Comments on: FBI searches apartment of alleged Palin hacker

Bureau reportedly searches apartment of David Kernell, a 20-year-old University of Tennessee student, as part of its investigation into hacking of Alaska governor's Yahoo e-mail account.

[Kwasiowusu]

@ chris_d : "Well guys, to quote you, "If Gov. Palin isn't doing anything wrong, she has nothing to worry about!"

Why don't you go hack your Messiah's mail, grab all his personal snail mail( especially the ones to Tony Rezko, Bill Ayers , Jeremiah Wright etc), and publish them on internet for everyone to see?
Its virtually certain that if the Obamination's personal emails were made public today, he'd be out of business today.

[heitzler]

As, I'm sure, would McCain's - especially since he is a serial adulterer.

[drfrost]

A very interesting question. I think I'm fairly objective in this issue. I can honestly say I'd be as upset for Obama if this happened to him. Maybe even more so because he's running for a higher office. But either way, I hope they don't ruin this kid's life. Yes, he deserves a "reasonable" punishment, but I'm afraid the people involved are going to be more prone to make an example out of him...

[jlevias]

Hacking someone's email is wrong. Posting what you find on the internet is also wrong. We all know it and the person that did it certainly knew it. The big question now is whether what Palin did was wrong or not. Using personal email for government business? Maybe. Using it so that it's not subject to Freedom of Information Act regulations? Yes. If you're not doing anything wrong, why cover your tracks? My only concern about this matter is the abuse of power using personal email to get around the rules and the allegation of the firing of one of her employees again for personal reasons. These are only allegations at this point but it should at LEAST raise eyebrows of registered voters. Our credibility on the world's stage has certainly been tarnished and something that has to be considered when heading to the polls in November.

[drfrost]

I suspect you have no idea what it's like to be involved in a state lawsuit. You have no idea how much of a burden get's handed down to you as an "edict" from the legal department (for which they provide no funds, staffing or equipment to implement). You start doing more work on your personal systems and on personal email as simple "pain" management. I understand EXACTLY where her office is coming from.

[lawdgg]

With all the "surveillance" on possible terroristic threats, you would think this matter would have led to the computer rather quickly. Of course, there were will be denials from the Democratic party of any participation from any person in authority, but realistically who else would care what communications Palin has had regarding governing Alaska than the Democratic party that is trying so hard to discredit her? Smells of watergate and wouldn't put it past to find there is an Obama connection that remains to be uncovered, although it is very likely that in this age of adoration of Obama, Obama can do no wrong, even when Obama has no clue how to run a State much less a Nation.

[jfpF92]

yep, you're right about one thing. We adore Obama!

[lilmoya47]

Didn't see anywhere in the story where she was useing Yahoo for gov. business. I beleive it said it was her personal e-mail account.

[Dreifort]

your comment is TOO simple lilmoya47... liberals do not understand simple statements, you need to expound with BIG words (such as words college professors might use to sound smart). if you take your simple statement and turn it into 3 or 4 paragraphs, the liberals might read it. will they understand your statement? ummmm...no. but they will read it if you inflate it with big words.

[Ixnay566]

lol @ everyone who calls this hacking, this isn't even close. It takes no special skill to correctly <b>guess</b> the answers to questions. Also how can you possibly compare email security to national security? How many of you used the same password for your cnet account as for your email account?? You just freely gave away credentials. How many have ever clicked on a "forgot your password" link? Where you 100% positive that you were directed to the correct page? Or did you not even think to check. Who's gotten SPAM? Accidently opened SPAM? I promise you for the right $ amount, nobody's email is safe.

[Ixnay566]

^-- Imagine "guess" is bold :-P

[djFLWB]

This is why in the medical world using email for patient records is verboten. You are not allowed whatsever per HIPAA to email anything concerning a patient because email is not secure.

You would think that those in government would get on day one, as they get the keys to their new office, is a protocol for secure messaging.

We have learned over the past 8 years that politicos use private email to defeat the open records laws.

That is the truly what has been revealed with this hack. Palin was bypassing open records laws.

That and Kernell is an idiot for allowing himself to be traced back to his apt.

[drfrost]

1) Kernell was definitely being more enthusiastic than cautious. A state common to many young males (and certainly something I was guilty of at his age).

2) Using personal email for matters of no consequence means nothing. It reduces the amount of garbage that has to be saved for no apparent reason, especially during a lawsuit. There is nothing illegal about it in and of itself.

[oddsoul]

I really could care less who did what or who is responsible for this mess. The thing that I am appalled about though is that someone in a position of public authority over citizens such as you and me failed to listen to the advice of IT professionals and the common sense of numerous very successful companies. What everyone should be outraged about is that yours and my potentially confidential information could be leaked on the internet so easily like that. Do not use your personal information when you are not specifically representing yourself. In the spirit of keeping this universal and not targeted, I am sure there are many other politicians who use their private email to conduct "official" business. This only further reflects the bad management and business policies adopted by this country's government. There are a great many laws and conventions that are in place in the public sector that we otherwise regard as "red tape" that we find annoying and cumbersome but are in place to make sure that we do use good management practices. If our politicians fail to live by or espouse this sentiment in their management practices then I guess that says a whole lot for how zealous, truthful, or reliable we are.

