<div class="KonaFilter image-container display-table"><div><div class="image"></div></div></div><ul class="summary-list"><li>The US Navy is no longer publicizing promotions of admirals, a policy that promotes reduced transparency in the service.</li><li>Chief of Naval Operations Adm. John Richardson argued Wednesday that one of the reasons the service is doing this is to protect flag officers from cyberattacks.</li><li>The US Navy is "under cyber siege," an internal cybersecurity review recently concluded.</li><li>A significant amount of information about top Navy officers can still be found online, undermining Richardson's rationale of the service's new policy.</li></ul>A top US admiral explained Wednesday that the Navy is keeping high-level promotions a secret because hackers from China and other adversarial countries are targeting flag officers.While the Army, Air Force, and Marine Corps all continue to publish lists of newly promoted officers, the Navy abruptly stopped in October, USNI News first <a href="https://news.usni.org/2019/02/25/navy-stops-announcing-flag-officer-nominations">reported</a> last month.The policy reportedly began with the promotion of Trump's doctor, Rear Adm. Ronny Jackson, who withdrew from consideration to lead Department of Veterans Affairs <a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/ronny-jackson-trump-va-unprofessional-behavior-ig-report-2018-4">amid a scandal</a>.Chief of Naval Operations Adm. John Richardson defended the policy decision Wednesday, arguing that publishing this information - which <a href="https://www.senate.gov/legislative/noms_confn.htm">the US Senate continues to publish</a> - leaves high-ranking Navy officers vulnerable to cyberattacks."I don't know if you've been personally attacked in the cyber world, but our flags are," Richardson said at a conference in Washington, DC, Breaking <keyword id="6354810" type="UNKNOWN" weightage="100" keywordseo="defense">Defense</keyword> <a href="https://breakingdefense.com/2019/03/navy-cno-defends-increased-secrecy-in-wake-of-chinese-hacking/">reported</a>. It is "just a vulnerability that we are trying to think about," he added, <a href="https://www.military.com/daily-news/2019/03/14/cno-navy-admirals-are-facing-cyberattacks.html">according</a> to Military.com."There's always a tension between on the transparency and security," he explained, telling reporters that the Navy intends to do anything it can "to make sure we're keeping their information and stuff secure."An alarming internal Navy cybersecurity review recently concluded that the service, as well as its industry partners, are "under cyber siege," The Wall Street Journal <a href="https://www.wsj.com/articles/navy-industry-partners-are-under-cyber-siege-review-asserts-11552415553">reported</a> Tuesday.Read More: <a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/chinese-hackers-are-tearing-the-navy-and-its-industry-partners-apart-2019-3">The US Navy and its partners are 'under cyber siege' from Chinese hackers and are hemorrhaging national security secrets</a>"We are under siege," a senior US Navy official stressed to The Journal. "People think it's much like a deadly virus - if we don't do anything, we could die."The service has been hit relentlessly by Chinese, Russian, and Iranian hackers, with the threat presented by Chinese cyber criminals among the most severe. China is accused of hacking the US military, large and small defense contractors, and even university partners to steal anything not nailed down.Last year, Chinese government hackers stole important data on several US Navy undersea-warfare programs from an unidentified contractor. Among the stolen information were plans for a new supersonic anti-ship missile, The Washington Post <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/national-security/china-hacked-a-navy-contractor-and-secured-a-trove-of-highly-sensitive-data-on-submarine-warfare/2018/06/08/">reported</a> in June, citing US officials.Speaking to Congress Wednesday, Army Gen. Paul Nakasone, head of US Cyber Command, said that the US is prepared to aggressively strike back against adversarial powers in cyberspace.Read More: <a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/us-to-use-more-aggressive-cyber-to-strike-back-at-enemies-2019-3">The US is ready to use more aggressive cyber operations to strike back at enemies</a>While Navy leadership argues that the decision to keep flag officer promotions a secret is to eliminate exposure that could put its admirals at risk, the defense appears a bit thin, as their names, ranks and <a href="https://www.navy.mil/navydata/bios/bio_list.asp">biographies</a> are still publicly available."This may not work out in the end, I don't know, but that's kind of our mindset there," Richardson reportedly said Wednesday.

Chinese hackers have been hammering the US Navy, and admirals are in the crosshairs

<ul class="summary-list"><li>The results of the 2020 presidential election and several key congressional races are yet to be determined.</li><li>Regardless of who wins, the US can celebrate pulling off a successful presidential election with far fewer problems than expected.</li><li>Seasoned election officials and ordinary citizens alike stepped up to avoid many of the nightmare scenarios predicted at the beginning of the COVID-19 outbreak in the US.</li><li>A record number of Americans voted by mail or early in person with few widespread issues, and in-person <keyword id="43546" type="EVENT" weightage="60" keywordseo="Voting">voting</keyword> on Election Day was smooth and orderly.</li></ul>The morning after the <keyword id="7600569" type="UNKNOWN" weightage="60" keywordseo="2020-election">2020 election</keyword>, many Americans felt a mix of confusion, trepidation, and — for some Democrats — even sadness <a href="https://thehill.com/homenews/house/524439-house-democrats-fall-way-short-in-disappointing-night">over the initial results of the nail-biting election</a>.Contrary to the rosy picture painted by some polls and election forecasts, the result of the presidential race <a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/2020-election-results">remains undetermined</a>, Democrats <a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/2020-senate-election-results">have a slim path to retake the US Senate</a>, and many Democratic House representatives <a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/2020-house-elections-results">lost reelection bids</a>.But no matter how the presidential election and other key races turn out, voters, election officials, and dedicated volunteers who helped keep the 2020 general election largely safe and secure in the face of the pandemic are clear winners of this election cycle.When the coronavirus hit the US, it put additional strain on election offices, <a href="https://www.govexec.com/management/2019/09/distrust-staffing-and-funding-shortages-imperil-election-security/159647/">many of which were already underfunded and understaffed</a>, and squeezed state and local governments' budgets. Almost overnight, local election officials had to contend with a <a href="https://publicintegrity.org/politics/elections/democracy-2020/elderly-workers-run-elections-but-covid-19-will-keep-many-home/">massive shortage in available poll workers</a> and <a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/missing-ballots-long-lines-foreshadow-november-election-problems-2020-6">skyrocketing demand for voting by mail</a>.After some states experienced serious issues with both mail and in-person voting <a href="https://www.pewtrusts.org/en/research-and-analysis/blogs/stateline/2020/07/08/election-experts-warn-of-november-disaster">in their primary elections</a>, <a href="https://www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/2020/07/november-election-going-be-mess/614296/">headlines warned for months</a> of an impending election meltdown, <a href="https://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2020/07/new-york-election-failure-mail-in-voting/614446/">widespread chaos with mail ballots</a>, <a href="https://www.vox.com/recode/2020/8/7/21358946/postal-service-mail-delays-election-trump-mail-in-ballots">disruptions at the US Postal Service</a>, problems with in-person voting, and <a href="https://www.buzzfeednews.com/article/paulmcleod/2020-election-12th-amendment-electoral-college-nightmare">vote-counting disputes</a> over the rise in mail ballots that could even reach the Congress or Supreme Court.On top of that, some experts feared that the hyperpolarized political environment and some of President <keyword id="6354484" type="PERSON" weightage="60" keywordseo="Donald-Trump">Donald Trump</keyword>'s inflammatory rhetoric suggesting the presence of widespread voter fraud <a href="https://www.npr.org/2020/09/30/918766323/trumps-calls-for-poll-watchers-raises-fears-about-voter-intimidation">would lead to unrest and even violence at polling places</a> by individuals or militias.