Laptop, iPad, other electronics and documents stolen from Senators during breach

essentialsaltes · Jan 8, 2021

LINK

As questions continue to arise over the potential security ramifications after the Capitol building was stormed on Wednesday, Rep. Jim Clyburn, a Democrat from South Carolina, told reporters on a call today that his iPad was stolen during the breach.

Clyburn is not the only lawmaker who had items stolen. Oregon Sen. Jeff Merkley said in a video on twitter that rioters stole a laptop that was on a table in his office.

According to authorities, US officials said multiple senators' offices were hit.

"This is probably going to take several days to flesh out exactly what happened, what was stolen, what wasn't," said Michael Sherwin, acting US attorney for the District of Columbia, said on a call with reporters Thursday afternoon. "Items, electronic items, were stolen from senators' offices. Documents, materials, were stolen, and we have to identify what was done, mitigate that, and it could have potential national security equities. If there was damage, we don't know the extent of that yet."
Why this matters: The thefts raise questions about Congress's cybersecurity posture and whether US officials have done enough to secure their computing devices and networks from direct, physical access.

MIDutch · Jan 8, 2021

Wonder how many national secrets the Proud Boys and QAnon are in possession of.

Heck, they could probably fund their insurrectionist movement for years if they're willing to sell to the Russians.

Triumvirate · Jan 8, 2021

essentialsaltes said:
Why this matters: The thefts raise questions about Congress's cybersecurity posture and whether US officials have done enough to secure their computing devices and networks from direct, physical access.

And things were pretty ropey on that front in the first place.

Green Sun · Jan 8, 2021

essentialsaltes said:
LINK

As questions continue to arise over the potential security ramifications after the Capitol building was stormed on Wednesday, Rep. Jim Clyburn, a Democrat from South Carolina, told reporters on a call today that his iPad was stolen during the breach.

Clyburn is not the only lawmaker who had items stolen. Oregon Sen. Jeff Merkley said in a video on twitter that rioters stole a laptop that was on a table in his office.

According to authorities, US officials said multiple senators' offices were hit.

"This is probably going to take several days to flesh out exactly what happened, what was stolen, what wasn't," said Michael Sherwin, acting US attorney for the District of Columbia, said on a call with reporters Thursday afternoon. "Items, electronic items, were stolen from senators' offices. Documents, materials, were stolen, and we have to identify what was done, mitigate that, and it could have potential national security equities. If there was damage, we don't know the extent of that yet."
Why this matters: The thefts raise questions about Congress's cybersecurity posture and whether US officials have done enough to secure their computing devices and networks from direct, physical access.

Even with on-disk encryption, the general rule of thumb in computer security is if a dedicated actor has physical access to your machine, it's compromised. For national security, this is a tremendous blow. Determining exactly what information the attackers will have access to is going to be a long, tedious process. Recovery is next to impossible. This is going to be a mess that is going to take a very, very long time to clean up.

cow451 · Jan 8, 2021

Classified smashified. What’s the big deal?

BTW.....

What’s Snowden doing these days

Triumvirate · Jan 8, 2021

Green Sun said:
Even with on-disk encryption, the general rule of thumb in computer security is if a dedicated actor has physical access to your machine, it's compromised. For national security, this is a tremendous blow. Determining exactly what information the attackers will have access to is going to be a long, tedious process. Recovery is next to impossible. This is going to be a mess that is going to take a very, very long time to clean up.

I would question whether there is sensitive information just lying around in an office.

If there is....yeah, y'all need to sort your opsec policies out.

But even otherwise innocuous information being lost could be a problem. I wouldn't want these fascists knowing say - the meeting and location schedules for politicians they don't like.

TLK Valentine · Jan 8, 2021

And I was told they weren't looters...

Green Sun · Jan 8, 2021

Triumvirate said:
I would question whether there is sensitive information just lying around in an office.

If there is....yeah, y'all need to sort your opsec policies out.

But even otherwise innocuous information being lost could be a problem. I wouldn't want these fascists knowing say - the meeting and location schedules for politicians they don't like.

True, I'd hope that here's nothing that's too high-up in the confidentiality system. But you're correct, even things like schedules and locations can be a risk.

And potentially something more concerning, information scraped from these stolen assets can be used to gain knowledge of the network environment for future attacks. Credentials are the obvious ones, and in all likelihood those will be changed hopefully soon, but there's a lot more that may not be obvious for a while.

Triumvirate · Jan 8, 2021

Green Sun said:
True, I'd hope that here's nothing that's too high-up in the confidentiality system. But you're correct, even things like schedules and locations can be a risk.

And potentially something more concerning, information scraped from these stolen assets can be used to gain knowledge of the network environment for future attacks. Credentials are the obvious ones, and in all likelihood those will be changed hopefully soon, but there's a lot more that may not be obvious for a while.

Mmhm. If you asked me to tell you from memory all the stuff on my gadgets that could be leveraged into getting at me...I'm not going to remember all of that.

