US National Security Official Caught Using 'Less-Secure Signal App Knockoff' (theguardian.com) 76
Remember when U.S. National Security Adviser Mike Waltz mistakenly included a journalist in an encrypted chatroom to discuss looming U.S. military action against Yemen's Houthis?
A recent photo of a high-level cabinet meeting caught Waltz using a "less-secure Signal app knockoff," reports the Guardian: The chat app Waltz was using appears to be a modified version of Signal called TM SGNL, made by a company that copies messaging apps but adds an ability to retain messages and archive them. The White House officials may be using the modified Signal in order to comply with the legal requirement that presidential records be preserved... That function suggests the end-to-end encryption that makes Signal trusted for sharing private communications is possibly "not maintained, because the messages can be later retrieved after being stored somewhere else", according to 404 Media.
Thursday the national security adviser was removed from his position, the article points out.
He was instead named America's ambassador to the United Nations.
A recent photo of a high-level cabinet meeting caught Waltz using a "less-secure Signal app knockoff," reports the Guardian: The chat app Waltz was using appears to be a modified version of Signal called TM SGNL, made by a company that copies messaging apps but adds an ability to retain messages and archive them. The White House officials may be using the modified Signal in order to comply with the legal requirement that presidential records be preserved... That function suggests the end-to-end encryption that makes Signal trusted for sharing private communications is possibly "not maintained, because the messages can be later retrieved after being stored somewhere else", according to 404 Media.
Thursday the national security adviser was removed from his position, the article points out.
He was instead named America's ambassador to the United Nations.
Trumptards (Score:5, Insightful)
Just like the putinist party of rashistan, only with a much, much dumber electorate.
Re:Trumptards (Score:5, Informative)
You must be willfully ignoring high profile news then. It was reported on by basically everyone, even including news agencies that are acting as propaganda wings of the Republicans and Trump.
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Willfully ignorant is the credo of the trumptard.
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Remember when U.S. National Security Adviser Mike Waltz mistakenly included a journalist in an encrypted chatroom to discuss looming U.S. military action against Yemen's Houthis?\
No, I don't remember this.
You must be willfully ignoring high profile news then. It was reported on by basically everyone, even including news agencies that are acting as propaganda wings of the Republicans and Trump.
It was also reported in the article linked in the very sentence that was quoted from TFS. To wit. [bbc.com]
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I'm surprised that his ATSC converter-box still works.
Re:Trumptards (Score:4, Interesting)
Gee I wonder why (Score:5, Insightful)
They don’t want to use approved government systems with all those pesky records laws.
Republicans aren’t sending their best and brightest.
Re:Gee I wonder why (Score:5, Insightful)
They've spent at least the past half-century chasing anyone who is bright out of their circle. The result is concentrated idiocy. The same can be said of their voters - concentrated, curated, weaponized idiocy. These people don't know how to build, only destroy. Toddlers on a tantrum. Problem is someone gave them guns and nukes.
Re:Gee I wonder why (Score:5, Interesting)
They don’t want to use approved government systems with all those pesky records laws.
Republicans aren’t sending their best and brightest.
Additionally, remember their bitching about Hillary Clinton's e-mail server? They're running in the, "Every accusation is a confession," model.
Re:Gee I wonder why (Score:5, Insightful)
More accurately it's "everything bad you accuse us of doing we feel Democrats have already done so we are absolutely justified in doing 10x worse"
Then just add a complete lack of shamelessness and a leader who promises swift revenge and you have yourself a good ol' authoritarian party takeover.
Re:Gee I wonder why (Score:5, Insightful)
Sure and I don't think anyone is contesting that, even Clinton but when a group of people spend over a year and $20M investigating something and excoriating about how bad it is, how people need to go to prison about it we generally don't expect them to just do that very thing themselves (and worse!) and then defend doing it. We usually don't trust those people, that's a bad way to operate in society.
It's the double standard and hypocrisy but we in a post hypocrisy world now, there's no such thing as shame for ones actions against your stated principles.
Re: Gee I wonder why (Score:4, Informative)
if you or I had done anything similar we would have been in prison in about 45 minutes. But alas, nothing happened.