<div type="image" title="voting" height="1000" width="2000" msid="79047469" hostid="261"></div><h2>'If there weren't problems, we should be worried'</h2>But despite those challenges, the United States saw historic early turnout and is on track for record-breaking overall voting numbers. The US Elections Project's <a href="https://electproject.github.io/Early-Vote-2020G/index.html">database of early-voting data</a> indicates that 100 million Americans voted early in person or by mail in 2020, compared with 57.2 million who did so in 2016.High voter turnout is not mutually exclusive with election administration problems or even attempts to suppress the vote. There were some administrative issues caused by human error in 2020, as in every election, and efforts on the part of some state officials in places like Texas <a href="https://www.nbcnews.com/politics/elections/federal-judge-rejects-texas-republicans-bid-toss-127-000-drive-n1245828">to restrict voting</a>.In scaling up voting by mail, some counties experienced problems <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2020/10/16/us/politics/ohio-mail-ballots-trump.html">getting voters their ballots in a timely manner</a>. Printing errors in places like <a href="https://www.wesa.fm/post/printing-error-sends-wrong-ballots-nearly-29000-voters-allegheny-county">Pennsylvania</a> and <a href="https://abcnews.go.com/Politics/york-city-election-officials-scramble-fix-printing-error/story?id=73317892">New York</a> caused ballots to be sent to the wrong voters. And <a href="https://www.pbs.org/wgbh/frontline/article/covid-19-most-litigated-presidential-election-in-recent-us-history/">last-minute court battles over election rules</a> confused voters.Voters in many jurisdictions <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2020/10/12/us/politics/georgia-voting-lines-turnout.html">also endured hours-long waits to vote in person</a> because of insufficient resources or logistical problems at sites in states including Georgia and New York.But instead of an election marred by chaos, voting problems, and civil unrest, the 2020 general election will be remembered as one with both record-high voter turnout and participation, including by mail, and unprecedented numbers of citizens <a href="https://www.npr.org/2020/10/29/928225412/on-poll-workers-many-election-officials-breathe-sigh-of-relief">stepping up to serve in their communities as election workers</a>.And the fact that we know of the problems that occurred shows how, for the most part, the system works exactly as intended."A presidential election is an election in which 150 million Americans do something very unusual during a short period of time in a process run by a million volunteers. If there weren't problems, we should be worried," David Becker, the CEO of the Center for Election Innovation and Research, told reporters before Election Day. "There will always be some problems in elections. They are episodic. They are sporadic. They are part of the human condition."Election Day was also <a href="https://news.google.com/articles/CAIiEMOvsJsIq3duKRDM-lAkmqEqGQgEKhAIACoHCAowvIaCCzDnxf4CMO2F8gU?hl=en-US&amp;gl=US&amp;ceid=US%3Aen=US%3Aen">remarkably smooth and uneventful</a> for a pandemic election, thanks in part to the unprecedented number of Americans who voted early and the many who stepped up to be poll workers and help out at in-person voting locations.<h2>Nightmare scenarios didn't play out, and the 2020 election was a success</h2>While <a href="https://www.cnn.com/2020/11/03/politics/voting-polls-news/index.html">there were some sporadic issues</a> with some polling places not opening on time, equipment not being delivered in the morning, faulty technology, and <a href="https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/politics/elections/2020/11/03/law-enforcement-alert-case-extremists-militias-try-disrupt-voting/6123061002/">attempts at voter intimidation</a> — all of which are par for the course in any election — there were few reports of excessively long lines and no widespread meltdowns at polling places."We are on the path to a very successful Election Day, and an election season characterized by record turnout during early voting and record participation in vote by mail," Kristen Clarke, the executive director of the Lawyers' Committee for Civil Rights Under Law, which runs the Election Protection Hotline, told reporters on Tuesday, adding that she had not seen "major systemic problems or attempts to obstruct voting" on Election Day.<div type="image" title="illinois voting machine coronavirus gloves" height="2647" width="5295" msid="79047471" hostid="261"></div>In addition to the overwhelming success of scaling up mail voting, the 2020 presidential election was one of the most secure from foreign interference and technology vulnerabilities in recent memory, experts like Becker have said, largely because of <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2020/10/18/us/elections/voting-machines-paper-ballots.html">the now widespread use of paper ballots</a> and voting machines with verifiable paper trails.US officials undertook a wide-ranging effort to warn Americans of attempts to interfere with the election from foreign adversaries, including Russia, China, and Iran. And in the days and weeks leading up to Election Day, Paul Nakasone, the director of the National Security Agency, <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/live/2020/11/03/us/trump-biden-election" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">told reporters</a> that foreign adversaries interfered less than they had before the 2018 midterm elections.The country's top intelligence and law-enforcement officials <a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/fbi-chris-wray-intelligence-officials-video-election-security-trump-2020-10" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">released a video last month</a> reassuring voters of the safety and integrity of the election and countering many of the president's conspiracy theories about voter fraud and mail-in voting.John Ratcliffe, the director of national intelligence, said that Russia and Iran were attempting to "influence public opinion" ahead of the election. He said that Russian and Iranian actors had obtained some voter-registration data, though as ProPublica's Jessica Huseman noted, most of that information is public anyway, and Ratcliffe's disclosure did not indicate whether any election systems had been breached.FBI Director Christopher Wray said that regardless of how voters cast their ballots, "rest assured that the security of the election — and safeguarding your vote — is and will continue to be one of our highest priorities." And William Evanina, the top counterintelligence official in the US, contradicted Trump's claims about <a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/intelligence-community-no-evidence-foreign-interference-mail-in-ballots-2020-8" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">foreign interference with mail ballots</a>, saying that "it would be very difficult for adversaries to interfere with or manipulate voting results at scale."The day after Election Day, the nation's top cybersecurity agency also debunked Trump's claim that the election results in key battleground states like Michigan, Wisconsin, and Pennsylvania were fraudulent because the candidate leading the statewide vote count changed from Trump to Biden as more ballots were processed.The Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency <a href="https://twitter.com/SashaIngber/status/1324045835005472771" target="_blank" rel="noopener">marked the following claim as a "rumor"</a>: "If results as reported on election night change over the ensuing days or weeks, the process is hacked or compromised, so I can't trust the results."The reality is that "election results reporting may occur more slowly than prior years," <a href="https://twitter.com/SashaIngber/status/1324045835005472771" target="_blank" rel="noopener">the agency said</a>. "This does not indicate there is any problem with the counting process or results. Official results are not certified until all validly cast ballots have been counted, including ballots that are counted after election night."

