When Hillary Clinton served as Secretary of State, she used a private email server that was stored at her home and later in hosting facility not cleared for classified information (supposedly in a bathroom).

Initially, she claimed there was no classified information on the server at any time. Further, when she was required to turn over records to comply with archival rules, she had her staff delete the personal messages and pass the rest along.

In the current investigation, they've discovered classified emails - some classified after the fact, some not - which included KH-designated intelligence (aka detailed satellite images). In addition, when she delivered the data to the State Department, she gave a copy of all of it to her lawyer, who didn't have clearance for the classified data.. which shouldn't have been there anyway.

Yes, previous Cabinet-level staff had used private servers but the National Archives explicitly recommended against it in 2006 (a recommendation, not law) and then President Obama signed an Executive Order making it the law in 2009. Secretary Clinton continued doing it until she left the State Department in 2013.

At minimum, it was disregard for the recommendations and eventual law. At worse, it was flagrant disregard for protecting the means and methods - that includes people - who collected and needed that information.

> In the current investigation, they've discovered classified emails - some classified after the fact, some not

"some not"? If you are implying that Clinton's server held messages marked as classified when sent, could you provide some evidence to this effect? The Clinton campaign is quite adamant that this is not true.

This is a red herring. It doesn't matter if it was marked or not. It is up to the sender to take the precaution. That there are now thousands of emails marked after the fact as classified, wouldn't that tell you the assumption should have been made to err on the side of caution, and assume most everything you are discussing has high probability to be classified information?

And using your own insecure personal server for these emails essentially guarantees that it's been hacked by.. China, Russia, take your pick.

In fact there is a term called "born-classified" which applies to information about foreign governments provided by foreign sources. Here's some evidence:

http://www.reuters.com/article/us-usa-election-clinton-email...

There's a fundamental misunderstanding about classified material, which is that it becomes de-classified once it is public. Not true.

For example, take the Wikileaks information dump, which came from a huge cache of State Dept. cables and has now been covered in hundreds of public newspaper articles. If one of her friends forwarded one of those articles to Clinton, boom, she now has classified information in her email. Why? Because those cables, despite being leaked, were never de-classified.

Another example: a lot of the stuff revealed by Snowden was classified at a very high level. It still is today, even though it is widely available public information. Can you see how this could cause problems for someone who is a government official, but has friends/family/contacts who wish to discuss these news articles?

The press is a well-known vector that leads to a lot of government staff having classified information in their unclassified email systems. Typically investigations are rare and prosecutions rarer, because it's basically impossible to prevent and does no practical damage (since the info is already out there).

This is why the mere fact of having classified material on an email server does not necessarily imply incompetence or malice.

I did not imply anything, I said it quite clearly: some of the emails contained information that was classified at the time she sent/received them.

According to CNN:

> Two government agencies flagged emails on Clinton's server as containing classified information, the inspector general said, including some on "special access programs," which are a subset of the highest "Top Secret" level of classification, but are under subject to more stringent control rules than even other Top Secret information."

Ref: http://www.cnn.com/2016/01/19/politics/hillary-clinton-email...

> some of the emails contained information that was classified at the time she sent/received them.

As far as I can tell, the article to which you refer says nothing of the sort. It says that the email contains information which was classified after the fact. The article is based on the Inspector General's letter (http://i2.cdn.turner.com/cnn/2016/images/01/20/2016.01.14.-....), which says the same thing. Do you have evidence that the information was classified at the time it was mailed to her server? Her campaign says it was not.

Well as long as the campaign is your source, you should definitely believe them. They're much better informed than the FBI, State Department, and Senate Select Intelligence Committee investigators.

What is classified after the fact? It's pretty straight forward in that letter. The emails contained info derived from classified info. Info derived from classified info is itself classified. There is no classified after the fact. It was all classified from the get go.

Classified after the fact means marked classified after the fact.

This matters because a lot of publicly available information--stuff we all know, stuff you can read in the paper today, or can be easily found on Wikipedia--is nevertheless considered classified information. There is no possible way that a single person can keep it all straight in their head, which is why State staff (and others) rely on the markings on documents (digital or otherwise) to know how to treat them.

