 This is American issues take two we're talking about another embarrassing lease of link of classified data The tagline is why can't we protect our national secrets? This has happened before and it has happened again We need to understand what our vulnerabilities are the Washington Post reported that they were getting close They were doing some wonderful reporting on this but getting close to find out who the members of the gamer group were That might have been responsible and surely just a few hours later the newspapers the Times and the Post both reported and a fellow named Jack Teixeira had been taken into custody as the primary suspect For leaking the information is with the Air National Guard in Massachusetts We'll know more about this as time goes by but it's hot and for this discussion We're gonna have Tim Apichella, Stephanie Spell Dalton and Jeff Portnoy right now Okay, we're back for a very very important discussion about a very immediate issue Tim So that they arrested this guy And he is the primary suspect and we get to know from the newspapers from the Washington Post and the Times There's a bunch of young kids and this fellow Teixeira was in the National Guard and and he had a little gamer group Going on on a gamer site called Discord, which I can tell you more about but What does this all mean? And this is the strangest kind of confluence. This is not an external actor This is right here at home inside our military What are your reactions? Oh my reactions is there's too many people that have access you got a 20 year old young adult Who has access to the most sensitive documents not only access but apparently was able to fold the documents and take of a secured room Only to be copied or transcribed and or photographed later on for his little chat game extravaganza Too many people have access to these documents obviously and obviously the protocols are not being followed They're probably well in place, but they're not being followed. So Where I come from heads would roll Yes, sir. Oh Stephanie, let me go to you the same question You know, what is what what comes to mind on this? We've lost a lot of intelligence here We've been embarrassed, you know for the third time in recent years And we what is our reaction? Are you do you agree with Tim? I? Certainly agree with Tim. Good point I think that for decades or even maybe since it came out the Xerox machines Copiers are are very easily accessible wherever I have worked in a variety of places And I mean found one person was copying a book on it And so people are in there at night a day So I as Tim said that the access to this material is is that way too low a grade level or Pay level so I believe there should be some concern. I think we were all concerned I mean, is this the next one since Snowden? but these people are not only violating the copyrights Permissions and and of course, you know going against what what are their duties to be careful about Security they're in these groups. What why has this person was in a 20 to 30 people group You mentioned the discord Jay might tell us more about that later But I read about this his own group that he led the thud shaker Central group that he's a part of so here, you know 30 people that are fiddling around with these ideas and then taking it to the next level whenever they're in the mood And that seems to be what this alleged leaker has done It's a totally out of line with any any employment agreement he has With me let me go to you Jeff, you know back in in the Snowden day What was interesting in the press was that there are 2.5 million people in this country? Held top top secret clearances. That's extraordinary It struck me as as multiples of the number of people Who had top secret clearances when I was in the service, but that was in the 60s in the 70s So what's interesting now is the newspaper reports that Even after the experiences we've had with Julian Assange and with Snowden The number of top secret clearances has not reduced. It's been increased It's now 4.2 million people have these clearances Something is wrong in Mudville. Don't you agree? Trump had these documents in Mar-a-Lago. What's the big deal? I mean, I'm not as excited about it as you are. I mean If you think a 20 year old Got access You don't think the Chinese and the Russians Have had this all along. I mean come on We're talking about a pimply acne kid at 20 years old And you're thinking the Chinese and the Russians don't have the same documents I mean, you got to really be naive to think that That this stuff is not already known To our so-called adversaries and secondly If the government told the truth About some of these things it wouldn't be that big a deal I mean what we're learning is what we've been told about the war in Ukraine Is a bunch of lies And misstatements. I mean, I think I'm more interested in what misrepresentations we've been handed by the government When somebody goes ahead and leaks So, you know, I'm not that excited about it. I don't disagree by the way That there's a serious flaw In our system When as you point out a 20 year old guy who used to be in the National Guard or whatever Can get access and then share it with his friends in a chat room I mean, there's a serious serious problem But I'm not so sure that's the biggest problem that arises or something like this. Well, would you would you Yes, I won't argue that a lot of the intelligence Available is going to be in the hands of the Chinese and the Russians who are very akamai about these things But I guess the problem that I would post to you is what about our allies who are offended Now some of them are good sports, you know, poland for example Issued a statement this morning saying we understand mistakes are made and you know and in keeping intelligence secrets So we don't blame the united states But others may be kind of ticked off at us and that changes our foreign policy It changes our