Jeff Sessions, the current (4 August 2017) Attorney General of the United States, wants to improve on Barack Obama‘s legacy as the most secretive presidency of the modern era.
Sessions has announced a tripling Justice Department probes into leaks and a review of guidelines for subpoenas for members of the news media. Attorney General says Justice Dept. has tripled the number of leak probes. (Media subpoenas are an effort to discover media sources and hence to plug the “leaks.”)
Sessions has thrown down his gage, declaring war on occasional transparency from government leakers. Indirectly, that war will include members of the media as casualties.
Shakespeare penned the best response for taking up Sessions’ gage:
Cry ‘Havoc,’ and let slip the dogs of war;
In case you don’t know the original sense of “Havoc:”
The military order Havoc! was a signal given to the English military forces in the Middle Ages to direct the soldiery (in Shakespeare’s parlance ‘the dogs of war’) to pillage and chaos. Cry havoc and let slip the dogs of war
It’s on all of us to create enough chaos to protect leakers and members of the media who publish their leaks.
Observations – Not Instructions
Data access: Phishing emails succeed 33% of the time. Do they punish would-be leakers who fall for phishing emails?
Exflitration: Tracing select documents to a leaker is commonplace. How do you trace an entire server disk? The larger and more systematic the data haul, the greater the difficulty in pinning the leak on particular documents. (Back to school specials often include multi-terabyte drives.)
Protect the Media: Full drive leaks posted a Torrent or Dark Web server means media can answer subpoenas with: go to: https://some-location. 😉
BTW, full drive leaks provide transparency for the relationship between the leaked data and media reports. Accountability is as important for the media as the government.
One or more of my observations may constitute crimes depending upon your jurisdiction.
Which I guess is why Nathan Hale is recorded as saying:
Gee, that sounds like a crime. You know, I could get arrested, even executed. None for me please!
Not!
Nathan Hale volunteered to be a spy, was caught and executed, having said:
I only regret, that I have but one life to lose for my country.
Question for you:
Are you a ‘dog of war’ making the government bleed data?
PS: As a security measure, don’t write that answer down or tell anyone. When you read about leaks, you can inwardly smile and know you played your part.