If what the campaign says is true, then it sounds to me like a technicality. It seems to me implausible that 22 emails containing intel of the most secret sort had that intel classified after the fact (http://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2016/jan/20/hillary-clint...).

----------------

FROM: Important Official TO: Hillary Clinton

MESSAGE: Info you requested - JFK is still alive. He wants to meet you soon. Also, aliens. Lots of them.

----------------

In that ridiculous example, it seems like the Sec of State isn't thinking to herself, "I hope they don't classify this info later."

It's the official's responsibility to know what is and what isn't classified whether it is "marked". As a lawyer (and a Clinton!), she would certainly be parsing her words carefully.

Side note: I've read a few articles in which previous State employees have characterized State Department IT infrastructure as... less than functional.

Given that this is the federal government, an older and large department, and pre-USDS/18F, I consider that at least a somewhat plausible scenario.

Would be curious if anyone closer could lend a technical opinion on whether those claims have merit or are spin. (Given how bad signal:noise is on this issue)

Less than functional or not, it is the duty of people with access to classified information to protect it. You sign tons of paperwork to that effect.

Honest mistakes happen all the time. If you're lucky, your hand is slapped and people move along. But it is possible to have your clearance revoked - like Sandy Berger - or even serve prison time for purposeful malfeasance or disregard for the rules.

And this isn't a new thing... remember how when Obama took office everyone talked about securing his Blackberry - http://www.nytimes.com/2009/01/23/us/politics/23berry.html?_... ?

> While lawyers and the Secret Service balked at Mr. Obama’s initial requests to allow him to keep his BlackBerry, they acquiesced as long as the president — and those corresponding with him — agreed to strict rules. And he had to agree to use a specially made device, which must be approved by national security officials.

Which works when you're the President and can have a custom device made. But what about when you're Secretary of State? Or even, god forbid, some poor functionary down at the bottom end of State? Or the Department of Indian Affairs?

I absolutely agree that protecting classified information by whatever rules are in place is of primary importance.

However, we've all seen dysfunctional organizations. So I'm also sympathetic to someone trying to get work done and ignoring soft guidelines in favor of an institutionally accepted interpretation that's conducive to accomplishing the job. And unsympathetic to telling someone at the time "we really should do that, but everyone does this" and than raking them over the coals from a future armchair that we were shocked (!) that they didn't following all guidelines.

Show me a successful, highly-productive individual's records and I'll show you somewhere they forgot to cross a t.

> ignoring soft guidelines

Except we're not talking about "soft guidelines" or simple recommendations but actual laws:

* Executive Order 13526 - https://www.whitehouse.gov/the-press-office/executive-order-...

* 18 U.S. Code § 793 - https://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/text/18/793

* The 2009 Federal Records Act

* (probably) The Freedom of Information Act

in addition to a classified information non-disclosure agreement:

* https://foia.state.gov/searchapp/DOCUMENTS/HRC_NDAS/1/DOC_0C...

When >25% of government workers respond that private emails were used at least some of the time, that's an institutional problem.

http://www.govexec.com/insights/state-internal-workplace-com...

https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/clintons-experience-...

You don't use custom devices, of course; in fact, your phone stays at the front. I've never known of anyone to be able to move IT equipment in and out of classified environments. I'm assuming that they make exceptions just for these top leaders so that they can move about and interface with the world while still keeping connected to classified information.

So, if it's some poor functionary at the bottom of state, his ass is out on the street if his phone comes into the classified area. Some spillage can sometimes be met with a slap on the wrist, but there's very little chance that you'll get off easy after bringing a microphone/GPS/camera/networked/mass storage device in to secure areas.

Most of the NSA people are free to buy Huawei Nexus 6p (although I'll bet there's some statistically significant disinclination) because their phones should never be interfacing with any of the information they use in their work.

I once had my two-way pager destroyed because I forgot to check it in one day. I had to pay for the new one myself. :(

So, as another outside observer looking in, the use of the private email doesn't seem to be relevant to the document release itself, right? That's just the result of a FOI request, because public official's emails are subject to FOI, regardless of where they're stored.