See again we say that but what does that mean? Nothing happened because they ended up not really finding anything, nothing classified was intentionally shared and of all of it a very small amount was ever shared and most of it was retroactively classified.
Also things did happen, a year of media coverage and $20M of investigations, the DOJ, FBI, Congress all investigated, something like 250 witness testimony and arguably the whole thing cost her the election. This isn't about if Hillary Clinton is a nice person or her positions it's if she did criminal things and the result of that is no, not really.
So yes, both sides have done shitty things but right now if you can't see that one side is far more deceitful, duplicitous, lying and corrupt then I don't know, I would ask to see where you get your media from. The ol' both sides schtick is just boring and thought terminating.
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nothing classified was intentionally shared and of all of it a very small amount was ever shared and most of it was retroactively classified.
You're quoting Clinton's campaign team here, don't do that. Politicians are always biased. You should find better sources.
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Party politics are for rubes.
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Trump was a NY democrat for years, that's nothing new. Then he found out how easy is it to grift the right wingers and here we are.
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You're gonna tell me Donald Fucking Trump is going to take his tangential friendship over effectively a guaranteed win and legendary status in the Republican party politics, even just putting her on trial his base would go bananas, that guy, the guy who loves adoration. Also would be holding back alllll his various cabinet members over the years who would be prodding him to do it.
Cmon this is fantastical thinking, this is fake moon landing stuff.
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You're gonna tell me Donald Fucking Trump is going to take his tangential friendship over effectively a guaranteed win and legendary status in the Republican party politics,
Yeah, actually. Trump doesn't care about Republicans. Trump stopped chanting "lock her up" as soon as the election was won.
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And you think that was because of personal relationship with Clinton? If they had something they'd use it, no doubt.
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Charges? Release of evidence? Nothing? So why should we believe anything but the stated evidence from the investigations which I represented fairly accurately and there were no charges because there wasn't anything worth criminally charging.
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Id ask if that's the opinion of the Clinton Campaign Team or the FBI but you'll probably just tell me they're the same thing!
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While true, that's not the point: these people worked up hysteria about Hillary, called her crooked and demanded she be locked up. Then they went and did something worse: not only used an illegal system themselves but also leaked secret information through their own incompetence about an ongoing operation. The level of hyprocrasy is staggering. They can't live up to the standards they demanded from others.
Re:Gee I wonder why (Score:4, Informative)
IIUC, Hillary Clinton *did* run and use an email server that was illegal for her to use for government communication. So that was one accusation that I feel was true.
Trump and his cronies have now done the same thing and even worse in both terms.
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They don’t want to use approved government systems with all those pesky records laws.
It is right there in TFS! They are using TM SGNL because of the data retention rules . Signal is open source , or at least the protocol is, allowing people to make compatible apps. And because the law requires all government communications to be archived, they need to use a version that does this. The official signal app does not. Signal show be seen as a replacement for email, not for classified discussion.
Waltz probably should not be taking the fall for Signalgate. It was Hegseth who cho
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That's a possible explanation. It may be correct. As I read the article summary, however, it was a guess by the author rather than an assertion.
Re:Gee I wonder why (Score:4, Informative)
The problem is, what fall? Falling all the way down into being named as an ambassador?
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Given how much Trump cares about the UN, it is definitely a demotion. But enough to keep him quiet.
Re: Gee I wonder why (Score:1)
The article: "... The White House officials may be using the modified Signal in order to comply with the legal requirement that presidential records be preserved."
It's literally why they're using that version.
Buttery males! (Score:5, Insightful)
Fun fact when Trump was President last time the number of American intelligence agents captured and killed skyrocketed. Meanwhile he was giving out classified documents like party favors at his golf course.
And we still gave him another term. Christ were on track to give him a third term. Not like anyone will stop him they didn't last time
Re:Buttery males! (Score:5, Interesting)
when Trump was President last time the number of American intelligence agents captured and killed skyrocketed.
Even right now reports are the Houthi's have shot down 7 Predator drones in the past 6 weeks [npr.org]
Re:Buttery males! (Score:5, Insightful)
What is more alarming is not the number of informants captured or killed but the number of informants turned double-agents.
