

It appears this reported dated 2007, has not been updated, amended or reviewed by Congress which is in large part, the debate today given the San Bernardino massacre by a pair of militant Islamists.

 

No-Fly List Is Only One of Many U.S. Watchlists
Obama wants to deny those on list from buying guns; GOP objects and ACLU wants reforms
WSJ: WASHINGTON—Last week’s mass shooting in San Bernardino is sparking a renewed debate about one of the most controversial domestic aspects of the war on terror: The U.S. government’s watchlists.

The federal government maintains several databases of people suspected of links to terrorism, including a no-fly list barring certain individuals from boarding airplanes in the U.S.

Those databases, especially the no-fly list, long have been challenged by civil libertarians regarding the lack of transparency about how and why people are included. Most individuals in the databases have never been charged with a crime and are only suspected of being involved with terrorism.

The no-fly list itself is the smallest of all the government terrorism watchlists with about 16,000 names at last count, though it has attracted the most public criticism and legal challenges. A federal court this year declared the government’s system for dealing with appeals and challenges to inclusion on the no-fly list are unconstitutional.
Passengers on the no-fly list are denied the ability to board flights, but previously weren’t given an explanation why. In response to a lawsuit, the government said this year it would tell passengers if they were on the list and offer them an opportunity to provide additional information as part of an administrative appeals process to potentially be removed from the list.

In the wake of the California attack that killed 14 people and that investigators say may have been inspired by Islamic State, Democrats want people who are banned from air travel to also be prevented from buying weapons. Republicans say such a ban would be overly broad and may deprive some Americans of their constitutional right to bear arms.

The text of a Senate bill didn’t explicitly mention either the no-fly list or any other terrorism list, but Democratic sponsors said it would in practice ban those on the government lists from buying guns. The proposal, which would gave the attorney general the power to block gun sales, was defeated in the Senate last week.

Still, President Barack Obama continued to make the case for the proposal in a speech from the Oval Office Sunday night. “Congress should act to make sure no one on a no-fly list is able to buy a gun. What could possibly be the argument for allowing a terrorist suspect to buy a semi-automatic weapon?” he said.
Some Republicans and other gun rights supporters have pointed to the high error rates and false positives in the government’s terrorism databases. In one notable incident, the late Massachusetts Sen. Ted Kennedy, a Democratic Party icon, was singled out for special scrutiny at airports because his name matched an alias used by a terrorist suspect.

“These are everyday Americans that have nothing to do with terrorism, they wind up on the no-fly list, there’s no due process or any way to get your name removed from it in a timely fashion, and now they’re having their Second Amendment rights being impeded upon,” Sen. Marco Rubio, a Republican presidential candidate, told CNN this week.

Various government agencies maintain databases on suspected terrorists, each with a different function. Most of those lists were either created or vastly expanded after the Sept. 11, 2001 terrorist attacks under President George W. Bush’s administration.

The National Counterterrorism Center runs a central repository of more than 1 million people called Terrorist Identities Datamart Environment, or TIDE. The TIDE database, which includes about 25,000 Americans as of 2013, is drawn from intelligence community sources and is classified.

An unclassified subset of the TIDE database is made available to law enforcement as part of the Terrorist Screening Database. That database contains biographical and biometric information about potential terrorists and can be accessed by local, state and federal law enforcement officials who don’t have security clearances. As of 2011, that database was said to contain about 420,000 names, according to the FBI.

The Transportation Security Administration receives an even smaller list of people subject to travel restrictions drawn from the Terrorist Screening Database. In addition to the 16,000 names on the no-fly list in 2011, another 16,000 were on the selectee list. The selectee list doesn’t prevent individuals from flying but subjects them to extra scrutiny.

Critics say that banning suspected terrorists from buying guns poses the same problems as banning them from traveling: namely, the lack of transparency around the process used and concern of depriving individuals of their rights over the mere suspicion of terrorism.

“There is no constitutional bar to reasonable regulation of guns and the no-fly list could serve as a tool for it—but only with major reform,” said Hina Shamsi, an attorney with the American Civil Liberties Union’s National Security Project.

Ms. Shamsi litigated the ACLU’s ongoing challenge to the no-fly list in federal court, winning a victory for several of her clients who were denied the right to travel. Several plaintiffs in the lawsuit were removed from the no-fly list and the government has made some modifications

“These lists are compiled on the basis of mere suspicions,” said Bruce Ackerman, a constitutional law scholar and professor at Yale University. “What we need is a system in which defense lawyers who have received security clearances can effectively challenge the government’s evidence.”

Per the U.S. State Department, there are several other lists.

