silentius on Nostr: I hope the US doesn’t go after or make Signal Foundation the scapegoat for this ...
I hope the US doesn’t go after or make Signal Foundation the scapegoat for this colossal accidental leak fuck-up by Trump's top officials, including:
• Vice President JD Vance,
• Secretary of State Marco Rubio,
• Director of National Intelligence Tulsi Gabbard,
• CIA Director John Ratcliffe,
• White House Chief of Staff Susie Wiles,
• Brian McCormack, a member of the National Security Council.
No one realized that Jeffrey Goldberg, editor-in-chief of The Atlantic, was included in a chat among top security officials on secret war plans, whose username appeared as "JG," had been added.
“The Presidential Records Act requires federal officials to use government-approved communications channels for all work-related matters – whether they are classified or not.”
“Rep. Jim Himes, the ranking Democrat on the House Intelligence Committee, said he was ‘horrified by reports that our most senior national security officials, including the heads of multiple agencies, shared sensitive and almost certainly classified information via a commercial messaging application, including imminent war plans.’
‘If true, these actions are a brazen violation of laws and regulations that exist to protect national security, including the safety of Americans serving in harm’s way,’ Himes, of Connecticut, said in a statement.
‘These individuals know the calamitous risks of transmitting classified information across unclassified systems,’ said Himes, adding that ‘a lower ranking official under their command’ would likely lose their security clearance and be subject to criminal investigation for doing the same.”
https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/politics/2025/03/24/trump-officials-add-journalist-classified-chat/82638362007/
• Vice President JD Vance,
• Secretary of State Marco Rubio,
• Director of National Intelligence Tulsi Gabbard,
• CIA Director John Ratcliffe,
• White House Chief of Staff Susie Wiles,
• Brian McCormack, a member of the National Security Council.
No one realized that Jeffrey Goldberg, editor-in-chief of The Atlantic, was included in a chat among top security officials on secret war plans, whose username appeared as "JG," had been added.
“The Presidential Records Act requires federal officials to use government-approved communications channels for all work-related matters – whether they are classified or not.”
“Rep. Jim Himes, the ranking Democrat on the House Intelligence Committee, said he was ‘horrified by reports that our most senior national security officials, including the heads of multiple agencies, shared sensitive and almost certainly classified information via a commercial messaging application, including imminent war plans.’
‘If true, these actions are a brazen violation of laws and regulations that exist to protect national security, including the safety of Americans serving in harm’s way,’ Himes, of Connecticut, said in a statement.
‘These individuals know the calamitous risks of transmitting classified information across unclassified systems,’ said Himes, adding that ‘a lower ranking official under their command’ would likely lose their security clearance and be subject to criminal investigation for doing the same.”
https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/politics/2025/03/24/trump-officials-add-journalist-classified-chat/82638362007/
quoting nevent1q…rgtdSignal is an excellent application but security requirements at such a high level mandate an exceptionally high-security device and operating system as well. The weakest link is the device and operating system they're using. I'd be very disappointed to hear if they had been using their personal iPhones or Stock Android devices for this (and it seems like they are, why the hell would you have a random journalist on your phone?). State actors would laugh.
Sensitive Compartmented Information are meant to be handled in unique facilities...
There's an improvement if they had a high security operating system (shameless plug) but even then it should be more bespoke in my eyes. The whole purpose of the device should be just to communicate over their service and nothing else.