4Chan's half-hack of Palin's email goes awry

Chatter on 4chan.org's /b/ board.

In perhaps the most astonishing development yet for the culture of online troublemakers, 4chan.org's /b/ board (see a few of their past exploits here and here ) apparently managed this morning to take over the e-mail account of vice presidential candidate Sarah Palin.  The generally apolitical 4chan pranksters, who have now been widely profiled in the media, are known less for their social activism than for their propensity for pulling online stunts designed to evoke maximum anger, shock and disgust. 

But now the anonymous participants on 4chan's /b/ bulletin board--the home base of their community and launching pad for their pranks--seem to feel they blew a chance to do some real damage.

According to accounts so far, and chatter on /b/ itself, shortly after the password information to Palin's account was posted on the board, the account became inaccessible, either because too many people tried to access it at once, or because a dissenter from within /b/ changed the password.

Either way, the amount of information retrieved from the Palin account appears to be relatively small.  A screen shot of Palin's account shows it contained 84 unread e-mails and possibly hundreds more, but only two have made their way online, suggesting the rest were not saved before the account was locked. If they were, wouldn't we have seen them online by now? 

"/b/ is now 'epic fail /b/' for not finding anything good in Palin's e-mail," wrote one anonymous commenter on the site, slamming the board with /b/'s highest-order insult.  "Seriously, /b/. We could have changed history and failed, epically."

"I agree," said another.  "This is epic fail. How can there not be something good in those messages?"

One of the bits of data that appears to have been taken from the account is a text-only list of all the e-mails contained in its Inbox, including the subjects and names of the senders.  The list, linked here, looks authentic and matches with the data in the screenshots of the account. (Note: this link was having trouble Wednesday night because of interest in this story.)

The list contains several interesting-looking entries, including several from Palin's chief of staff Mike Nizich labeled "FW: CONFIDENTIAL Ethics Matter" and "RE: Request for Information and Documents," one by Palin aide Ivy Frye titled "veep talking pts" and a variety of others relating to judicial nominations, policy points and personnel and budget issues in the Alaska government.

Illegal invasion of privacy and e-mail hijacking will never be an acceptable way to express your political views, or your nihilistic lack thereof, or whatever was motivating the /b/ participants. So there's probably some poetic justice in the ending of this episode: This frenzied crew, having decided to break the law in order to gain access to a possible political motherlode managed--amazingly--to do little more than lock themselves out of it without having found much at all. 

Comments

[Gina]

Throughout the entire primaries and the general election, the Obama campaign has played dirty politics. In addition to the never ending vitriol of the Obama bloggers on the internet, nearly every time I have posted a supportive blog for Hillary Clinton ... and, then for McCain/Palin ... my computer's mailbox has been inundated with hundreds of pieces of email spam. Another example of under handed behavior by Obama's henchmen, is that they have been organized to approach retirement homes, as volunteer community speakers ... only to visit multiple times spewing lop sided pro-Obama, and negative McCain propaganda to elderly people, to get their votes in November. And, now we can see unprincipled politicians and bias media hacks using the race card ... telling people " if you don't vote for Obama, you must be a racist". Usually, when Americans uncover such despicable tactics, they can count on the mainstream media to expose it to the public ... however, in this case, most of the mainstream media is in the tank for Obama ... so, they either look the other way, or they make phony biased excuses to mischaracterize, and cover up what's really happening.

[O Reilly]

Mmmmm scummy...

[Stephen Gianelli]

To: The hacker puke who retaliated against me for the above opinion with a Trojan attack on my PC:

I am not a public figure, a government agency, or anyone else who gives a s***.

I am, however, 50ish, Itialian, and very much pissed off.

Please think of me as Tony Soprano with post graduate degrees, and with the financial means to find you.

[Lisa]

This is a hoax by one glowing and simple fact that everyone seems to be overlooking. The screenshot of the e-mail subject lines clearly depict messages that appear to be Delivery and/or Read receipts of E-mails sent. Anyone that has a true Yahoo account will tell you, there is no function in Yahoo mail to allow for read or delivery receipt messages. All I can say is the 'Paint' function in Windows sure can do wonderous things to stir the masses over an empty pot. Sad.