The 2020 election catastrophe that wasn't

Washington, May 14 (AP) President Donald Trump and Republicans are launching a broad election-year attack on the foundation of the Russia investigation, including declassifying intelligence information to try to place senior Obama administration officials under scrutiny for routine actions. The effort has been aided by a Justice Department decision to dismiss its prosecution of former Trump administration national security adviser Michael Flynn, an action that rewrites the narrative of the 3-year-old case in a way that former federal law enforcement officials say downplays the legitimate national security concerns they believe Flynn's actions raised and the consequences of the lies he pleaded guilty to telling. The DOJ decision comes as Trump and his Republican allies push to reframe the Russia investigation as a "deep state" plot to sabotage his administration, setting the stage for a fresh onslaught of attacks on past and present Democratic officials and law enforcement leaders. "His goal is that by the end of this, you're just not really sure what happened and at some gut level enough Americans say, 'It's kind of messy,'" said Princeton University historian Julian Zelizer. The latest indication of that came Wednesday when two Republican critics of the Russia investigation, Sens. Chuck Grassley of Iowa and Ron Johnson of Wisconsin, disclosed a list of names of Obama administration officials who they say may have received Flynn's identity from intelligence reports in 2016 and 2017. Among the names is Trump's Democratic opponent, Joe Biden, who was vice president when the Russia probe began. Names of Americans are routinely hidden, or minimized, in intelligence reports describing surveillance of foreigners, so U.S. officials have to make a specific request if they want to know the person's identity, or "unmask" them. Biden and the other officials had full authority to seek the name of a unidentified person who had interacted with the Russian ambassador - it turned out to be Flynn. They did so through proper channels, according to Trump administration documents. Rather than reveal any actual wrongdoing, the release of the information by the president's allies seems designed to create suspicion around Biden and other senior Democrats as the November election approaches. Trump hyped the disclosure of the list with Biden's name as a "massive thing." But the Biden campaign dismissed the revelation, with spokesman Andrew Bates saying it simply indicates "the breadth and depth of concern across the American government" at the time about Flynn's conversations with foreign representatives. In 2016 the FBI and other agencies were scrutinizing Russian interference on Trump's behalf and trying to understand whether Trump associates were involved in that effort. None of the officials could have known the unidentified person was Flynn, Bates said. The issue has been politically charged since early 2017, when details emerged about Flynn's conversations during the presidential transition period with Russia's then-U.S. ambassador. As part of special counsel Robert Mueller's Russia investigation, Flynn pleased guilty to lying to the FBI about having discussed sanctions with the diplomat. U.S. intelligence agencies who conduct surveillance of foreigners hide or "mask" as a matter of course the names of Americans to whom foreigners speak or speak about in intelligence reports that are disseminated across government. U.S. officials may ask the National Security Agency to disclose - or unmask - the names of Americans referenced in intelligence reports if they believe the identity is essential in understanding the intelligence, and they do so thousands of times a year. In fact, unmasking requests increased in the first years of the Trump administration from 2015-2016 totals during the latter years of the Obama administration, according to a government transparency report issued last month. The list declassified by Richard Grenell, a Trump loyalist and acting national intelligence director, shows a broad range of U.S. officials submitted requests between November 8, 2016, and January 31, 2017, to unmask the identity of the American who was revealed to be Flynn, according to a cover letter from NSA Director Paul Nakasone. It is unclear if they actually viewed the unmasked information. Flynn's call with Russian Ambassador Sergey Kislyak occurred in late December 2016. Many of the requests to unmask his identity took place before then. The content of the intelligence reports was not disclosed. The highly unusual disclosure comes as Trump, scrambling to manage the coronavirus crisis, has been eager to shift the focus elsewhere. He has repeatedly pronounced Flynn "exonerated" and pushed a loosely defined "Obamagate" allegation that the previous administration tried to undermine him during the presidential transition. Trump has tried to rally his supporters around the claim to revive enthusiasm among voters disappointed by his handling of the pandemic. He used the first 20 minutes of a recent Fox News interview to attack the Obama administration rather than offer updates on the pandemic. He has increasingly lashed out in the year since Mueller's report, which while identifying substantial contacts between his associates and Russia did not accuse him of a crime or allege a criminal conspiracy between his campaign and the Kremlin. Revelations since then have exposed problems in the early days of the FBI's probe, including errors and omissions in applications to surveil an ex-Trump campaign adviser. Attorney General William Barr has said dropping the case against Flynn, who pleaded guilty to lying to the FBI about having discussed sanctions with the Russian ambassador during the presidential transition, was in the interests of justice. The department says the FBI had insufficient grounds for interviewing Flynn about his "entirely appropriate" calls and that any imperfect statements he made weren't material to the broader counterintelligence investigation into the Trump campaign. But the decision stunned former law enforcement officials involved in the case, including some who say the Justice Department is rewriting history and omitting key context. Former FBI Deputy Director Andrew McCabe said the FBI was obligated to interview Flynn about his conversations with the Russian ambassador, and said Flynn's lies compounded the bureau's concerns. And because White House officials were inaccurately asserting that Flynn had never discussed sanctions with Kislyak, U.S. officials were concerned Flynn could be vulnerable to blackmail since Russia also knew what was discussed. "Mr. Flynn was set to become the national security adviser, and it was untenable that Russia - which the intelligence community had just assessed had sought to interfere in the U.S. presidential election - might have leverage over him," Mary McCord, the Justice Department's top national security official at the time, wrote in a New York Times opinion piece in which she accused Barr of misrepresenting her viewpoints. U.S. District Judge Emmet Sullivan has yet to rule on the Justice Department's dismissal request and has indicated that he is not inclined to do so swiftly. (AP) INDIND

Trump, GOP launch broad attack on Russia probe foundations

