AP Confirms: Hillary's Private Server Was Extremely Vulnerable to Hacking

The private email server running in Hillary Rodham Clinton's home basement when she was secretary of state was connected to the Internet in ways that made it more vulnerable to hackers, according to data and documents reviewed by The Associated Press. Clinton's server, which handled her personal and State Department correspondence, appeared to allow users to connect openly over the Internet to control it remotely, according to detailed records compiled in 2012. Experts said the Microsoft remote desktop service wasn't intended for such use without additional protective measures, and was the subject of U.S. government and industry warnings at the time over attacks from even low-skilled intruders. Records show that Clinton additionally operated two more devices on her home network in Chappaqua, New York, that also were directly accessible from the Internet. One contained similar remote-control software that also has suffered from security vulnerabilities, known as Virtual Network Computing, and the other appeared to be configured to run websites. The new details provide the first clues about how Clinton's computer, running Microsoft's server software, was set up and protected when she used it exclusively over four years as secretary of state for all work messages. Clinton's privately paid technology adviser, Bryan Pagliano, has declined to answer questions about his work from congressional investigators, citing the U.S. Constitution's Fifth Amendment protection against self-incrimination.

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"The hacker scanned Clinton's basement server in Chappaqua at least twice, in August and December 2012" http://t.co/lOtLCSm5MN

— Kyle W. Orton (@KyleWOrton) October 13, 2015

Remote-access software allows users to control another computer from afar. The programs are usually operated through an encrypted connection — called a virtual private network, or VPN. But Clinton's system appeared to accept commands directly from the Internet without such protections. "That's total amateur hour," said Marc Maiffret, who has founded two cyber security companies. He said permitting remote-access connections directly over the Internet would be the result of someone choosing convenience over security or failing to understand the risks. "Real enterprise-class security, with teams dedicated to these things, would not do this," he said...The findings suggest Clinton's server "violates the most basic network-perimeter security tenets: Don't expose insecure services to the Internet," said Justin Harvey, the chief security officer for Fidelis Cybersecurity...Mikko Hypponen, the chief research officer at F-Secure, a top global computer security firm, said it was unclear how Clinton's server was configured, but an out-of-the-box installation of remote desktop would have been vulnerable. Those risks — such as giving hackers a chance to run malicious software on her machine — were "clearly serious" and could have allowed snoops to deploy so-called "back doors."

“That’s the holiest of holies inside the CIA—the true identity of a secret source. Even inside CIA, in internal emails, in cables, you never mention or talk about the true name of a source. You use a pseudonym. So I mean, honestly, it’s quite stunning...It could be literally lethal....Who has access to that? Who is trying to hack into it? If this was a foreign-based source living in Libya, let’s say, if you get outed as the CIA source over there, you’re a dead man. So it couldn’t be more serious.”