[Zein]

We should hear her side of the story: I'm sure Palin just wants to tell us how she's feeling. She wants to make us, the public, understand. She's never going to give up; she's never going to let us down. She's not running around and hurting us.

And come on, we wouldn't get this from any other guy.

[Kebb]

This is only one of her published public email accounts, this is Gov.Palin but the media initially reported on Gov.Sarah, so who knows

[Lollerz]

@Felix
They're not the same Anonymous you dimwit.

[Juntos]

What, Gina? How is your rant relevant at all to the article?

btw slinging mud does not reduce the amount of mud slung.

[Anon]

Hey Stephen Gianelli!

Some hacker got your PC because you posted on this forum? Are you really going to track them down? You lawyers just love those veiled threats, don't you?

Anonymous already owns you, so please don't make your situation worse. Maybe it was you who hacked SP's account, hmmm?

[An Onynmouse]

Gov. Palin may not be as internet savvy as some hackers on steroids might like, but I think it is important to look closely at the time line here.

1) Obama locks up the Democrat nomination, watches McCain start to gain in polls.

2) At GOP convention, McCain picks Palin. Poll numbers soar.

3) A couple of guys, who are up to no good, start making trouble in the neighborhood.

4) I got in one little fight.

5) My Momma got scared.

6) I moved with my Auntie and Uncle in Bel Aire.

[KC]

"To: The hacker puke who retaliated against me for the above opinion with a Trojan attack on my PC:

I am not a public figure, a government agency, or anyone else who gives a s***.

I am, however, 50ish, Itialian, and very much pissed off.

Please think of me as Tony Soprano with post graduate degrees, and with the financial means to find you."

Don't be so paranoid, Tony.
SOOOO let me see if I have this straight though: The goverment is allowed to hack into what/whomever THEY want. Why should it be different for the citizens?

[whitnee]

I can't believe "truthseeker". It is people like you with your ridiculous hype that create rumors like this. Obama camp? Don't post that bullsh*t unless you have actual proof. Otherwise, keep your ignorant opinions to yourself.

[Anonymous]

I lol'd.

Hard.

[mongo]

1) sarah palin does official work on her yahoo account

2) a yahoo account can easily be phished/brutforced anonymously and remotely

3) sarah palin is running for vice president.

4) sarah palin does not understand that a yahoo account is not safe. SHE DOES NOT UNDERSTAND.

5) there was no "hacking." the "hack," as it were, was a simple script kiddie exploit.

6) this was done by a few people at like 2 in the morning pacific time when everyone on the planet was asleep or just barely waking up.

7) if there had been a concerted effort by anons, every single email would have been copied, hosted, and then deleted from her inbox.

8) anonymous has already dug up all of the pics of her daughter drinking without even trying, it was just another daily routine.

the point: you cannot hide from the populace. we will find out what needs to be known. if you have secrets, they will be disclosed. do not expect to be a public figure and have a private life.

[Sean]

The simple fact is that she used very, very, very poor judgment in using ANY public email system for Alaska State business. The state email systems are required to meet federal encryption and security standards and although “she travels extensively” state governments have VPN systems in place to provide remote users with security and encryption.

Bottom line, she was trying to avoid the official channels and paid the price. She is an idiot.

Sean
Network Engineer

[Yukari Yakumo]

Saying 4chan hacked Palin's email account is like saying the United States killed JFK; both crimes were committed by a single individual (though the latter was far more tragic) . Anonymous is not some underground hacker group, nor should they be blamed for the crimes of an individual. Anonymous is, quite literally, anonymous: "having no known name or identity or known source." Anyone who chooses not to reveal your true name is technically anonymous. There are no secret rituals, no organized structure, no unanimous values, and no requirements to join.