So, you think we should ignore Trump leaking information that could cause agents to be captured or killed? Because $DISTRACTION?
Dude that is some weak sauce (Score:5, Informative)
It's a thought terminating cliche. It's something you use, whether you would know it or not, to stop thinking about the bad shit you're supporting and the people you're getting killed.
It works because everybody hates the DMV because the Republican party sabotaged the DMV so that you would associate them with government and demand less government leaving a power vacuum.
But you can't actually think about any of that because you've got the stack of thought terminating cliches and, well, that's what a thought terminating cliche does.
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Can’t wait until Obama announces his 2028 run and watch the mental gymnastics of how Trump is eligible but Obama is not.
Democrats won't do that (Score:1)
All told it looks like about 7 million Americans were prevented from casting a ballot, and so far the Democrats and the left wing are doing absolutely nothing about that. Paving the way for a third term of trump.
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Left wingers have this silly childish fantasy that if they just keep yelling long enough 18 to 24s are all going to show up to the polls and vote for progressive policies.
First the Democrats would have to put forth some progressive policy based legislation when they can pass it, instead of some more of the same no of course we won't stop insider trading fuckery.
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Clearly the US constitution says that no president may be elected to a third term, which would disqualify Obama, but means there's no problem with Trump being elected to his fourth term.
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I need you to provide proof that you aren't a Republican party strategist.
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Yeah the fact I cannot tell if this is sincere or satire is why this very argument will probably end up being in an opinion by Alito.
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Can’t wait until Obama announces his 2028 run and watch the mental gymnastics of how Trump is eligible but Obama is not.
As long as its Michelle, she's eligible to be elected. Barack clearly is not and I don't think its likely he could pull off the work-arounds and become President without getting elected. Gerald Ford is the only un-elected President we have had and no one thinks he manipulated Agnew and Nixon to resign.
Re: Buttery males! (Score:3)
and you know who the major attendees of that golf championship were? The Saudis...
isnâ(TM)t it incredibly interesting how the rants he goes on are about so many other countries, but the Saudis are just somehow never talked about? And how billions of dollars went to Jared Kushner and are now going to Trump via his shit coin?
When you enplace dangerously unqualified people... (Score:5, Insightful)
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There are morons everywhere -- including in the military, although I think it's harder for them to flourish there. Fortunately, morons typically are a minority and do not have unchecked influence. That's not the case right now in the executive branch.
If the system had worked the way it should, Congress would not have approved morons for the executive branch's cabinet. Even so, it's important for the military to be controlled by the executive branch, and not separately on its own account. Just look at the co
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There are morons everywhere -- including in the military, although I think it's harder for them to flourish there.
lol- you clearly didn't spend your early 20s hanging out at the barracks in Ft Hood.
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There are morons everywhere -- including in the military, although I think it's harder for them to flourish there.
lol- you clearly didn't spend your early 20s hanging out at the barracks in Ft Hood.
The key word was flourish. I suspect the "morons" tend not to get promoted into critical positions. The ones who do may have other qualities that might cause concern (like stubbornness and ambition) but I don't think they're stupid or unobservant.
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Idiots get along just fine in the military.
They fly up the NCO promotion chain without problems.
When I was hanging out there, I knew first sergeants serving and fucking 18 year old privates.
Now I'll grant I have zero experience hanging out with actual commissioned officers, but among the enlisted- ya. The literal dregs at all positions of power (at least that you're likely to find at a barracks)
I'm sure you don't end
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Emojis (Score:2)
"Minimal civilian casualties expected at target" followed by three smiley faces and a thumbs up.
Re: Emojis (Score:2)
Re: Emojis (Score:1)
Why do they use Signal or a knockoff? (Score:3)
I understand that Signal was approved and installed during the Biden administration but I don't understand why. With all the money we spend on the NSA and the DOD, why don't we have our own secured and compliant government system for communications like this?
Re:Why do they use Signal or a knockoff? (Score:5, Informative)
It was "approved" in that CISA (which now does not really exist) said it was an end-to-end encryption as "mobile communication best practices" for government officials personal security safety but there were explcit calls that it cannot be used for non-public DoD information. The same guidance recommended using a password manager, use FIDO and to not use SMS, all stuff we here know is good advice for people.