<ul class="summary-list"><li>President <keyword id="6354484" type="PERSON" weightage="60" keywordseo="Donald-Trump">Donald Trump</keyword> on Tuesday announced he had fired <keyword id="10289327" type="UNKNOWN" weightage="60" keywordseo="chris-krebs">Chris Krebs</keyword>, the head of the Department of Homeland Security's Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency.</li><li>Krebs was instrumental in protecting US elections from domestic and foreign interference and enjoyed broad bipartisan support as the head of <keyword id="159896" type="ORGANIZATION" weightage="60" keywordseo="CISA">CISA</keyword>. Lawmakers from both parties defended Krebs after Trump axed him.</li><li>Krebs spearheaded the DHS' robust effort to combat many of Trump's election-related conspiracy theories.</li><li>He also appeared in a preelection video with top US law enforcement and counterintelligence officials to reassure Americans of a free and fair election and emphasize it was safe to vote by mail.</li><li>In recent days, Krebs told multiple associates he expected Trump to fire him, Reuters reported.</li></ul>President Donald Trump has fired Chris Krebs, a senior US official who was head of the Department of Homeland Security's Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency.Trump announced Krebs' firing in a <a href="https://twitter.com/realDonaldTrump/status/1328852352787484677" target="_blank" rel="noopener">series</a> of <a href="https://twitter.com/realDonaldTrump/status/1328852354049957888" target="_blank" rel="noopener">tweets</a>, singling out a recent statement Krebs made about election security."The recent statement by Chris Krebs on the security of the <keyword id="7600569" type="UNKNOWN" weightage="60" keywordseo="2020-election">2020 Election</keyword> was highly inaccurate, in that there were massive improprieties and fraud — including dead people voting, Poll Watchers not allowed into polling locations, 'glitches' in the voting machines which changed votes from Trump to Biden, late voting, and many more," Trump tweeted. "Therefore, effective immediately, Chris Krebs has been terminated as Director of the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency."Twitter subsequently flagged Trump's tweets for containing disputed claims about the election. No evidence has emerged to support his claims of "massive improprieties and fraud."<div type="image" title="trump tweets chris krebs" height="342" width="594" msid="79273713" hostid="261"></div>Shortly after he was fired, Krebs <a href="https://twitter.com/C_C_Krebs/status/1328859222071783424" target="_blank" rel="noopener">tweeted</a> from his personal account: "Honored to serve. We did it right. Defend Today, Secure Tomrorow."Just a few hours before his termination, Krebs used his government Twitter account to rebut Trump and other Republicans' claims that election infrastructure was tampered with."ICYMI: On allegations that election systems were manipulated, 59 election security experts all agree, 'in every case of which we are aware, these claims either have been unsubstantiated or are technically incoherent,'" Krebs tweeted.<a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/dhs-breaks-from-trump-2020-election-most-secure-in-history-2020-11">Last week, CISA</a> announced there was "no evidence that any voting system deleted or lost votes, changed votes, or was in any way compromised," contradicting Trump's false and unsubstantiated claims about election fraud.<h2>Krebs expected to be fired after publicly rebuking Trump's conspiracy theories</h2>CISA was created in 2018, and as its leader Krebs was instrumental in protecting US elections from outside interference, whether domestic or foreign, and he enjoyed broad bipartisan support. But his firing wasn't entirely unexpected; Reuters reported earlier this month that Krebs had told multiple people he anticipated being fired by the White House.In the days and weeks before his firing, Krebs spearheaded the DHS' robust effort to combat many of Trump's election-related conspiracy theories.Krebs managed the DHS' "<a href="https://www.cisa.gov/rumorcontrol#post" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Rumor Control</a>" website, which defended the federal government's efforts to protect the integrity of the election and struck down misinformation about canvassing and auditing, voter registration, ballot-counting measures, and the overall electoral process.He also used his government Twitter account, with the handle @CISAKrebs, to frequently post "Rumor Control Updates" and retweet news reports debunking misinformation and conspiracy theories from Trumpworld alleging that the election was "rigged" against the president.In the weeks before the election, Krebs participated in a video with other top US law enforcement and national security officials to reassure Americans of the integrity of the election and emphasize that it was safe to vote by mail, in defiance of Trump's efforts to thwart the process."I'm here to tell you that my confidence in the security of your vote has never been higher," Krebs said in the video. "That's because of an all-of-nation unprecedented election-security effort over the last several years.""Elections are going to look a little different this year," he said. "While this will change the way Americans vote, Americans will vote. And Americans will decide American elections. And you, as the American voter, are the last line of defense."Krebs also said voters should "be patient because of the changes due to COVID, on November 3, we might not know the outcome of our election.""And that's OK, but we're going to need your patience until official results are announced," he added. "So get out there and vote with confidence, and be a part of protecting 2020."In the end, <a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/2020-election-administration-was-successful-not-a-disaster-2020-11" target="_blank" rel="noopener">as Business Insider has reported</a>, the 2020 election was among the safest and most secure because of the use of paper ballots and voting machines with verifiable paper trails.Paul Nakasone, the director of the National Security Agency, also said there was less foreign election interference this year compared with 2018, and The Washington Post reported on Tuesday that US Cyber Command took steps to deter malicious actors, like Russian military hackers, from being able to meddle in the election.<h2>Republicans and Democrats defended Krebs after Trump axed him</h2>Lawmakers, election experts, and cybersecurity experts said Krebs' removal was among the most consequential actions Trump had taken since losing the election.Ciaran Martin, the former head of the UK's National Cyber Security Centre, tweeted: "Not seeking to distract attention from the wider issues, but I just want to put on record a tribute to the outstanding service of <a href="https://twitter.com/CISAKrebs" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">@CISAKrebs</a>. He's been the best partner an ally could hope for." Martin added that people in the US, the UK, "and beyond are safer online because of his work and leadership."David Levine, a former state and local election official who is now an elections-integrity fellow at the Alliance for Securing Democracy, <a href="https://twitter.com/davidalanlevine/status/1328874359537213440" target="_blank" rel="noopener">wrote on Twitter</a> that Krebs' ouster "is perhaps the biggest setback" resulting from the election so far.Election integrity "is about ensuring 1) that eligible individuals can vote; 2) that elections are perceived as legitimate, with accurate, fair and clear results; and 3) that elections are free from malicious activity," including foreign and domestic disinformation and cyberattacks, Levine wrote.He added that Krebs "practiced and preached these values, even when it wasn't politically expedient to do so, and and our nation owes him a debt of gratitude for all of the work he and his <a href="https://twitter.com/CISAgov">@CISAgov</a> colleagues did to help secure.""Chris Krebs is an extraordinary public servant and exactly the person Americans want protecting the security of our elections," Democratic Sen. Mark Warner, the vice chairman of the Senate Intelligence Committee, said in a statement after Krebs' firing. "It speaks volumes that the president chose to fire him simply for telling the truth."Adam Schiff, the chairman of the House Intelligence Committee, said in a statement, "President Trump is retaliating against Director Krebs and other officials who did their duty. It's pathetic, but sadly predictable that upholding and protecting our democratic processes would be cause for firing."Suzanne Spaulding, who spearheaded the Department of Homeland Security's cyber division during the Obama administration, tweeted that Krebs "is the only person I can think of who is leaving this administration with his reputation not just intact but, appropriately, burnished.""Thank you," she continued, "for picking up the baton 4 yrs ago and achieving so much progress for the org and mission!"Republican Sen. Ben Sasse also commended Krebs, saying in a statement: "Chris Krebs did a really good job — as state election officials all across the nation will tell you — and he obviously should not be fired."Sen. Rob Portman of Ohio, a Republican member of the Senate Homeland Security Committee, also defended Krebs, telling CNN's Manu Raju: "I know Chris, I've worked well with him. I think he's a real professional."Asked whether he thought Trump was wrong to fire Krebs, Portman said: "Yeah I think he was very good. I think what he was trying to do in an unprecedented way was to connect with every state in the country, and give them what they needed to protect and have a firewall ... against cyberattacks."