So what I wonder is, do we see this with every candidate? Is there a similar archive of Jeb Bush's emails from his time as Governor of Florida? Or do the States not tend to have the same kind of FOI transparency as the Federal Government?

> the use of the private email doesn't seem to be relevant to the document release itself, right? That's just the result of a FOI request, because public official's emails are subject to FOI, regardless of where they're stored.

I think probably someone would have tried to obtain her emails, whether the server issue came up or not. But as it happened, IIRC the sequence of events leading to the release began when the server issue came up.

Also relevant is that because Clinton controlled the server, she originally controlled which emails were deleted as 'personal' and which were released to the public.

> do the States not tend to have the same kind of FOI transparency as the Federal Government?

Some states, at least, have open records laws. Also, I've seen many governmental organizations adopt the policy of deleting all email after, e.g., 30 days, to reduce 'liability' (transparency).

> Is there a similar archive of Jeb Bush's emails from his time as Governor of Florida?

https://duckduckgo.com/?q=jeb+bush+emails+site%3Anytimes.com

To the best of my knowledge, governors would rarely have access to classified information other than law enforcement or potentially terrorism matters, so the laws and rules would be different than a Cabinet Secretary.

I can't speak about Florida or any State specifically, my background is purely at the Federal level.

State laws vary, but jeb bush has been pretty transparent - iirc he actually released a book of his emails as governor.

It should be pointed out that the book contained only emails sent and received from his official account, but nothing barred him (or Hillary) from using additional email accounts.

As it should be. The problem is when you start blending the two.. conducting official business from personal accounts.

That's opening the door to trouble as we're seeing.

Hillary Clinton used her on personal email server and address to conduct official business while serving as Secretary of State for the US (she's not the first to do this, Sarah Palin - former Governer of Alaska had similar problems I believe).

Two problems (at least):

- that is not permitted especially when handling Confidential/TopSecret material. You have to use their services/devices/etc so that they maintain control and accountability.

- all communication with public officials is archived and made public (once vetted/redacted as appropriate I'd assume), and is part of public record. If using private services, those communications will also be made public.

> all communication with public officials is archived and made public

Is that all communication period, or only communication with them while they're acting in their capacity as a public official?

How do public officials keep their legitimately personal business private? (E.g., having an affair). Can their personal email accounts be opened up and made public at any time? I'm curious.

All government work related emails are archived. They're available to the public through Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) requests - basically, you make a request to the federal government for certain types of information and they are required to provide it to you, subject to limitations for relevance, confidentiality, etc.

Purely personal emails aren't archived. Government officials and employees use personal email accounts all the time, and their contents aren't turned over to the government PROVIDED that they relate purely to prsonal matters.

But in Hillary Clinton's case, she used a personal email account (stored on her personal server) exclusively to conduct government business. She said she turned over government-related emails to the State Department (as is required by law) and permanently deleted the rest. She also says she never sent confidential info or received information marked as confidential through this personal email address.

There are several investigations going on right now into her email practices. The focus primarily is on whether she mishandled confidential/top secret information. In response to FOIA and other legal requests, the State Department has been releasing her emails to the public. But the State Department has been withholding some documents on the basis that they contained confidential/top secret information after all.

Clinton says the agencies are retroactively applying an overly broad definition of confidnetiality to her emails, but her detractors are saying that the confidentiality designations show that she mishandled government secrets in violation of the law. Hence the political firestorm.

No matter how this turns out, using a homebrew personal email server to conduct state business was an incredibly foolish thing to do. I can't believe Clinton did this. I don't care if Palin or Jeb Bush or other people used personal servers too - she was the Secretary of State with presidential ambitions, and she's had a big red target on her since 1992. This reinforces the worst stereotypes that people have about her and the Clintons in general, that they are secretive, paranoid, conspiratorial, and completely willing to operate in the grey areas of the law.