foreign relations. Isn't that a problem beyond what she knows and what button knows? Yes, but if any government thinks that we're able to keep our secret secret They're being naive I mean first of all much of this was probably shared Except the embarrassing things when you know, we say stupid things about other countries Uh, and again, you know, I'm not belittling, you know releasing the names of uh, of uh, CIA agents We're not talking about that At the moment and I you know clearly that we're putting people's lives in danger Which was the argument used against snowden. Yeah, although I don't believe anybody was ever assassinated I mean, there's always this oh my god over reaction but The one thing I full agreement is What the heck's going on with our security system? Whether it's nasa or the cia or whatever secret organizations the government has When somebody like that can get access to material that he never should have access to what was his job? I don't know communication. He was a communication specialist Communicating with who foreign governments or no, he was no, he was a facilitator to allow communication of of um, You know military messaging messaging and so he did he was he didn't um, actually get involved substantively It's just that it passed through his hands. That's that's the problem. Yeah, I know and look It's obviously a serious problem when material is easily accessed by By four and a half million people And uh, you know that exposes the flaw, but it's not the first time That those flaws have been exposed. Let me go to you tim. You know what the the very interesting intersection of this is discord Uh, let me take a moment and tell you that I have become familiar with discord because I am interested in AI artificial intelligence and one of the big programs That had come out in the past month or two and that's all that it's said is called mid-journey Mid-journey um, creates graphics you you feed in a description of what kind of graphic you want And amazingly mid-journey will give you a graphic That that comports with that description. Um, but what's interesting is to use mid-journey You have to have discord It's an odd name actually and discord allows you to see What other people on a given server have created using mid-journey? So they work hand in glove discord is an enabler. Uh, it's a it's a chat room thing Where you can see What what thousands of people are doing and learn and learn from that? Um, but the mid-journey server has nothing to do with with what was going on with this guy tech sharer Um, there are other servers many other servers many other chat rooms that are operating with millions of people 150 million uh in stalls as I understand it j. J. It's good to know that you're on the doc web I always thought that was a possibility and now you've made an admission That I think I need a lawyer Hey, there happens to be one in the room, so Yeah, well Jeff is Jeff is still a first amendment guy no matter what So tim, you know the intersection here it goes beyond I think what jeff was saying, you know And what you were saying and we have a problem in terms of securing our Security information and but the other part is that when you put when you when you when you connect both of these things up The fact that you know millions of people have security clearances And a lot of them are young who don't really understand what's happening in the world And who join these chat rooms and who think it's all kind of a game. That's what discord is It's a gamer server site And then you get a sort of a double whammy Uh, do you agree with that? Well, I don't know enough about it. So, um, I'll I'll agree just to say I agree I I think there's a dot here that needs to be connected and that is the erosion of of credibility for the united states Um, I'll just take us down a little history walk Uh when daniel elsberg released the pedigone papers and what incredible damage that did to the credibility of Of the government telling the truth about vietnam and the fact that we are winning the war Which and where we were not winning the war not by a long shot or I'll talk about The iraq invasion that was propagated a bond lies about, uh, sudam hussein heavy news And now we have detailed information about ukraine and uh painting I'm not so rosy picture yet the media has been painting a rosier picture So it's all about credibility of the united states and its ability to communicate the truth to the american public Uh, that's the bigger dot that needs to be connected and if this continues Um, no one's ever going to believe what the government says We know I I mean one thing that we really have to address here and I'd like to ask you about this stuff And he is uh, can united states remain A world power Can it remain a free society? Um when it cannot keep secrets Don't you have to be able to keep secrets and I'm not judging what secrets are capable and what or not I'm just saying don't we have to have the ability to keep secrets in order to be a world power to achieve our global goals Well, I that's a great question. I mean certainly this would relate to our policy making um as well as to um our our capacity to protect ourselves I mean that's that that's what's completely astounding is that these people have access somehow To these servers and to this activity because this takes some time But I've also come to understand that there's a big payday for all of this I mean I recently heard from a bulgarian colleague who's been called by people in bulgaria Asking him just to send some drones, you know like the kind you take pictures with Because they're they want the drones to like carry a grenade over Drop it at wherever they want to drop it But and and they're willing to pay anything for this material for the for that kind of protection and then certainly for this information I am sure there's plenty of money out there to support obtaining these documents from