Personally if I received an email from "[e-mail]" I would read it for laughs and delete it thinking that its spam. Heck, I even hope the spam filters on yahoo.com catch it and delete. Here's to hoping the Russians don't receive "spam" from our future leaders, that would go over well.

[knowles2]

Len Bullard, nah all it means is that Republican people made sure it was cleaned before anyone hack it. Same as they did her daughter boyfriend bebo account turn all the private features on, and probably made sure he was not cheating on any other girls in the area, as I have herd rumors of on other sites. He probably being paid to stay with her until after the election.

And honestly I would not be surprise if the Republican were the one to arrange this little act and then found the nearest democrat with the skill set to blame. Same has they did not intervene to stop Georgia from starting a war with Russia, which they could easy of prevented as they were given 24hours notice from Georgia, someone thought such a war would be good McCain, and it did seem to give him a slight poll lead.

But I do not know may be I am just seeing conspiracies everywhere.

[Rottentomato]

This guy should get 20 years in a Federal Prison.

This should be a lesson to the young and to the college students that it is not "cool" to hack.

Many of the hacking problems today come from young kids who think it is "cool". They also think that they are "invulnerable" because they are sitting at home or in the library. It is about time that they learn that hacking is just as bad as [if not worse than] robbery, and the penalty will be severe. You WILL be tracked down and put to justice!!!

[Shabadage]

Uh, guessing someone's details on a flawed "forgot my password" account isn't hacking. He did some research, answered Yahoo's questions, and then Yahoo let him reset her password. Hell, I'm not even sure if it's technically illegal.

[Dan Chandler]

David Kernell is a chess player a high caliber, good enough to have won his state's championship in 2004. It's difficult to believe that someone who is used to plannning strategic moves under pressure would react the way he is being portrayed thus far. Everythings is just a little too pat, right down to his dad's Democrat Party membership and legislative office. How do we know this doesn't have something to do with the legislative race in Memphis, Tennessee? Everybody is leaping to conclusions. Something smells fishy, as in red herring.

If Gov. Palin wasn't under investigation and hadn't refused to release emails, everything would be clear. But that's not the case.

Who has the most to gain by this publicity, and the destruction of these two accounts? Clearly it's not David Kernell or his father.

[tremelai]

Sarah Palin ordered all of her staff workers NOT to use the State of Alaska internal Exchange 2003 infrastructure to avoid potential future subpoena. Instead, she ordered her staffers to use free web based email such as Yahoo, gmail, etc. The use of yahoo and gmail for state business is a violation of State of Alaska computer use and security policy but not necessarily illegal. State employees can be terminated if they violate this email policy.
http://www.state.ak.us/local/akpages/ADMIN/info/security/

If Palin Administration staffers used these free, non-State Of AK email systems to transmit personnel records information, that may break Alaska privacy laws if the data contained confidential personal information. That sort of data is required to stay on internal SOA systems for obvious reasons.

Regards,

Tremelai from Alaska

[jrzshor]

problem here is that that 20 yr old and all the 20 yr olds think that this "hacking" not a big deal (hence doing it) and total cool (by posting the crime) and god help us.

[TtfnJohn]

Reliable...meaning not C|net or ZDNet point out that the crack was very easily done as the cracker took a good guess as what the email address was. It wouldn't have been hard as it had been published from one end of the planet to the other that she used WebMail and that made his search fairly easy.

As for the password, the security questions she put in the retrieve her password pointed directly to her husband and her school in Wasalia (sp). The first was easy, the second took a few seconds more work.

Not exactly a high level crack or even one to get all fussed and bothered about.

It's a classic case of PEBAK on the part of Gov Palin.

That said, I'm sure there's a lot of folks in both major US parties that the same can be said of.

So drop the conspiracy theories and other things to have fun with.

Plain and simple she screwed up. Everyone does it, now get over it.

ttfn

John

[gggg sssss]

Probably used it to buy the Palin McCain ads on p*ssy.org Then claimed someoen else had hacked intp her account.

[Harrison912]

As a web site owner of safety and security products, I'm all for getting to the truth but public figures should be allowed a certain level of privacy.

Thank you, Mr. Bullard, for your great comment.

None of us are immune to scrutiny and most of us would fail the test. I for one, plan to vote for McCain and Palin. Although they have their faults, neither of them set out to be politicians. They are citizens who saw a need and are rising to the challenge. I believe them to be true public servants who, like most of us are flawed but are willing to put themselves out there to help make our country a better place to raise our children.

I hope this young man is prosecuted to the fullest extent of the law. I'd like to see his private email.

[Dreifort]

his private email probably consists of photoshopped photos of hollywood celebs playing chess against a tag-team of himself and Micahel Moore.

[victor_sf]

This secret questions websites force you set are so silly. I always try to generate some random questions and answers and never give up the name of my first pet, teacher, etc.

[cph]

Great. Having once had my own e-mail account hacked by a criminal who then used it to defraud eBay customers, I hope this idiot's life turns real unpleasant for a while. Hackers are scum.

[JayWes]

Let this be a lesson for all; the standard answers to the standard security questions are not safe. Use them at your perail. Instead dream up a new name for your mothers maidan name, for your first dog, your first high school. It can be a rymhe of it or something else; but don't use something, some hacker can find out with a little work on the internet.