It seems like we could learn more about Clinton's emails by asking under FOIA for emails sent by a wide variety of other public officials to/from her? Do you know if this has or is already being done?

The latter. You can still use personal accounts for personal matters.

http://www.archives.gov/records-mgmt/toolkit/pdf/ID317.pdf

http://www.npr.org/sections/itsallpolitics/2015/04/02/396823...

Pretty sure only when they are acting. I believe they can have personal email accounts/phones, but they cannot use them for official business. Of course, we all know how nearly impossible that is to pull of. For which, you'll have courts and analysts just like this, sitting there sifting the wheat from the chaff if it makes it this far.

> How do public officials keep their legitimately personal business private? (E.g., having an affair)

If there's any grains of truth in House of Cards, I assume burner phones

Also, Gov. Scott Walker of Wisconsin, while he was Milwaukee County Executive.

If it was a two star general who did this, he'd be in jail.

Not a four star though: https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/national-security/petra...

I think it's safe to say that if Petraeus had done what Hillary apparently did, he would be incarcerated.

If conversations in social settings with former colleagues in the IC / DoD are indicative of sentiment throughout these communities, there will be a tremendous amount of discontent if she is not prosecuted for her decision to conduct official communications as one of the most senior members of the USG over an unsecured personal email server starting in 2009.

Strongly disagree. Petraeus was far worse; he intentionally and knowingly gave classified information to someone not authorized to see it. He pled guilty.

It's unclear (IMHO unlikely) that Hillary did anything illegal. She has not been charged with a crime. She has not, so far as we know, been investigated for any crime. And there's no evidence any classified information was leaked, intentionally or not.

Broadwell had a TS clearance and was a reserve military intelligence officer, so....no.

> "court papers filed with the plea deal stated Petraeus in 2011 unlawfully gave Broadwell the black books of classified information including identities of covert officers, code word information, war strategy, intelligence capabilities, diplomatic talks and information from high-level White House National Security Council meetings."

> "Petraeus then lied to the FBI about it, the court papers said."

source: http://www.msn.com/en-us/news/crime/former-cia-director-petr...

Clinton choosing to use a private email server was a big mistake, but Petraeus' actions are MUCH worse. Not even in the same category. He's lucky he did not end up in jail.

> Clinton choosing to use a private email server was a big mistake, but Petraeus' actions are MUCH worse. Not even in the same category.

Always great to hear from people who know how open investigations will be resolved.

To be clear: HRC is accused not only of conducting official business in a manner that was completely unauthorized from an infosec perspective and in direct violation of both IC standards and a Presidential Executive Order; she also apparently ordered a subordinate who needed to send her classified materials to "turn into nonpaper w no identifying heading and send nonsecure" [0]. To me this sounds like her giving a direct order to mishandle classified information.

It sounds like you're on Team Hillary and that's fine, we all have our political opinions. I do not think that your characterization of Petraeus' actions as "MUCH worse" than HRC's is accurate, either in terms of a reasonable-person evaluation of the severity of each respective (alleged in HRC's case) infraction or in terms of how the IC punishes these kinds of transgressions. They are normally merciless when it comes to people intentionally violating the integrity of classified information systems. Merciless.

[0]: http://www.cbsnews.com/news/state-department-releases-more-c...

> HRC is accused not only of....

No accusations have been leveled at Clinton, except in the press. That is, she has not been indicted, arrested, or charged.

That's not a "Team Hillary" thing, that is the literal truth of the legal situation.

Petraeus was charged and convicted.

<That is, she has not been indicted, arrested, or charged.>

That's your definition of "accusation"? By that standard, O.J. Simpson has no remaining accusations of homicide.

Her server setup at the time was legal and authorized. Most of your info above is incorrect.

Hillary is the subject of an open investigation? News to me. Do you have a source?

> If it was a two star general who did this, he'd be in jail.

You go to jail if you anger someone powerful and/or are disloyal, e.g., by leaking something without authorization or whistleblowing. Everyone else gets a slap on the wrist at most, afaict. General and CIA Director Petraeus gave classified information to his mistress; CIA Director John Deutch kept classified information unsecured on his home computer. Neither received significant punishment.

