Tag Archives: ethics

Cybersecurity

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A quick thought on this threat to our personal financial wellbeing, our companies’ wellbeing, and our collective wellbeing.  The Wall Street Journal ran an article on the subject earlier in the week, and this bit jumped out at me [emphasis added].

To better understand how far we have to go in creating a cybersafe culture, consider this: if you were taking a tour through a nuclear plant, and there was a big red valve with a sign on it that said “Do not touch,” how many of you would turn it? None, I would guess. But in a phishing test conducted at a major financial-services firm, one of the test emails actually said: “This is a Phishing Test. Clicking the link below will cause harm to your computer.” At least one executive clicked it! When asked why, he said, “I was curious to see what it would do.”

That executive should have been fired, for cause, on the spot.  It’s too bad the author of the article didn’t identify the company; if that executive still works there, that would be a financial services firm that shouldn’t get anyone’s business; the company will have demonstrated that it won’t take seriously its obligation protect its customers’ personal financial data—or the monies customers might actually place with it.

Free Speech

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…British style.  There is a trial in progress in Leeds (northern England, a bit up the road northeast of Manchester) concerning a

Muslim gang on trial for raping and grooming hundreds of victims, some as young as eleven.

Tommy Robinson, a British activist-journalist, was arrested and hauled off to prison for the heinous crime of reporting information about the defendants—public information, mind you.

British media are forbidden from reporting on certain trials….

The rationalization is that reporting might taint the jury.  Because some juries are more easily tainted than other juries on other trials.  Cue Bill the Cat.

No, it’s a matter of the British government, in the land that gave the world the Magna Carta and John Locke—and jury trials—not trusting its own citizens with the truth.  It’s also a matter of political correctness run amok.  Telling the truth might hurt the feelings of the defendants.

This is the culture the Progressive-Democrats and the Left generally want us to have.

 

h/t Ralph for this one.

The FBI and Backdoors

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Recall that the FBI has long wanted government-accessible backdoors into our personal but encrypted communications.  “Trust us,” FBI leadership assures us, “we wouldn’t misuse that access; we’ll only use for ‘criminal’ investigations, and only with government authorization.”  And they’ve claimed in support of that wide-eyed innocence that they can’t break into over 7,000 cell phones in the pursuit of criminal investigations.  Current FBI Director Christopher Wray even put the number at over 7,700.

However.

On Tuesday, the FBI told PCMag that a programming error resulted in a “significant overcounting” of the encrypted devices. “The FBI is currently conducting an in-depth review of how this over-counting previously occurred,” the agency said in a statement.

PCMag went on to cite the Washington Post as putting the actual number at around 1,200.

Oops, indeed.

According to the agency, starting in April 2016, it began using a new “collection methodology” with how it counted the encrypted devices. But only recently did the FBI become aware of flaws in the methodology, it said, without elaborating.

Right.

“Given the availability of these third-party solutions, we’ve questioned how and why the FBI finds itself thwarted by so many locked phones,” the Electronic Frontier Foundation said in a blog post.

Indeed.  Whether this government agency was being dishonest in its characterization of the encryption “problem,” or it was just being incredibly sloppy in using “collection methodology” that it has so plainly inadequately tested, this incident is just one more reason Government cannot be trusted with back doors into privately encrypted personal correspondence.

Confusion, or….

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The NLMSM has its collective panty in a twist over US Ambassador to the UN Nikki Haley’s use of her twitter account.

Or they’re manufacturing a paranoia about her use, claiming she’s campaigning for the Presidency by using her personal Twitter account for Official Business.  Here’s what Politico offered as examples of this misuse.

That can’t possibly be a personal opinion shared with her personal followers.  Nope—that’s Official Business.  She’s instructing staff with that expression.

And this:

Yeah, that’s an Official Instruction to…someone…all right.

And this:

Because any expression of sympathy and commiseration and encouragement can only be Official Business.

The NLMSM is getting desperate in its search for criticisms those not within its narrative.

A Mueller Interrogation

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It’s well enough known that Special Counselor Robert Mueller is anxious to interrogate President Donald Trump as part of Mueller’s “investigation” of Russian interference in our 2016 election and of the Trump campaign’s alleged role in colluding with the Russians in that interference.  Trump’s counselor, Rudy Giuliani, says that Trump should not agree to the interrogation unless and until Mueller details the degree of DoJ spying on the Trump campaign, including what the FBI’s planted “informant,” Cambridge Professor Stefan Halper (who may be only one of two or three such plants), was doing and what he passed on to his FBI handlers.

Giuliani is right about that.  Trump can take a number of direct actions on the matter himself, though, that would speed things along.  After much stonewalling by Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein, a Federal judge presiding over a related-only-by-Mueller-claim case got fed up with Mueller’s own stonewalling in that case and ordered Mueller to deliver up the DoJ letter and amendment specifying the scope of Mueller’s investigation.  On DoJ’s claim that the documents are classified, they were delivered under seal to the judge.

House and Senate committees that also have requested those documents have been refused: Rosenstein objects to petty Congressmen overseeing his august activities.  Trump should order Rosenstein to deliver the documents to the House and Senate committees under a short deadline, say by noon Eastern Time this Friday.  If Rosenstein really is concerned about classification, they can be delivered to the subset of committee members who have the requisite clearance—and, yes, the committees have members of both parties with the clearances (their need to know already is plain).  If those documents are not delivered on time, Trump should, at 1201 Eastern, declassify the documents (Presidents are the ultimate arbiters of what’s classified and not classified) and order them hand-carried to the committees by COB Friday.

Trump should handle documentation related to the FBI’s spy(s) in his campaign similarly.  He should order Rosenstein to deliver all documentation, including correspondence with and about Halper (et al.), related to the plants and what they passed back to their handlers, delivered to those same committees and to the White House (perhaps to Giuliani in particular).  In view of the probable extensive amount of such documentation, Rosenstein should be given until, say, noon on Monday to produce.  If that deadline goes unmet, Trump should, at 1201 on Monday, declassify those documents and order their hand-carried delivery to the committees and the White House by COB Monday.

It’s time to put an end to the stonewalling and get things moving again.  Then a Mueller interrogation can have a chance to be an honest one.