Trump just fired the US's top cybersecurity official, who spent weeks striking down the president's conspiracy theories about election fraud

<div class="KonaFilter image-container display-table"><div><div class="image on-image">Chris McGrath/Getty ImagesRussian President Vladimir Putin hands U.S. President Donald Trump (L) a World Cup football during a joint press conference after their summit on July 16, 2018 in Helsinki, Finland.</div></div></div><ul><li>President Donald Trump has a habit of conflating Russian election interference and Russian collusion.</li><li>Experts worry that his trademark response that there was "no collusion" also translates to an unwillingness to address Russia's continuing attacks on the US electoral system.</li><li>The White House has not issued any official guidance to US intelligence agencies to combat Russian influence on upcoming elections, so the National Security Agency and US Cyber Command have been acting to counter the threats on their own.</li><li>One Russia expert suggested that Trump's tendency to view Russian meddling as a partisan issue stems from the fact that he "does not want to diminish his election victory, and believes that admitting Russia meddled will somehow do so."</li></ul>Sign up for the latest Russia investigation updates <a href="http://e.businessinsider.com/join/the-russia-investigation" target="_blank" rel="noopener">here</a>»During a wild press conference in Helsinki following his summit with Russian President Vladimir Putin, US President Donald Trump addressed a question about Russia's election interference with his trademark response: "There was no collusion."Trump rolled out the statement when Reuters' Jeff Mason asked Putin why Americans and Trump should believe his claim that Russia did not interfere in the election, given that the US intelligence community has concluded otherwise.Trump immediately interjected, saying the "whole concept" of Russian meddling "came out as a reason why the Democrats lost an election which, frankly, they should have been able to win." <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2018/07/16/us/politics/fact-check-trump-putin-news-conference-.html" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Falsely claiming</a> that the Electoral College is "a lot more advantageous to Democrats," Trump added that "there was no collusion ... there was nobody to collude with."It's not the first time Trump has conflated Russian interference and collusion. But his latest refusal to address what his own intelligence chief called <a href="https://www.axios.com/director-national-intelligence-dan-coats-russia-cyber-terror-threats-9-11-1531578544-4ed9826c-8501-4e39-b6e1-1ed738e0eb39.html" target="_blank" rel="noopener">one of the gravest threats</a> facing the US was made all the more jarring by the fact that it came just three days after the Department of Justice indicted 12 Russian intelligence officers on hacking charges related to the 2016 campaign.<div class="KonaFilter image-container display-table float_left"><div><div class="image on-image">Alex Wong/Getty ImagesFormer FBI Director Robert Mueller, now the special counsel, is investigating Russian interference in the 2016 US election.</div></div></div>In early 2017, the US intelligence community determined that the Kremlin ordered an elaborate and multifaceted campaign to meddle in the race. A key pillar of that campaign, according to US intelligence, was the hacking of the DNC and the subsequent dissemination of emails intended to hurt Democrats and the campaign of the party's 2016 presidential nominee, Hillary Clinton.The special counsel Robert Mueller has been investigating Russian interference in the 2016 election, whether the Trump campaign colluded with Moscow in the process, and whether Trump has tried to obstruct his team's probe.Friday's indictment did not accuse any Americans with crimes in the indictment or insinuate that any US citizen knowingly colluded with Moscow.Still, the charges seemed to hit a nerve with Trump."Every time you hear all of these, 12 and 14, it's stuff that has nothing to do - and frankly, they admit these are not people involved in the campaign," Trump said during the press conference on Monday. "We ran a brilliant campaign, and that's why I'm president."William Pomeranz, the deputy director of the Kennan Institute for Advanced Russian Studies at the Woodrow Wilson Center, pointed out that the indictment only addresses interference."Trump has never addressed that because he only wants to talk about collusion," Pomeranz said. "But the issue is interference, and the reality is that Trump not only did not challenge Putin about that, [but] he shows a glaring misunderstanding of what occurred in this election and what his responsibility is as head of the United States and defender of the Constitution."<h2>Trump's own intelligence chief says the 'warning lights are blinking red again'</h2><div class="KonaFilter image-container display-table float_right"><div><div class="image on-image">Thomson ReutersTrump stunned observers when he rebuffed the US intelligence community in favor of Russia in Helsinki.</div></div></div>Trump's reluctance to accept the US intelligence community's findings that Russia meddled in the election has other, broader consequences.Dan Coats, the Director of National Intelligence, said last week that "the warning lights are blinking red again" on potential cyberattacks against the US."The warning signs are there," Coats said during a talk at the Hudson Institute in Washington, DC. "Today, the digital infrastructure that serves this country is literally under attack."Coats compared the threat level facing the US now to the weeks before the September 11 attacks."And here we are nearly two decades later, and I'm here to say, the warning lights are blinking red again," Coats said.Russia, he added, is the "most aggressive foreign actor, no question. And they continue their efforts to undermine our democracy."Despite that, the White House has not given the National Security Agency and US Cyber Command any official guidance on how to guard the 2018 midterms and future elections against foreign interference.So last week, NSA director Paul Nakasone announced that he had directed the two organizations to act independently of the White House to counter Russia's aggression. They are also working with the FBI, the CIA, and the Department of Homeland Security on the initiative."Nakasone, and the heads of the other three-letter agencies, are doing what they can in their own lanes, absent an overall approach directed by the president," former NSA director Michael Hayden <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/national-security/nsa-and-cyber-command-to-coordinate-actions-to-counter-russian-election-interference-in-2018-amid-absence-of-white-house-guidance/2018/07/17/baac95b2-8900-11e8-85ae-511bc1146b0b_story.html?utm_term=.83a5cdf5d5d9" target="_blank" rel="noopener">told the Washington Post</a>. But "as good as it is, it's not good enough. This is not a narrowly defined cyberthreat. This is one of the most significant strategic national security threats facing the United States since 9/11."Trump's reticence on such a pressing issue has baffled national security experts."Whatever you want to call [yesterday] - whether it was a summit or a meeting - it was a clear victory for Putin," said Edward Price, the former senior director of the National Security Council under President Barack Obama."After all, one of Putin's strategic goals in 2016 - beyond electing Trump - was to be on the same plane and playing field as the American president," he told Business Insider. "Trump gave him that [Monday] ... Putin couldn't have scripted a more perfect outcome."<div class="KonaFilter image-container display-table float_left"><div><div class="image on-image">REUTERS/Leah MillisPresident Donald Trump's prepared remarks show his own handwritten notes at the start of a meeting with members of Congress at the White House on July 17, 2018.