people that are Factless and sitting at these Well, there was no money here. Not every not that we know of yet But there is a war going on jeff Can you conduct or support parties to a war? No, I'm being able to keep a secret No, I don't think anybody's going to disagree about the importance of keeping secrets But but that doesn't mean that you can lie To the public I mean that that's the disconnect. I don't think Clearly you got to keep secrets Important secrets the names of undercover Spies, although you can't use that word anymore and you know secret diplomacy and stuff like that I agree with that Let's take the one that really bothered the Ukrainians where we said, you know, they were vulnerable They didn't have the ammunition um that they were not likely to win the spring offensive Um made them look like they were weak And and of course part of you know, their program is not to look weak Even if they are weak now this all came out This has an effect on the war not not, you know, even if you say that Vladimir Putin knew all of this he knew the Ukrainians are weak It's the others who might Support or not support the Ukrainians. What what was that divide the ammunition and the fighter planes and the tanks What was the movie was the dogs of war? that talked about misinformation Uh, oh that wagged a dog wagged a dog. Oh, yeah, same thing same movie Uh, I'm just exlexic. I just uh mixed it up. Um, you know, I I don't think I mean, I know I don't disagree with you that secrets are critical And that this is this should never have happened And you know heads are gonna roll somewhere and then it'll happen again five years from now But but It exposes both to the People of this country and to the world Lies that we have been telling people Internally and externally And yeah, it's tremendous embarrassment as you say Poland's kind of Been a nice neighbor By saying, oh, yeah, you know, these mistakes are made they probably are made in Poland Should they be made in the united states? I think it's inexcusable And and it just shows you how vulnerable Our system is to these kinds of hacks. Who's at fault? I mean if Congress will politicize this issue guaranteed And that means they're gonna blame the president, of course Yeah, well and and the and the democrats will blame trump for, you know, the systems that were improved Um, but who is actually at fault from what we know because um, the reality is that uh, Lloyd austin got up a couple days ago and said we are going to bend every effort to find out who these people are And now they have so what? I'm saying I don't think they have because what happened is the washington post did the investigation They really got down on it More than the times as far as I can see and then almost immediately thereafter the fbi That's a department of justice not the department of defense made an arrest Um, so, you know query what exactly did the do-do do here? I'm not impressed yet. Maybe I'll be impressed later How about you who's at fault? you Okay, I mean, you know, I mean we can pick anybody I mean, they're going to take the low-hanging fruit and make them pay That's the reality They're not going to get to the people that allowed this to happen that designed the system and do something They've got to do something. So, you know, the problem as I mentioned earlier is the intersection of information on social media It's different than it was even in snowden's time and certainly uh in julietta sarge Um, it's different and and query. How are we going to handle this? We we don't have a clue on social media We don't even know what facebook does congress has never taken any action Against or to regulate any of these social media companies and now we have social media eating our lunch Um, so would you go after social media? For what for this guy leaking the documents and playing some game? Yeah Yeah We had no control over what he was doing none Well, that's who's fault is that to ask your question? Well, maybe it means congress has to assert some do what do what I don't know. We'll have an investigation you and me Hey jay Yeah, let me jump in. You know what when the cia has a leak they sit everyone down under a Polygraph and start asking questions So you just start working your way up the ranks because you're right this 21 year old didn't come by these documents just by by by happenstance No, it's true But you know, there was this cell this this group Of a couple of dozen young people like this and and most of them thought it was a kind of joke Most of them thought it was a game Like discord has discord as a gamer's site. Well to use jeff's terminology this pimple face kid 21 year old kid was feeding his ego by sharing classified documents Hey guys, look what I got access to exactly That's exactly right But we cannot afford to have that happen And it's more sophisticated Well, you better start talking to the generals and the kernels and the majors because they're allowing it to happen Okay Stephanie you had a point jay have a point that to me it it resonates The the archives problem. Okay that all these presidents and people and that have worked for the the executive branch Have these documents all of a sudden you find out you have a document Boxes things you opened up when you thought all this stuff was put in a store, you know Archival storage with accession accession numbers and sealed boxes and I mean There's this going on all the time in the executive branch and then you find out. Well, no I mean these documents are also all these other places. So the question to me is What is this as as you all have asked? It's a it's an executive branch problem um for the secret and top secret documents that the Archives has got to expand here and do something about their systems of tracking and storage And uh rotating these documents around and then plus the issue that's coming up in the discussion is who gets them Who's going to see them and