Halbhh · Jan 8, 2021

essentialsaltes said:
LINK

As questions continue to arise over the potential security ramifications after the Capitol building was stormed on Wednesday, Rep. Jim Clyburn, a Democrat from South Carolina, told reporters on a call today that his iPad was stolen during the breach.

Clyburn is not the only lawmaker who had items stolen. Oregon Sen. Jeff Merkley said in a video on twitter that rioters stole a laptop that was on a table in his office.

According to authorities, US officials said multiple senators' offices were hit.

"This is probably going to take several days to flesh out exactly what happened, what was stolen, what wasn't," said Michael Sherwin, acting US attorney for the District of Columbia, said on a call with reporters Thursday afternoon. "Items, electronic items, were stolen from senators' offices. Documents, materials, were stolen, and we have to identify what was done, mitigate that, and it could have potential national security equities. If there was damage, we don't know the extent of that yet."
Why this matters: The thefts raise questions about Congress's cybersecurity posture and whether US officials have done enough to secure their computing devices and networks from direct, physical access.

Well, if any of the thieves were actual foreign agents blending into the crowd, sure, that would be a potential danger. It would seem pretty basic to have made various security about whether a stolen laptop could have anything extracted from it, such as for instance to have really sensitive things only stored more securely, so that a laptop cannot download to store something, but can only view remotely after passing log on challenges and so on. So, you'd hope they had that basic kind of thing done right. But, you know people.

Paulos23 · Jan 8, 2021

It doesn't surprise me, several of those people expressed the feeling that the people paid for everything in the Capitol Building so it is theirs. This is short-sighted since some of the stuff is paid for by the Congressperson themselves.

Not to mention the secrets that might get out now.

essentialsaltes · Jan 8, 2021

Prosecutors charge man photographed in Pelosi's office, W.Va. legislator following Capitol riot

Prosecutors also revealed the name of a man they said had brought multiple weapons to the protest. Kohl said that police searched a truck belonging to an Alabama man named Lonnie Coffman and found two handguns, an M4 carbine assault rifle and 11 Molotov cocktails that included "Styrofoam material that essentially constitute homemade napalm."

Strathos · Jan 8, 2021

TLK Valentine said:
And I was told they weren't looters...

It just proves that they were BLM/Antifa in disguise.

Aryeh Jay · Jan 8, 2021

Yeah, but Hillary...

essentialsaltes · Jan 9, 2021

Adam Johnson, the man seen on video carrying House Speaker Nancy Pelosi’s lectern during the invasion of the US Capitol, has been arrested in Pinellas County, Florida, at the request of the US Department of Justice, a law enforcement official told CNN.

essentialsaltes · Jan 9, 2021

“National security equities” may have been among the records stolen from the Capitol on Wednesday when pro-Trump insurgents stormed the building and looted several congressional offices, the Justice Department said in a briefing Thursday.

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link2
A lot of things were broken to pieces, or pilfered, or defaced. Windows and door frames. The placard above House Speaker Nancy Pelosi’s door. Camera equipment owned by the Associated Press. A photo of the late congressman and civil rights leader John Lewis, with a quote about the necessity of getting into “good trouble,” that had stood on an easel outside of the office of House Majority Leader Steny Hoyer (D-Md.).

Seven pieces of historically significant art were covered in “corrosive gas agent residue,” according to a spokesperson for the Committee on House Administration, which has oversight over the House curator and the Architect of the Capitol.

“On the West Front, the teams identified graffiti on the building near the Inaugural Stands and two broken Olmsted light fixtures,” said a spokeswoman for the Architect of the Capitol in an email. “Statues, murals, historic benches and original shutters all suffered varying degrees of damage – primarily from pepper spray accretions and residue from tear gas and fire extinguishers – that will require cleaning and conservation.”

Belk · Jan 9, 2021

Green Sun said:
True, I'd hope that here's nothing that's too high-up in the confidentiality system. But you're correct, even things like schedules and locations can be a risk.

And potentially something more concerning, information scraped from these stolen assets can be used to gain knowledge of the network environment for future attacks. Credentials are the obvious ones, and in all likelihood those will be changed hopefully soon, but there's a lot more that may not be obvious for a while.

If their security is anything like ours (and for everyone's sake let us hope it is much better), then these devices should already of been remote wiped. There would be very little left that could be salvaged for as future attack.

7thKeeper · Jan 9, 2021

Hmm... depending on how they try to access those, and depending on the device (iPad for example), you could be giving your location away if the device connects anywhere.

cow451 · Jan 9, 2021

Belk said:
If their security is anything like ours (and for everyone's sake let us hope it is much better), then these devices should already of been remote wiped. There would be very little left that could be salvaged for as future attack.

Hey, I know a guy. He's legally blind but he can figure out stuff.

Pommer · Jan 9, 2021

cow451 said:
Hey, I know a guy. He's legally blind but he can figure out stuff.

Delaware?

Laptop, iPad, other electronics and documents stolen from Senators during breach

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