</div></div></div>Pomeranz echoed that point.Trump's comments blaming both the US and Russia for the decline in relations between the two countries ignores "all the things that have occurred on Putin's watch and essentially whitewashes them, starting with Crimea and including Syria, the nerve agent attacks in the UK, and the attacks on the US electoral system," he said."Why Trump feels that this is a partisan issue that does not warrant a whole of government response is something that only makes sense when you understand that Donald Trump does not want to diminish his election victory, and believes that admitting Russia meddled will somehow do so," Pomeranz said.On Tuesday, Trump said he had "full faith" in US intelligence agencies and <a href="http://www.businessinsider.com/trump-putin-comments-helsinki-walkback-misspoke-2018-7" target="_blank" rel="noopener">wanted to clarify his Monday statements</a>. "The sentence should have been: I don't see any reason why it wouldn't be Russia" that interfered in the US election, he said. "Sort of a double negative."Written in <a href="http://www.businessinsider.com/trump-no-colusion-typed-note-photos-2018-7" target="_blank" rel="noopener">black marker on his typed remarks</a> was a note in all caps: "THERE WAS NO COLUSION." <div class="margin-top"> <h3>NOW WATCH: <a href="http://www.businessinsider.com/north-korean-defector-calls-out-kim-jong-un-terrorist-singapore-summit-2018-6">North Korean defector: Kim Jong Un 'is a terrorist'</a></h3> <div> </div> </div>

Trump keeps conflating Russian meddling and collusion, and experts worry it could have a devastating effect on national security

<div class="KonaFilter image-container display-table"><div><div class="image on-image"></div></div></div><ul class="summary-list"><li>On Tuesday, the <a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/category/national-security-agency">National Security Agency</a> made its Ghidra - its tool for reverse-engineering software - available as <a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/category/open-source">open source</a>, which means anyone can use or modify it for free.</li><li>Anybody can use it as a free <a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/category/cybersecurity">cybersecurity</a> tool for disassembling suspicious files, analyzing malware, and testing for vulnerabilities. </li><li>Since the Ghidra tool is free, this increases access for people to use it in both professional and educational settings - potentially making for a safer internet, even as it could introduce new people into the profession of cybersecurity, experts say.&#xa0;</li><li>The NSA promises that there are no backdoors or other methods of spying built in to Ghidra, but hackers have gone over the code with a fine-tooth comb to double-check that claim.&#xa0;</li></ul>It's been almost a week since the National Security Agency released a free software tool for picking apart suspicious files, and security enthusiasts are already poring over the code to hunt for bugs and backdoors. And once the project's completely online for people to modify, developers will scramble to make this tool even more powerful, experts say.On Tuesday, the NSA released an <a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/amazon-web-services-open-source-licensing-undermine-2018-12">open source</a> project called Ghidra, a software reverse engineering framework developed by NSA's Research Directorate for NSA's cybersecurity mission. The secretive spy agency originally developed Ghidra to analyze attacks and cybersecurity risks on government agencies and other organizations. Like individuals and companies, government agencies are also prone to cybersecurity attacks, including ones from other countries.&#xa0;Right now, the code is only available to download, but the NSA is in the process of putting the project onto code hosting site <a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/github-hires-microsoft-google-veteran-shanku-niyogi-new-product-svp-2019-1">GitHub</a>. And once that happens, experts expect to see enhancements from amateur and professional security developers roll out soon - making the tool even more robust, and a major reason why the NSA likely chose to release a formerly closed project, experts say. As an <a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/open-source-initiative-open-letter-definition-2019-2">open source</a> project, Ghidra can be used or modified by anyone for free.In the meantime, the release of Ghidra has provoked a frenzy of activity as malware researchers, hobbyists and even the conspiracy-minded dissect the software and put it through its paces, assessing its capabilities and seeking to allay the inevitable suspicions about the spy agency's gift.&#xa0;"If you have security concerns about Ghidra, do what I do and install all your research tools inside a Virtual Machine," suggested MalWare Tech, a verified Twitter user with 141,000 followers.Read more: <a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/rubrik-build-open-source-community-2019-2">A former Marine explains how her service helped prepare her to lead a new open source initiative for $3.3 billion startup Rubrik</a>Making Ghidra <a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/open-source-software-investors-success-2019-2">open source</a> benefits NSA, experts say. It can be costly to work on improving Ghidra, but as an <a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/google-cloud-ceo-thomas-kurian-veiled-shot-amazon-open-source-2019-2">open source</a> tool where anyone can modify it, an online community of developers can work to improve it much faster. It can also encourage recruitment and community interaction with th NSA, Graham says."The significance is that the product can be improved by the community instead of being solely funded by the NSA. Development of such a product is costly, and even the NSA doesn't have unlimited funds. It'll be great demonstration of the value of open-sourcing internally developed projects," Rob Graham, consultant and owner at Errata Security. told Business Insider in a Twitter DM.<h2>What is reverse engineering?</h2>Reverse engineering helps users recover information needed to understand cybersecurity risks. For example, when there's a suspicious file, it can be hard to find the specific issues with that file. But with reverse engineering, a person can disassemble the file to figure out how it works and what risks it might have - essentially, working backwards. This is similar to figuring out how a dish is prepared at a restaurant so you can make it at home. With Ghidra, people can inspect suspicious code, analyze malware and test for vulnerabilities.&#xa0;Ghidra's technology isn't anything new as there are currently commercial reverse engineering tools available, but as an <a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/why-investors-throwing-money-at-open-source-startups-2019-2">open source</a> tool, it increases access for people to work with reverse engineering, says Jon Amato, research director for Gartner's technical professionals security and risk management strategies team."It lowers the bar for entry for people who can do reverse engineering in the industry and are frustrated and priced out for commercial tools," Amato told Business Insider.Ghidra is not as sophisticated as some commercially available tools, Amato says, but it's still a "good first start" for people who want to get their hands dirty with reverse engineering. Plus, right now, commercial tools can cost thousands of dollars a year. Although the NSA has released a set of other <a href="https://code.nsa.gov/">open source projects</a>, this is the first <a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/rubrik-build-open-source-community-2019-2">open source</a> tool specifically for analyzing malicious code and malware-like viruses."This functionality has been in freeware and commercial based tools for years," Amato said. "The problem was commercial tools were crazy expensive. [Ghidra] competes with more commercial tools in that in can do a bunch of different stuff but it can do it for free.Amato says that this tool isn't a general purpose security tool, but rather, a niche tool that would only be used in specialized security jobs. That being said, now that the tool is free, he&#xa0;believes that Ghidra will likely be used as a teaching tool in colleges and universities - giving students access to learning about this specialized type of cybersecurity technology."We'll start to see this used in academic classroom environments because some of the commercial tools can be a little difficult to gain licenses for even for academic environments," Amato said. "The learning ecosystem is going to be the first and most immediate change we'll see."