Red Flags and Watch Lists

Red Flags

 

These links, and subsequent links found on these web pages, describe the efforts of the U.S. federal government in the area of export control through Project Shield America. The Department of Homeland Security’s Immigration and Customs Enforcement office takes a proactive stance on the prevention of illegal export of sensitive U.S. munitions and strategic technology. Through the inspection of outbound shipments at high-threat ports and border crossings, educational outreach to industry leaders, and international cooperation with foreign governments, Project Shield America endeavors to protect American technological accomplishment from adversaries. These links also inform the public about the effective role that it can play in deterring illegal export activity. “Red Flag Indicators,” from the Department of Commerce’s Bureau of Industry and Security, encourage citizens to play an active role in the fight against proliferation and highlights specific activity indicative of potential export violations.

 

 

U.S. Department of Homeland Security – Shield America Brochure
U.S. Department of Commerce – Red Flag Indicators
 

Watch Lists

The following links provide information on countries, companies, and individuals that the U.S. Departments of State, Commerce, and Treasury have determined constitute a potential threat to domestic export control initiatives. Additionally, summary information about embargoes and sanctions imposed by the United States, United Kingdom, and the United Nations can be found below.

AECA Debarred List – Entities and individuals prohibited from participating directly or indirectly in the export of defense articles, including technical data and defense services.  Pursuant to the Arms Export Control Act (AECA) and the International Traffic in Arms Regulations (ITAR), the AECA Debarred List includes persons convicted in court of violating or conspiring to violate the AECA and subject to “statutory debarment” or persons established to have violated the AECA in an administrative proceeding and subject to “administrative debarment.”

U.S. Denied Persons List – Individuals and entities that have been denied export privileges. Any dealings with a party on this list that would violate the terms of its denial order are prohibited.

U.S. Unverified List – The Unverified List includes names and countries of foreign persons who in the past were parties to a transaction with respect to which the Bureau of Industry and Security (BIS) could not conduct a pre-license check (PLC) or a post-shipment verification (PSV) for reasons outside of the U.S. Government’s control. Any transaction to which a listed person is a party will be deemed by BIS to raise a Red Flag.

U.S. Specially Designated Nationals Lists – OFAC publishes a list of individuals and companies owned or controlled by, or acting for or on behalf of, targeted countries. It also lists individuals, groups, and entities, such as terrorists and narcotics traffickers designated under programs that are not country-specific. Collectively, such individuals and companies are called “Specially Designated Nationals” or “SDNs.” Their assets are blocked and U.S. persons are generally prohibited from dealing with them.

Entity List –  Parties whose presence in a transaction can trigger a license requirement supplemental to those elsewhere in the Export Administration Regulations (EAR). The list specifies the license requirements and policy that apply to each listed party.

U.S. Embargo Reference Chart – Foreign countries against which the United States federal government has imposed controls for the export of defense articles and services.

Consolidated Screening List – Link to a downloadable file that consolidates export screening lists of the Departments of Commerce, State and the Treasury into one spreadsheet as an aide to industry in conducting electronic screens of potential parties to regulated transactions. UK Embargoes – A reference point for lists of UN, EU, OSCE, and UK sanctions.

 

Preparing for War on Multiple Fronts?

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Preparing for War, too Slow?

Keep an eye on Libya, it too may require a repeated effort.

Without any formal announcements, the military has been testing missile systems both in an offensive and defensive measure. The Pentagon is charged with keeping ahead of forecasted conditions and they are successful and do make robust recommendations to the White House. Under sequestration, some needed measures are not possible yet proving the need given recent global terror events some requests are approved while others are delayed.

 

ALBUQUERQUE, N.M. (AP) — An early morning missile test in New Mexico left a white contrail that quickly turned into a corkscrew that was visible for hundreds of miles Thursday.

The unarmed Juno target missile was launched at 6:55 a.m. MST from an old military depot in northwestern New Mexico.

It was aimed at White Sands Missile Range, some 215 miles away, but a White Sands spokesman says it was successfully intercepted over the range by a Patriot missile and disintegrated midair.

Range spokesman Luciano Vera says a second Patriot fired from White Sands self-destructed after the first Patriot hit the target.

The corkscrew-shaped contrail was visible in Phoenix, 245 miles southwest of the launch site.

Moving forward, the Pentagon is also diligently working to gain a robust intelligence advantage as well as expanding a Middle East war footing.

WASHINGTON — As American intelligence agencies grapple with the expansion of the Islamic State beyond its headquarters in Syria, the Pentagon has proposed a new plan to the White House to build up a string of military bases in Africa, Southwest Asia and the Middle East.

The bases could be used for collecting intelligence and carrying out strikes against the terrorist group’s far-flung affiliates.

The growth of the Islamic State’s franchises — at least eight militant groups have pledged loyalty to the network’s leaders so far — has forced a debate within the Obama administration about how to distinguish between the affiliates that pose the most immediate threat to the United States and Europe and others that are more regionally focused. The regional groups, some officials say, may have opportunistically adopted the Islamic State’s brand to bolster their local clout and global stature.

