Malcolm Nance: The Plot to Hack America

The Trump Opposition Research dossier was put together by DNC staffer Alexandra Chalupa. On June 15, the website Gawker published the entirety of Chalupa’s opposition files on Trump. 1It was a collection of what dirt could be dredged up and used in tough political seas that were sure to come. To the DNC and the Clinton campaign, the dossier of data was rather mundane information from online sources collating the publically-available information the DNC and Clinton campaign would use to characterize Trump. To a general hacker it would be of little interest except for amusement purposes. If the folder contained routine information, sophisticated narrative management could counter whatever the Clinton camp prepared. If the folder contained something explosive, leaking it early could defuse any interest, or it could be argued that the information was false based on the insecurity of the servers. For the Trump campaign, knowing in advance what the DNC and Team Clinton knew would prove invaluable to defending and counterattacking Hillary. And it is not unprecedented. One paranoid American president, so concerned with what secrets the DNC had on him, performed the same operation that appears to have occurred here.

There were early indications that a foreign nation had been targeting the opposition files before the news broke. In a May 3, 2013 email written on her DNC email account to Luis Miranda, the DNC communications director, Chalupa wrote in that she had spoken to Ukrainian journalists about her research on Trump. She also noted that when she started researching information on Paul Manafort, Trump’s new campaign manager, and his ties to the Ukraine, Yahoo security started sending her numerous messages warning her that her email had become the target of “state-sponsored actors.” Yahoo implemented a security protocol in December, 2015 that would warn its users if any foreign government activity was seen impacting their accounts. 2The Yahoo CIO issued a blog post stating, “We’re committed to protecting the security and safety of our users, and we strive to detect and prevent unauthorized access to user accounts by third parties.” 3The main component of this early warning system is a pop-up banner that reads Important Action Required. We strongly suspect that your account has been the target of state-sponsored actors. Learn how to better protect yourself.

Chalupa noted at the end of her email to Miranda that “Since I started digging into [Trump campaign chairman Paul] Manafort, these messages have been a daily occurrence on my Yahoo account despite changing my password often.” It was well known that Paul Manafort is the lawyer who led what is known as the “Torturers Lobby.” 4In his portfolio was a rogue’s gallery of dictators, strongmen, and autocrats, including the Ukraine’s deposed pro-Moscow dictator Viktor Yanukovych.

One of the most surprising events after the announcement of the DNC hack occurred a few weeks later in conservative media. During Fox News’ May 9, 2016 show, The Megan File , contributor Andrew Napolitano made an amazing statement to host Megan Kelly about the hacks. Napolitano claimed to have confidential information about what was going on at the highest levels of decision-making at the Kremlin, SVR (Russia’s foreign intelligence service), and Putin’s inner circle, saying “there’s a debate going on in the Kremlin between the Foreign Ministry and the Intelligence Services about whether they should release the twenty thousand of Mrs. Clinton’s emails that they have hacked into and received and stored. All of this is happening at once.” 5

Taken in the context of what we now know, it begs the question, how did Napolitano come upon this incredibly specific information? Was it information passed onto him from U.S. intelligence, a Russian source, wishful thinking on his part, or just outright fabricated? Only the most senior ranking members of the Russian foreign ministry and intelligence apparatus know this, as it describes discussions at the inner sanctum Russian intelligence, including Putin himself.

If the alleged source was American, then perhaps the Director of the FBI, and only on an absolute need-to-know basis, together with the President, the National Director of Intelligence, the Director of the CIA and Director of NSA would be privy to this information. Access to such a source would be among the crown jewels of any intelligence community. If the story had any basis in fact and sourced from America there would have been a national security mole hunt by the FBI on par with the hunt to capture the Russian spies Aldrich Ames or Robert Hanssen.

It appears that the source of the story emanated from a mythical figure; a journalist named Sorcha Faal. Sorcha Faal is widely believed to be a pseudonym for David Booth. Booth hosts a wild-eyed conspiracy theory website called Whatdoesitmean.com. 6Usually websites like this and the more popular and crazier Infowars.com are easily dismissed as tinfoil hat crowds who see government conspiracy everywhere. Yet in this case “Sorcha Faal” appears to be so well wired into the Kremlin that “her” work at this website was often copied by mainstream Russian information propaganda like Russia Insider’s Svobodnaya Pressa (“Free Press”) . This site pushes wild conspiracy theories such as the proposition that the U.S. trains and directs ISIS, and writes op-eds about the dangers of European multiculturalism. It is a core component of the Russian propaganda system, and such news organs as Ren TV (a large, private, pro-Putin Russian television channel) and Sputnik News (a multinational propaganda organ of the Russian government) often cite its links as sources.

Did the Russians, after hacking the DNC, feed this story back to the West through Whatdoesitmean.com? Whatever the source, it would appear that Judge Napolitano and Fox News brought it right into the mainstream. It would not be out of the ordinary for the Russian information war strategists to insert false media stories during a global influence effort; they have a century of practice as the Soviet Union. Using Fox News, Andrew Napolitano may have unwittingly transmitted a secret Trump Campaign punch; the thought came from conservative media, but it may have been created for propagation by Russia itself.

This was not the first time that foreign players had tried influencing U.S. elections. This time around appeared initially no different than prior nuisance hackings. However the calm on the surface was just hiding deep ripples in the U.S. Intelligence community. By summer of 2015 the National Security Agency (NSA) knew that the FSB and other agencies were probing around the seams of the elections. Though they would never publicly admit it, the NSA, home to US Cyber Command, would have been the principal agency to tip off the FBI if there were any indicators of a cyber intrusion operation underway at the DNC. Apparently they passed on some kind of warning—also known as a tipper. The Bureau did give the DNC a hint, but did not provide information as to the direction or severity of the threat because doing so would have identified the source, which could have only been tracked to its origin by the NSA.

On May 18, 2016, the Director of National Intelligence (DNI), James Clapper, briefed Congress about cyber-attacks and activities that may affect the 2016 Presidential campaigns. Clapper said of the 2008 campaign that foreign intelligence agencies “met with campaign contacts and staff, used human-source networks for policy insights, exploited technology to get otherwise sensitive data, engaged in perception management to influence policy… This exceeded traditional lobbying and public diplomacy.” 7He did not state which foreign agencies. Clapper stated that the U.S. intelligence community has observed espionage activity in the past two presidential elections, and that interest by foreign spies was much higher than in past election cycles. According to Ellen Nakashima, who wrote several stories on hacking for the Washington Post , the Public Affairs Director for the DNI, David P. Hale stated “we’re aware that campaigns and related organizations and individuals are targeted by actors with a variety of motivations—from philosophical differences to espionage—and capabilities—from defacements to intrusions…” 8