<h2>Skepticism</h2>Still, some users were skeptical about the announcement.&#xa0;Ghidra has already been around for years, and it's likely that the NSA has replaced its internal tools for reverse engineering, says&#xa0;Jerry Gamblin, principal security engineer at Kenna Security."It was known to exist, and because it had lost internal value and it wasn't a tool that was going to drastically make the Internet safe, it allows them to give something back to the security community," Gamblin told Business Insider. "It's good timing for the NSA."The fact that it's from the NSA may also deter some users from using this tool, but otherwise, since Ghidra's release, the security community has already started sifting through the code to try out the code and to look for bugs. "There is no backdoor in Ghidra," Robert Joyce, NSA senior advisor, said at RSA on Tuesday. "This is the last community you want to release something out to with a backdoor installed, to people who hunt for this stuff to tear apart."Here's what people are saying about Ghidra.&#xa0;<div></div><div></div><div></div><div></div> <div class="margin-top"> <h3>NOW WATCH: <a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/north-korea-kim-jong-un-scariest-dictators-2016-1">Here's how North Korea's Kim Jong Un became one of the world's scariest dictators</a></h3> <div> </div> </div>

The NSA publicly released a tool for cracking software wide open, and hackers are loving it - so long as the NSA makes good on its promise not to use it to spy on them

<ul class="summary-list"><li>President <keyword id="6354484" type="PERSON" weightage="60" keywordseo="Donald-Trump">Donald Trump</keyword> is still refusing to concede the election after losing to President-elect <keyword id="99719" type="PERSON" weightage="60" keywordseo="Joe-Biden">Joe Biden</keyword>, and the Trump administration is doing everything in its power to stymie Biden's transition team.</li><li>But national security veterans and former intelligence officials told Insider that, in many ways, the biggest risk to the US isn't a rocky transition but what the president might do in the 65 days between now and when he leaves office.</li><li>Since Trump lost the election, nearly a dozen senior government officials have been fired, forced to resign, or resigned in protest, and there may still be departures to come.</li><li>"Trump seems to wake up every day with a kind of anxiety or hatred," Bob Deitz, a former NSA general counsel, told Insider. "He didn't get reelected, so he's in vengeance mode. His bloodlust is rising up."</li><li>"In terms of damage that can be wrought, if Donald Trump wants to make some really atrocious choices as president on his way out, he can probably do more damage that way than just blinding the incoming president," one former senior Justice Department official said.</li></ul>It's been nearly two weeks since the election, and President Donald Trump still refuses to concede to President-elect Joe Biden, despite losing both the Electoral College and the national popular vote to him. Instead, Trump and those around him are alternating between claiming that he won the race and alleging without evidence the election was stolen from him, while purging government agencies of perceived enemies and stacking them with loyalists.Simultaneously, Biden is plowing full steam ahead with building a COVID-19 task force, staffing up his transition team, and preparing for Inauguration Day on January 20.The juxtaposition between the two camps raises a question that hasn't been tested in modern US history: What happens when a democratically elected president is denied the chance at a smooth transition because the incumbent refuses to concede and hamstrings the agencies responsible for maintaining stability?In many ways, four national security veterans told Insider the biggest risk to the US isn't what Trump is doing to hamper Biden — who will take office regardless of whether Trump concedes — but what the president himself might do in the 65 days between now and when he leaves office in January."One worries that a person like Trump, who's pissed off at the world and sitting there sucking his thumb and feeling sorry for himself, will wake up at 3 in the morning and tweet something that could be really destabilizing," Bob Deitz, the former general counsel at the National Security Agency, told Insider. "There's also the concern that he might just — and <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/trump-will-leave-the-question-is-how-much-damage-hell-do-to-national-security-before-then/2020/11/10/551d31a4-239d-11eb-a688-5298ad5d580a_story.html" target="_blank" rel="noopener">he's been trying to do this</a> — declassify information about Russia because of his vendetta over the Mueller investigation."Since Trump lost the election, the following officials were fired, stepped down, or resigned in protest: the <a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/trump-has-terminated-his-secretary-of-defense-after-losing-election-2020-11" target="_blank" rel="noopener">secretary of defense</a>, the <a href="https://www.cnbc.com/2020/11/10/trump-loyalists-promoted-to-powerful-pentagon-roles-after-esper-firing.html" target="_blank" rel="noopener">undersecretary of defense for intelligence</a>, the defense secretary's chief of staff, the <a href="https://thehill.com/policy/defense/525832-defense-deputy-chief-of-staff-latest-pentagon-official-to-resign" target="_blank" rel="noopener">deputy chief of staff</a>, the National Security Agency's <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2020/11/10/us/politics/a-trump-loyalist-is-installed-at-the-national-security-agency.html" target="_blank" rel="noopener">general counsel</a>, the Department of Homeland Security's <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/national/dhs-officials-fired-white-house/2020/11/12/98fdf224-2554-11eb-8599-406466ad1b8e_story.html" target="_blank" rel="noopener">assistant director for cybersecurity</a>, the Department of Energy's <a href="https://www.defensenews.com/breaking-news/2020/11/06/head-of-nuclear-weapons-agency-unexpectedly-resigns/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">head of National Nuclear Security Administration</a>, DHS's assistant undersecretary for <keyword id="6356001" type="UNKNOWN" weightage="60" keywordseo="international">international</keyword> affairs, and the <a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/doj-richard-pilger-resigns-barr-memo-election-fraud-investigations-2020-11" target="_blank" rel="noopener">head of the Justice Department's election-crimes division</a>.More departures may come soon. Trump has been <a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/trump-considering-firing-fbi-director-chris-wray-after-election-2020-10" target="_blank" rel="noopener">furious for months with FBI Director Christopher Wray</a> and Attorney General William Barr over their refusal to open investigations targeting the Bidens to give Trump a preelection boost in the polls. The president is also said to be <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/trump-will-leave-the-question-is-how-much-damage-hell-do-to-national-security-before-then/2020/11/10/551d31a4-239d-11eb-a688-5298ad5d580a_story.html" target="_blank" rel="noopener">frustrated with CIA Director Gina Haspel</a> after she and other officials strongly opposed his push to broadly declassify intelligence about Russia that could compromise sources and methods.And in the past several days, Chris Krebs, the head of DHS's Cybersecurity Infrastructure and Security Agency who played a robust role in countering Trump's conspiracy theories about voter and election fraud, told associates he expected to be fired by the White House.