You see similar things in the military as a tension between enlisted service members and officers. It's a common belief that officers can get away with murder while the enlisted are given severe punishments for minor infractions. There's plenty of truth to it, but also a less visible component; it's far easier to get rid of officers than enlisted because enlistment confers rights, whereas officers serve at the pleasure of the President. So while officers aren't being made to stand in front of everyone while being berated for showing up late, I've known officers to be kicked out for things as minor as poorly-timed kidney stones (right before they were supposed to start a school.)

Anyway, all that is to say that the underlings are subjected to the rules, but up at the top it's more a matter of shuffling people away, often with minimal fanfare.

Colin Powell and Condoleezza Rice also did the same thing.

Powell and Rice did not operate their own private email servers.

That seems somewhat worse, they used private email on servers they did not control?

A rare lapse in following procedure, likely accidental, is not even on the same planet as setting up a private email server to avoid oversight.

Those emails would still be safer on gmail than in some small IT firm's bathroom closet.

You are asserting that she did this to avoid oversight. If that were truly the case, wouldn't she have had a drastic hard drive failure and unreliable backups? That model has worked for IT departments for years.

Isn't it far more likely that she instructed someone on her staff to instruct someone in the back office to instruct some underpaid admin to just "make crap work so I can stop using dialup?"

I know we cannot prove a negative, but I'd bet $100 she couldn't edit an /etc/sendmail.cf without bricking it. (I know that's not your point, I just find it an amusing thought.)

Edit: parent was edited and my reply appears nonsensical. The parent stated that the server was set up to avoid oversight, which I do not believe has been established as true.

> parent was edited and my reply appears nonsensical. The parent stated that the server was set up to avoid oversight

Still does.

> I do not believe has been established as true

The only reason for someone in her position to set up a private email server is to avoid oversight - it's bizarre that anyone could think otherwise - the burden of proof is on her at this point.

But not in AOL servers, or yahoo. Private servers can be set up pretty freaking well for security. Not sure how hers were setup though.

The extremely low physical security of Hillary's server probably outweighs all of this.

It was just sitting in an office. A single person could have literally kicked in the door and waltzed off with a huge cache of state secrets, and we probably wouldn't even have a video tape of the theft.

The server was not secure enough to be storing state secrets. There's no arguing against this.

It wasn't accidental at all, they all knew they weren't on government email servers.

... when it was perfectly legal. It wasn't made illegal until 2009, by Obama's own hand.

Most government officials use the federal government's email system servers to classify emails.

From time to time someone uses a private email server that they pay for hosting instead of federal government ones. It sort of complicates things when that happens because it is not seen as much secure as a government one. We have laws about classified emails and rules to follow.

Hillary claimed there was no classified email on her server, and that she turned over all emails. The email of the private served was deleted, but now is being recovered. There is an FBI investigation into it that recovers emails.

The Republicans have attacked Hillary over private email use, but Sarah Palin and other Republicans also used private email servers.

I am sure in non-US nations this is no big deal, and you are wondering why it is being investigated. In the USA we want our government to be transparent and accountable for their documents and emails. Have have a freedom of information act that we can request documents and emails from the government on certain issues like Benghazi and the Embassy attacks. But if the email is deleted, how can we see it?

Anyway it has become a political issue that Republicans are using against Hillary Clinton right now.

Hillary, illegally, maintained a private email server for official correspondence and transmitted classified materials over it. The email server was hacked and the contents stolen and later published.

She is currently under investigation by the FBI for this.

There's no evidence that the email server was ever hacked. The contents were not stolen and later published. They were released to the FBI by Clinton (after she deleted some "personal" emails), and now released to the public under a FOIA request.

While there is no evidence that her email server was hacked, she did have correspondence with Sydney Blumenthal, who's account WAS hacked, and emails from that account were published.[1] This, combined with the fact that Clinton's server didn't boast the best security (allegedly), and it's not a stretch to imagine that her server was hacked.

[1] https://pando.com/2015/03/20/exclusive-interview-jailed-hack...