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Democrats Desktops (Apple) Blackberry Databases Government Power Privacy Security Software News Apple Hardware IT Politics Technology

Clinton's First Email Server Was a Power Mac Tower (arstechnica.com) 223

An anonymous reader shares with us an excerpt from a report via Ars Technica: As she was being confirmed as Secretary of State, Hillary Clinton contacted Colin Powell to ask him about his use of a Blackberry while in the same role. According to a Federal Bureau of Investigations memorandum published today (PDF), Powell warned Clinton that if it became public that she was using a Blackberry to "do business," her e-mails would be treated as "official" record and be subject to the law. "Be very careful," Powell said according to the FBI. "I got around it all by not saying much and not using systems that captured the data." Perhaps Clinton's troubles began when she switched from a Blackberry-hosted e-mail account to an account on her Clintonemail.com domain -- a domain hosted on an Apple Power Mac "G4 or G5" tower running in the Clintons' Chappaqua, New York residence. The switch to the Power Mac as a server occurred the same month she exchanged messages with Powell. The Power Mac, originally purchased in 2007 by former President Clinton's aide Justin Cooper, had acted as the server for presidentclinton.com and wjcoffice.com. Cooper managed most of the technology support for Bill Clinton and took charge of setting up Hillary Clinton's new personal mail system on the Power Mac, which sat alongside a firewall and network switching hardware in the basement of the Clintons' home. But the Power Mac was having difficulty handling the additional load created by Blackberry usage from Secretary Clinton and her staff, so a decision was made quickly to upgrade the server hardware. Secretary Clinton's deputy chief of staff at the State Department, Huma Abedin, connected Cooper with Brian Pagliano, who had worked in IT for the secretary's 2008 presidential campaign. Cooper inquired with Pagliano about getting some of the campaign's computer hardware as a replacement for the Power Mac, and Pagliano was in the process of selling the equipment off.
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Clinton's First Email Server Was a Power Mac Tower

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  • by dgatwood ( 11270 ) on Friday September 02, 2016 @07:13PM (#52818757) Homepage Journal

    I could see being confused about the difference between a G3 and G4 tower if you're colorblind, but a G5? I mean, it was either grey plastic or it looked like a cheese grater....

  • by ls671 ( 1122017 ) on Friday September 02, 2016 @07:17PM (#52818771) Homepage

    "But the Power Mac was having difficulty handling the additional load created by Blackberry usage from Secretary Clinton and her staff..."

    Seriously?

  • She's got a couple of hundred million in the bank and she's scrimping on the hardware? Incredible.
    • by garote ( 682822 )

      That's how you _keep_ a couple hundred million in the bank.

      Seriously, though. The state of official government hardware would HORRIFY anyone who's worked in the Silicon Valley. Five years out of date is the standard, ten years out of date is common. And in this instance it's not even official government hardware, which means corners cut from corners.

  • by Areyoukiddingme ( 1289470 ) on Friday September 02, 2016 @07:45PM (#52818927)

    Finally, news nerds actually care about. Now we can have the argument over whether Hillary Clinton should be barred from office for life for using a Mac or instantly sainted for using a Mac.

    Here, I'll start the ball rolling. Ban her from office! Unclean!

    • Now we can have the argument over whether Hillary Clinton should be barred from office for life for using a Mac or instantly sainted for using a Mac.

      She's history's greatest monster, but she hates systemd, so I'm really conflicted.

  • The opaqueness and secrecy of Apple was a natural fit for Clinton.
  • by Anonymous Coward

    "Gross negligence" is defined as "such a gross want of care...as to justify the presumption of willfulness "
    --Black's Law Dictionary 1185 (4th ed.1968), the definitive dictionary for the legal profession;

    "Whoever, being entrusted with...any document...relating to the national defense...through gross negligence permits the same to be removed from its proper place of custody...shall be fined under this title or imprisoned not more than ten years, or both."
    --18 U.S.C. 793(f);

    "Although we did not find clear ev

    • by guruevi ( 827432 )

      Perhaps she has Alzheimer's, that would be consistent with "I don't remember doing shit" and any judge would allow that as a valid defense.

  • ...In real life the bad guys (gal) can use a Mac.

  • We all know that journalism is a thing of the past, and this is a perfect example. The official report says NOTHING about a Power Mac. In 2007, Apple wasn't even selling Power Macs. Furthermore, the report says that the server was experiencing connectivity issues with BlackBerries, not that it couldn't handle the load. I see no mention of load issues in the official report.

  • What server software was running on the Mac? EIMS? Sendmail?

    (I have run EIMS for almost 20 years - too bad the developer decided to go in a different direction.)

  • http://www.cnn.com/2016/09/02/... [cnn.com]

    Really? Read that, she is either lying or completely incompetent...

  • Hillary Clinton contacted Colin Powell to ask him about his use of a Blackberry while in the same role. According to a Federal Bureau of Investigations memorandum published today (PDF), Powell warned Clinton that if it became public that she was using a Blackberry to "do business," her e-mails would be treated as "official" record and be subject to the law. "Be very careful," Powell said according to the FBI. "I got around it all by not saying much and not using systems that captured the data."

    So Hillary remembers every word of a brief conversation she had with Powell eight years ago, but she can't remember with the "C" in Classified stands for? Sure.

  • by kenh ( 9056 ) on Saturday September 03, 2016 @10:12AM (#52821101) Homepage Journal

    "The truth is, she was using (the private email server) for a year before I sent her a memo telling her what I did," Powell said.

    Source: CNN [cnn.com]

    Then again, who are you going to believe, Powell or Clinton?

  • I think Hillary was treated fairly by the FBI director. The problem is we should all be treated like this, with due process. Instead the way it works for us normal people is the states attorney charges us will a million trumped up things as a way to get leverage over us to plea bargain.

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