[Anonymous]

Ok, here's where LAT is a bit fuzzy on what happened:
The so-called "internet white knight" posted a screenshot of the password change and forgot to delete the password from the input box. Then a bunch of people tried to log on at the same time tripping the 24 hour account lockdown. In the morning Palin's advisors (or whatever) were notified and the account was deleted. From what I heard, there were two accounts (gov.palin@yahoo and gov.sarah@yahoo). Both were deleted at (or around) the same time.

This just raises serious red flags to me. I'm pretty sure there's a law against using a private email for government use. It just seems like a cheap way to avoid backups in case one were to have criminal charges filed against oneself.

[Anon]

18 U.S.C. 1030(a)(2)(C), accessing a protected computer without authorization to obtain information—Punishment, 1 year in prison.

18 U.S.C. 1030(c)(2)(B)(ii)-(iii) -- accessing a protected computer without authorization to obtain information IF the offense was committed in furtherance of any criminal or tortious act in violation of the Constitution or laws of the United States or of any State—Punishment, 5 years in prison.

Hacking into a private email account, even an easily cracked Yahoo account, is no joke.

[Anon]

Oh ya...and anyone who thinks the perps will be caught is sorely mistaken. There are free and easy ways to foil even government efforts to figure out who did this. And unless the perps were very very dumb, they used them. Good luck FBI, you will definitely need it. XD

[Stephen Gianelli]

Dear Anon | September 18, 2008 at 01:29 PM:

You will note that I always post openly under my own name, and that I am not a coward like you are.

Second, threats from an insignificant anonymous pimple faced nerd who lacks the courage to use his own name in a dark room don't amount to much.

Third, I already noted the IP address of the computer that the Trojan tried to contact before the virus was removed from my computer.

Unauthorized access to a private computer, data theft, and maliciously causing harm to a computer are all very serious federal offenses. Keep it up, and all “anonymous” is going to own is a jail cell.

[Stephen Gianelli]

Dear XD:

You realy need to keep up with the news.

The FBI has already identified the Palin hacker. Someone posted a screen shot identifying Ctunel.com as the poxy server used to do the deed, and the site owner is cooperating and has turned over his logs.

The hacker is a 20 year old student who is the son of a Democratic state legislator.

[Anonymous]

Declaring that those who post as 'Anonymous' are "pimple faced nerds who lack the courage to use his own name" is hardly a very intellectual retort.

And IP addresses aren't exclusive to any specific computer, they're linked to whatever device that computer is using to connect to the internet. thus a buil-in wireless adapter will have a different IP than a 3rd party one.

Also.. if you think so little of the fellow who made a poor attempt to hack you.. why are you retaliating on this message board? He's clearly trolling you and your anger is only feeding his destructive force.

...and "hacking" a yahoo account isn't so much hacking as it is taking the time to do it. Especially when the account's holder is a public figure whose personal information is widely known. It shouldn't have been done, but the US government provides secure email accounts for a reason.

[AnotherAnon]

Anyone that thinks 4chan is pro Obama is a fool.
Anyone that thinks 4chan is pro McCain is a fool.
Anyone that thinks 4chan is pro ANYTHING just does not get it.
The only reason they do ANYTHING is for the lulz.
PERIOD!

[John]

What a bunch of hypocrites to criticize the hackers for looking into other people's email. Remember the Patriot Act? I see that no one sees the parallels between what our government has been allowed to do versus what these hackers have done. The only difference is that the hackers may be penalized by the government for looking for Sarah's email even though she used bad judgment to conduct government business in a personal email account. Are their any penalties for government officials of prowling into our emails? I can bet that many nerdy, government-employed hackers are currently looking into peoples accounts since the inception of the Patriot Act without probable cause or oversight. Sarah's email hackers certainly did not have any oversight to prevent their prowling into people's email, but neither does the government. The current laws has much dismantled any true oversight of our government's surveillance programs of email, phone records, bank accounts of Americans in the name of national security. The laws need to be amended to have strict and judicial oversight of surveillance.

[Captain America]

This isn't a fail -- they caught her using a Yahoo account for gov't business. Pure journalism.