In the midst of that debate, senior military officials have told the White House that the network of bases would serve as hubs for Special Operations troops and intelligence operatives who would conduct counterterrorism missions for the foreseeable future. The plan would all but ensure what Pentagon officials call an “enduring” American military presence in some of the world’s most volatile regions.

While it is in vogue to side with Putin and his mission to stop Islamic State in Syria, it is pure propaganda. Russia has assumed a full defensive posture aiding Bashir al Assad and is only targeting anti-Assad forces in Syria, many of which are supported by the West and the Middle East Gulf States. Russia in fact is expanding their bases in Syria stealing away some objectives even from Iran. Further, Russia is using the conflict in Syria to test the skill levels of ground troops and newly created weapons systems.

Then while the globe is focused on tracking terrorists around the world and connecting them to Islamic State or al Qaida, there is yet another matter of grave concern pointing to North Korea. North Korean leader Kim Jong Un says his country has developed a hydrogen bomb, state media reported Thursday.

Jong Un made the statement during an arms industry inspection on Wednesday, South Korean news agency Yonhap said, citing reports.

Information related to the highly secretive nation of North Korea, which has nuclear weapons, is extremely difficult to independently confirm.

A report by the North’s official Korean Central News Agency said the country is now a “powerful nuclear weapons state ready to detonate a self-reliant A-bomb (atomic bomb) and H-bomb (hydrogen bomb) to reliably defend its sovereignty and the dignity of the nation,” Yonhap reported. *** This is not a new condition, as the United States has advanced technology to test the air quality to determine what it reveals, which is in fact part of the signals intelligence used by the geo-spatial systems. Going back a few years, conditions were prove what North Korea was doing when it comes to the creation of a hydrogen bomb. There was and is a surge in radiation going back to 2010.

We cannot overlook the matter of the continued aggression by China in the South China Sea where the United States has deployed the USS Larson, which is a guided missile destroyer tasked with surveillance and intelligence gathering.

While there is still the matter of Iran testing missile systems in violation of all resolutions, there is very little if anything being considered to stop Iran.

It appears all of these global events are in fact part of the briefings provided to the White House, yet the Commander in Chief has proven he would rather remain focused on social justice issues and defer national security matters to the next President. You be the judge as to what the worldwide global security conditions will be by then.

 

 

 

 

ISIS Speaks Mandarin? Threatening Who Now?

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Remember when during the Bush administration, we captured enemy combatants on the battlefield that were known as Uighurs? They were sent to Gitmo and under Barack Obama they were released? Remember when only in recent weeks that Barack Obama said that Islamic State was contained?

How to Say ‘Islamic State’ in Mandarin

ForeignPolicy: New Chinese-language propaganda seems to ignore Uighurs, the group Beijing says has the most terrorist connections.

On Dec. 6, the Islamic State released a slick recording of a Mandarin Chinese-language song glorifying jihad, in what seems to be a direct attempt to recruit Chinese Muslims to the terrorist group’s cause. “Awaken, Muslim brothers! Now is the time to wake up,” proclaims the song in Chinese. “It’s our dream to die on this battlefield.”

Although the Islamic State recording is — horrifyingly — catchy, it is unlikely to make it far on the Chinese-language Internet. The nation’s ruling Chinese Communist Party enforces strict online censorship, filtering in real time posts that it deems destabilizing or overtly critical of the government.

The Islamic State has targeted China on several occasions. In July 2014, Islamic State leader Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi called out China as a country that oppresses its Muslims. In December 2014, the Chinese state-run Global Times reported that 300 Uighurs, a largely Muslim Turkic-speaking ethnic minority that mostly lives in the northwest Chinese region of Xinjiang, had left China to join the militant organization, though there is no way to verify that statistic. And on Nov. 18, the Islamic State announced that it had executed its first Chinese hostage, a Beijing native named Fan Jinghui.

But this new recruitment effort indicates that the Islamic State is not just interested in Uighurs, but in all of China’s Muslims, including the Hui, Chinese speakers whose features are often indistinguishable from the majority Han ethnic group. It’s unlikely this latest song is actually attempting to recruit Uighurs, many of whom speak Mandarin poorly or not at all, particularly those in Xinjiang’s rural southern regions.

Chinese authorities have put particular blame for extremist violence within the country on Uighur separatists, a group that has often chafed under what many feel to be the imposition of Mandarin on their culture and historic homeland. The Chinese government has sought to connect the simmering insurgency among some Uighurs in Xinjiang with international terrorism and more recently with the Islamic State. After November attacks in Paris killed 130 and wounded hundreds, including one Chinese citizen, Beijing called on Western powers to recognize Xinjiang, and recent violent attacks in several cities throughout China, as an important front in the global war on terror. Beijing has denounced the failure of Western countries to do so as a “double standard” on terrorism.

Outside observers and Uighur advocacy groups maintain, however, that the Chinese government conflates dissidents and separatists with terrorists, and Chinese authorities have not publicly released evidence establishing a direct connection between high-profile domestic attacks within China and outside terrorist organizations.