the other issue is of course what needs to be classified? Most of this stuff is certainly not going to turn any heads That's classified top secret, you know may may not be that all that are classified that way are warranted So I I'm seeing that this is a big project that needs to get started and then also how do people get access to uh to uh these servers that they're not supposed to be on Where's the oversight for who this 21 year old? Kid get gets to access. Why are they're not firewalls? He had he had legitimate access and His comment about this kid who was simply faced kid by the way We have no evidence that he was simply faced or anything else about his complexion But let me say this, you know, there's an attitudinal thing here It's the attitude of this guy these guys in the group, you know in the social media group And there's an attitudinal thing about him. He was apparently he is apparently a religious zealot He's conservative right wing Now he may be, you know young and stupid he might even be acne-faced But the fact is an attitudinal thing exists here not only for him But for the others involved in that group who spread around the information So we have a country Well, I guarantee he wasn't the prom king I mean, let's just be honest. It's somebody who spends 24 seven in front of his computer Unfortunately, we're developing a large portion of our young population that that's all they do Right they communicate on the computer. They don't have an ability to communicate face to face They spent 24 seven and that's what we're living with these days jay Right, that's the country and it's an attitudinal thing and it's all a big game In fact, in the article they made reference to of these various games that are happening and some of these kids They're not all in the military, you know texera. He's in the military But what i'm saying is the it's an attitudinal thing where they kind of um, they in they they conflate You know the games and the fiction and the fun and the social media Which which the social media what what did one guy said they asked him the fbi asked him You know, why did you do this? Why did you you know? Why don't you why did you re re re send this information? Uh, and he said i'm never going to tell you who the principal Sender was and they said why are you not going to tell us? And he said because he's my best friend Well, he never met the man They were buds On online. They were buds in social media. We have a reorganized social structure in the country And whether they were in the military or not in the military, you know, the young pimply faced group In fact, we're ignorant about you know public affairs public policy and foreign relations and they held And maybe still do hold the keys to the kingdom So I think this helps us recognize the changes that you talk about in our society in the way it works In the way people treat may I say treat the government? Treat the national interest Because it for them They don't have a clue how important that is and they don't seem to care Well, I don't know because the last game I played was pac-man So I'm not too sure. I understand what games are on the web But we have to do remedial remedial work with you, but does it is it is it is it an An important fact that he's a conservative religious Della, I mean I mean, I will find out more but we may find out that he's an ordinary old-fashioned trooper And and so he shouldn't have access because of that Is that what you're saying? No, I'm not going to that's pretty elitist. Jay. That's pretty elitist Well, I I let me say as a matter of principle if I were the general in charge And I knew that somebody had those propensities. I would not want them handling national secrets Yeah, that comes up. That brings me now. That just brings up a whole other subject There we go. There we go. All right, kim you um, what about that? What about Intersection, what about these kids who are playing games and don't have a clue and conflate, you know Fiction and nonfiction and don't seem to care if it affects the national interest Well, I'm with Jeff, you know, these kids are spending too much time in front of the computer Making quote-unquote friendships and they've never met in person Uh, the bottom line is our technology is outrunning our cultural norms and we can't keep up with it and that's the bottom bottom line and until we start putting um A little bit of thought into how we're operating our society and how we're operating the rules of our society You can expect a whole lot more of this and a lot worse Oh, I know I hear what you're saying We have to get congress to have hearings. No, I didn't say congress because they're do nothing Well, who then? you I thought it was you or maybe stephanie. No, you jay You know, that's the problem Congress started to investigate facebook a couple years ago during the trump administration And um, what's his name came down there and confused them all and the staffers were confused And the committees got nowhere and they put it on the back shelf for a year And then presumably they would be more akamai about, you know, what was going on and can ask better better questions Um, and and it happened again. Zuckerberg came back and confused them again and the the Bottom line there was nothing ever happened. There's been no regulation. Congress is not up to this. This is specialized This is high tech This requires a lot of training and experience and and focus which congress doesn't have even on its best non-partisan day problem Okay, they're a duple to do nothing. That's what I said Well, I I just think we need to get in there and get get it Under a corral leashed we have to the even at the nsa and at these other defense agencies There needs to be a review of by congress or a select committee or by the executive branch biden They we need to find out who who and what has access to what There is it in there And that that but but I don't