Snowden On Russia Backing DNC Hack: I Wanna See The Receipts
There's a lot of evidence that suggests Russia was behind the Democratic National Committee hack, and that least some of the emails may have been manipulated part of a military campaign of misinformation. But all that evidence comes from private security contractors. Edward Snowden thinks that if the Russians hacked the Dems, the NSA would know. And he has a strong platform to stand on: "I've done this personally."
As Motherboard pointed out yesterday, there are a number of little leaks and drops that point to Russia (even some hastily-deleted Cyrillic error messages), but the meatiest evidence Motherboard cited all came from private security companies, companies that the DNC itself contracted for information.
Edward Snowden thinks there's better information out there, as The Intercept pointed out with a string of Snowden tweets. Ed began:
If Russia hacked the #DNC, they should be condemned for it. But during the #Sony hack, the FBI presented evidence. https://t.co/SG7er8VDRD
— Edward Snowden (@Snowden) July 25, 2016
Even if the attackers try to obfuscate origin, #XKEYSCORE makes following exfiltrated data easy. I did this personally against Chinese ops.
— Edward Snowden (@Snowden) July 25, 2016
Evidence that could publicly attribute responsibility for the DNC hack certainly exists at #NSA, but DNI traditionally objects to sharing.
— Edward Snowden (@Snowden) July 25, 2016
The aversion to sharing #NSA evidence is fear of revealing "sources and methods" of intel collection, but #XKEYSCORE is now publicly known.
— Edward Snowden (@Snowden) July 25, 2016
Without a credible threat that USG can and will use #NSA capabilities to publicly attribute responsibility, such hacks will become common.
— Edward Snowden (@Snowden) July 25, 2016
This is the only case in which mass surveillance has actually proven effective. Though I oppose in principle, it is a mistake to ignore.
— Edward Snowden (@Snowden) July 25, 2016
To summarize: the US Intel Community should modernize their position on disclosure. Defensive capabilities should be aggressively public.
— Edward Snowden (@Snowden) July 25, 2016
"I've done this personally" is just great way to back up any claim about international espionage.
Snowden's main point is solid: the U.S. government has chimed in on major hacks like this before, the U.S. government has checked in on foreign hacking efforts before, and the U.S. government is hesitant to show its cards when dealing with spy efforts this serious. It all points to the main point that if there's anything to be known about Russia and the DNC hack, the NSA knows it, and they could tell us and they should.
Indeed, if there's good information out there that pins down Russia as acting against the incumbent American political party, it'd be appreciated if the NSA would let us all know.