You can read both memos from the admin here, if you can find anything in there that says "Yeah go ahead and use Signal for classified military plans" then we might have an equivalence.
https://www.cisa.gov/sites/def... [cisa.gov]
https://dodcio.defense.gov/Por... [defense.gov]
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It was "approved" in that CISA (which now does not really exist) said it was an end-to-end encryption as "mobile communication best practices" for government officials personal security safety but there were explcit calls that it cannot be used for non-public DoD information. The same guidance recommended using a password manager, use FIDO and to not use SMS, all stuff we here know is good advice for people.
You can read both memos from the admin here, if you can find anything in there that says "Yeah go ahead and use Signal for classified military plans" then we might have an equivalence.
https://www.cisa.gov/sites/def... [cisa.gov]
https://dodcio.defense.gov/Por... [defense.gov]
But if Signal doesn't retain communications for the required retention time then why is it approved for any governmental use at all?
The second memo doesn't really clarify things. It says don't use unapproved systems, but these people may have been under the impression it was approved.
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It wasn't "approved" for anything classified nor as an official government means. Is that memo an EO or agency directive? Is there evidence besides this general memo?
but these people may have been under the impression it was approved.
"These people" are the National Security Advisor, Secretary of Defense and how many other high ranking cabinet members? Is that where we are at, they were "confused". If that is the reason they should resign immediately correct?
Seriously if a person reads that first document and their conclusion is "Signal is a DoD approved communication syst
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but I don't understand why.
If you have something that has been audited to be suitable for a task and you can maintain control over it in a way that prevents it from losing its audit trail (e.g. using MDM to force only a specific approved version of the package to be installed from an internal server), why would you reinvent the wheel?
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but I don't understand why.
If you have something that has been audited to be suitable for a task and you can maintain control over it in a way that prevents it from losing its audit trail (e.g. using MDM to force only a specific approved version of the package to be installed from an internal server), why would you reinvent the wheel?
Signal does not provide centralized message retention, which I thought was a requirement for government communications systems.
Don't worry (Score:2)
This app is vetted by Israel. They're our allies.
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All the more reason to distrust it.
Infighting.. (Score:2, Offtopic)
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Perhaps you don't actually have much understanding of democracies? The citizens are constantly arguing and wrestling with each other, over all sorts of stuff that ranges from really important (tax, budget, infrastructure) to totally inane (the DEI culture war). The citizens only come together when something really serious happens. Otherwise, they're mostly free to shoot their mouths off, go about living their lives, and squabble over political
Re: Infighting.. (Score:2)
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However, what you see on Fox, NBC and social media doesn't reflect what happens day to day in the country. I work with both liberals and conservatives on a daily basis. We talk and joke and disagee sometimes, and agree to disagree in order to get along. Then, we go home, and some of us tune in to NBC and others tune into Fox and listen to people with steam coming out of their ea
Re: Infighting.. (Score:2)
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Something is threatening the US. Might even be the greatest threat since 9/11. He's sitting in the oval office.
They say all it takes for evil to triumph is for good men to do nothing. Well in the last few years in the US we've seen a hell of a lot of good men doing a hell of a lot of nothing.
Re: Infighting.. (Score:2)
Donâ(TM)t worry, behind closed doors it's all assured that as long as they keep making the donor class more money, everything will be OK for them.
from Marjorie Taylor Greene all the way on down, behind closed doors they are incredibly smart people who know exactly what they are doing. itâ(TM)s all a show to grift and distract you from whatâ(TM)s really happening, which is stealing everything you have and your entire future.
It's a club and you and I aren't part of it.
As a foreigner... (Score:2)
I would like to request that whatever selection methodology you are using to fill all of these important positions... absolutely continue to use it. Do exactly that, and repeatedly. My fondest wish for the US government... stay the course. Don't let any demand for appropriate skills or background intrude. You're killing it.
I'd like to name the process though. May I suggest that you "Kushner" these posts?
'Less-Secure Signal App Knockoff' (Score:2)