see going at it bit It's got to be overhaul these 20 year olds are sitting there in front of computers that are powerful and have access and the archives isn't even keeping track of its own documentation and I have no doubt that what but what Trump was doing and looking through that material was he was looking for big big buck Reserves he could get his hands on my final comment is I think this is a task for sink tech I think sink tech should undertake an investigation Your committee chair won't do it and provide Of the investigation and provide its findings to congress And we can then hope that this will never happen again. That's my fervent prayer. There's a hope But let me go to one question. I really meant to ask you and are we becoming a special? How long is the show going on today? Well, Jeff when you're on it's always I mean we only get paid for 30 minutes and you know Over time the check the check is in the mail I'm gonna have you said that one of the big problems is the government doesn't tell the truth. Okay and so Let's say that we agree You know and that gets this gets past the need to keep things secret And that what what you don't want is the government making affirmative misstatements of fact And so that later, you know, we find that maybe it was not telling the truth How do you do that? Jeff? Where do you start? What what what's the first step on on on changing? Mastery policy so the government always tells the truth. It's never going to change. So why why even? Speculate it's not going to happen It's the way government works and that's the way it is I mean you can have oversight committees and occasionally Historically after something has happened. There's an oversight committee and you learn That what you had been told was untrue Example a the vietnam war but we can go through Multiple multiple other things. That's the way it is. I don't get excited about it I don't expect to be told the truth. Well, you know one thing we seem to have learned Maybe not all of us during the trump administration is that truth counts Facts count how they do but and and fast and if you don't have facts, you can't have a democracy We I think we've learned that So how do we correct that because this is an extension of that same notion? You have untrue statements and they create problems when they're released How do we make a democracy? How do we keep a democracy by making sure that the only thing government Issues is true Have a mind. I would draw the I would draw the question I have one more comment on that question Which is it goes both ways because as we've referenced the movies there was a movie early on called war games In which some pre-adolescents or early adolescents launched The nuclear warheads And so as I'm saying it's going both ways. So this way we're getting people go in and get out what they want to get at or have You know some kind of motivation to obtain and get rewarded for it Also can go the other way is that that the system can be mishandled and we can start something really big So it's a huge huge challenge. Oh, yeah Well, he has a challenge which I think has has come out and his Lloyd Austin and and Tony Blinken's biggest challenge Is to try to make peace and you know ruffle You know smooth the ruffled feathers of all the people that we have offended By this release To me that's very important. And so the question is and we're almost finished if Just stand by and ask your client to stand back Clients are important. I'll go on record about that. Um, so let me ask you this Tim You know what how important is that what can we do? Can we ever? Ruffle those feathers Or unruffled them Oh, I think the juniors left the bottle here. So I'm with jeff. I'm with jeff We should always expect not to hear the truth from our government, but let's keep it to a minimum Um, and again, there's just far too much access to has these these these Confidentials sensitive documents restrict the heck out of that and just move forward Okay, we're out of time and jeff and his client have to go Uh, next time jeff I suggest you get you know Get your client on a second chair and have him and have him speak also in these subjects for her And uh, and maybe they'll agree with the bottom line is I am in great demand And you know, I have to juggle all of these people that Want my time? Well, and and because because of my relationship and my love for you I always try to put you somewhere near the top You're here Oh by the way, am I telling the truth we'll never know We'll We'll defend your right to say it whatever it is. That's right All right, I think we got to go now because I don't want you walking off the stage Thank you tim. Thank you stephanie and thank you too jeff. That was a lot of fun. It always is great seeing you guys Thank you so much for watching think tech hawaii If you like what we do, please like us and click the subscribe button on youtube and the follow button on vimeo You can also follow us on facebook instagram and linked in and donate to us at thinktech hawaii dot com Mahalo You know the fire is going and uh others are gonna pick it up We need to do something about this or we're very vulnerable. Well, you know I know it's a guy named read up his first name. He's a democrat And he's on the on force and the senate on forces and he was making statements this morning about how He was going to get to the bottom of it and they want to make them pay And so, you know, I think this is to your point It's not it's not so much that we hang somebody, you know by the short ones Um, that that's not going to solve the problem. We put them in jail, you know making a lifetime The problem is how you stop this is happening because that's much more difficult and finding the folks You know the party and punishing you And that that you know, sure you have a certain level of deterrence for the next guy who might think of doing something like this But it doesn't stop it