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The No Scandal Administration
There is a severe void of information from our government concerning the massive hack into the Office of Personnel Management that is only now coming out in various media reports, including some from ABC News and The Hill. Via the former:
The massive hack into federal systems announced last week was far deeper and potentially more problematic than publicly acknowledged, with hackers believed to be from China moving through government databases undetected for more than a year, sources briefed on the matter told ABC News.
“If [only] they knew the full extent of it,” one U.S. official said about those affected by the intrusion into the Office of Personnel Management’s information systems.
It all started with an initial intrusion into OPM’s systems more than a year ago, and after gaining that initial access the hackers were able to work their way through four different “segments” of OPM’s systems, according to sources.
Much of that data has been stored on OPM systems housed by the Department of the Interior in a Denver-area data center, sources said. And one of the four “segments” compromised held forms filled out by federal employees seeking security clearances.
A major federal workers’ union is unhappy with how the Office of Personnel Management is handling fallout from the massive data theft of 4 million federal employees’ records.
The National Federation of Federal Employees (NFFE), which represents over 110,000 government employees across the country, said it has received limited answers from the government and insufficient customer service from the company hired to help protect their members from identity fraud following the hack.
“Right now, federal employees are rightfully frustrated with the response offered following this cybersecurity breach,” said NFFE National President William Dougan in a statement. “Federal workers have had their personal and financial information exposed at no fault of their own.”
In the wake of the breach, OPM brought on identity-fraud protection company CSID at a cost of $20 million to give government employees robust identity-monitoring services for 18 months.
OPM told unions their members could start signing up for the complementary program on Monday via a PIN code that CSID would send by email or physical mail. Workers could also receive the PIN by calling CSID, OPM said.
Our federal government, which is supposed to be on top of things, has done very little explain the depth of what’s gone on in the hack that has apparently been underway for more than a year, undetected. The people who are supposed to be in charge haven’t given many answers as to just how this could have happened under the watch of a president who boasted that prior to one of his State of the Union addresses, he signed an executive order strengthening our cybersecurity.
What we do have is information that has leaked out of the tight-lipped government via anonymous sources. There is nothing to suggest anything is really being done in retaliation to an outright act of war by (allegedly) the Chinese government. Which, sadly, is par for the course with the Obama Administration.
As Republican strategist Rick Wilson so epicly explained on Twitter, this is just another example of the systematic corruption and status quo within Washington D.C.. The people in charge of our intelligence agencies, OPM, Secret Service, Veteran’s Affairs, Internal Revenue Service, etc., continuously screw up and let major scandals break out, and no one is really punished. Only one notable head has rolled, and that was Eric Shinseki, who was allowed to step down versus being fired for the being responsible for the deaths of several veterans.
Wilson also points out that Congress will set up a committee to investigate, they will issue a report no one will read, and everyone in Washington D.C. will move on. There isn’t going to be a heavy investigation into this, because hey, optics you guys.
Ultimately, Barack Obama has cultivated the already entitled air in D.C. to a point where, much like Marie Antoinette, parties are thrown while the world around them burns (literally, in the case of Baltimore). There is no air of accountability, because the greatest job security in the world is being a federal employee. If you screw up, you’re sent to another desk job. And, if that isn’t really the case, then hey, your optics are already crap, Government, and you should fix them because this is what everyone knows/believes to be true.
The OPM hack made vulnerable every type of personal information you can imagine on millions federal employees. This information, in the hands of your typical hacker, is dangerous to their personal finance and well-being. In the hands of a foreign, and most likely hostile, group? It is very much a national security issue, and one that should have been disclosed and addressed the moment we found out about it.
Oh, and check this out: Any foreign operatives that may have come to the U.S.’s side? Yeah, that information may have been obtained. Do you happen to even be related or close to someone who works for the government? Yeah, your information may have been obtained.
But, optics, you guys (sorry, that was totally insensitive of me) y’all. This president wants everything to be all okay so he can say he got through it without any major scandals. And the really insane part about it? His supporters (including but not limited to the media) will think he got through it without any major scandals.
The post The No Scandal Administration appeared first on RedState.
Source: http://www.redstate.com/2015/06/11/the-no-scandal-administration/