<div type="image" title="christopher krebs dhs cybersecurity" height="2733" width="5466" msid="79251822" hostid="261"></div><h2>Trump's post-election 'bloodlust'</h2>Since losing the election, "Trump seems to wake up every day with a kind of anxiety or hatred," Deitz said. "He didn't get reelected, so he's in vengeance mode. His bloodlust is rising up. And he'll go after people like Wray and Gina Haspel.""I assumed she was untouchable," added Deitz, who worked with Haspel at the CIA in the early 2000s. "But I have colleagues more knowledgeable than I am who think she's going to get bounced."He said he was concerned "in a very personal way" about Trump's decision to install Michael Ellis, a former White House official and aide to California Rep. Devin Nunes, as the NSA's new general counsel. US intelligence agencies are traditionally meant to be insulated from political forces, and NSA lawyers, in particular, are responsible for ensuring the agency doesn't use its vast electronic and cyber surveillance powers to target Americans."There haven't been that many general counsels at the NSA, and we meet from time to time. I know all of them, and every single one of us is nonpartisan," Deitz said. "There were certainly some Republicans and some Democrats, but by and large, there were no partisans. There weren't any drum beaters, and this guy, Michael Ellis, he's precisely the kind of person you don't want at the agency."The Washington Post <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/national-security/former-gop-political-operative-michael-ellis-named-as-nsa-general-counsel/2020/11/09/8c7c025a-22cc-11eb-8672-c281c7a2c96e_story.html" target="_blank" rel="noopener">reported</a> that Ellis' appointment to the most powerful legal role at the nation's premier surveillance agency was made under pressure from the White House. A former Republican political operative, Ellis is a staunch Trump loyalist and played a leading role in the White House's effort to stonewall the publication of former national security adviser John Bolton's book. One former National Security Council official later <a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/nsc-official-accuses-trump-aides-false-claims-john-bolton-book-2020-9" target="_blank" rel="noopener">accused Ellis and others of hijacking the review process for the book</a> and making false claims to stop its publication, while Trump attacked Bolton as a traitor and a liar.In 2017, Ellis gained recognition for his involvement in the "midnight run," a late-night trip Nunes made to the White House to obtain intelligence documents that Nunes said bolstered Trump's claim that the Obama administration illegally spied on his 2016 campaign. The Justice Department inspector general later <a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/doj-inspector-general-report-russia-probe-2019-12" target="_blank" rel="noopener">investigated the matter and found no evidence to support it</a>."If you don't have the strict oversight required of the general counsel's office at the intel agencies, or there's a suspicion that the general counsel is kind of winking and nodding, you can lose support certainly on Capitol Hill but also generally with the American public," Deitz said. "That's why Ellis' appointment is so bad. You need someone in that position who has enough juice and confidence to be able to say to a director — or someone higher up — when something is illegal or inappropriate. And the concern people have with Ellis is he's not the type of guy who would maintain a strict firewall between himself and White House lawyers or policymakers."He added, "With Ellis, Trump has a lawyer at the NSA who may just say 'yeah, no problem,' if, for example, the president makes a request to NSA about releasing documents to the White House or the public."The White House and the NSA did not immediately respond to a request for comment.Glenn Carle, a former CIA covert operative and a frequent Trump critic, told Insider he was more alarmed by Trump's metaphorical "decapitation" of government agencies than he was by the president refusing to pass the baton to Biden during the transition period."Even if you take one person out, for instance the head of the CIA, there's an entire institution carrying on, but there are decisions that need to be made, processes that would come to a stop or not work that well without that leader," he said. "In both a proactive and reactive sense, there are many things, including within the intelligence community, that could be significantly delayed even with an acting leader there to replace the person who's been fired, no question."If the quarterback disappears, you can still run an offense, but how well you're going to do it is questionable."<div type="image" title="FILE PHOTO: CIA Director Gina Haspel testifies to the Senate Intelligence Committee hearing about &quot;worldwide threats&quot; on Capitol Hill in Washington, U.S., January 29, 2019. REUTERS/Joshua Roberts/File Photo" height="3000" width="6000" msid="79251824" hostid="261"></div><h2>'If Donald Trump wants to make some really atrocious choices on his way out, he can probably do more damage that way'</h2>One former senior Justice Department official, who spoke on condition of anonymity to candidly discuss their views, told Business Insider that "in terms of damage that can be wrought, if Donald Trump wants to make some really atrocious choices as president on his way out, he can probably do more damage that way than just blinding the incoming president."They added: "He can make some terrible foreign-policy choices. He can attempt to eliminate key folks in the government as he's already done. Plus, you've got a <a href="https://www.whitehouse.gov/presidential-actions/executive-order-creating-schedule-f-excepted-service/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">floating executive order</a> that would try and convert civil servant roles to new Schedule F roles, which opens the door for them to be fired on political grounds."Amid Trump's refusal to concede the election, Emily Murphy, the politically appointed head of the General Services Administration, has not formally recognized Biden as the president-elect, leaving his team without many of the tools necessary to ensure a smooth transfer of power.The White House has also instructed senior government leaders <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/trump-transition-agencies-biden/2020/11/09/ad9f2ba2-22b7-11eb-952e-0c475972cfc0_story.html" target="_blank" rel="noopener">not to have any contact</a> with the Biden transition team until GSA acknowledges his election. And Biden is not yet receiving the daily intelligence product that presidents and incoming presidents receive, known as the President's Daily Brief (PDB).Current and former officials said that while it was problematic for Trump to stymie Biden, the president-elect is uniquely prepared to handle a tumultuous transition because of his eight years as vice president and the fact that it's been only a few years since he left office. Many members of his transition team similarly served in various roles within the US government until their departures when Trump took office in 2017.<div type="image" title="Joe Biden" height="1000" width="2000" msid="79251826" hostid="261"></div>"With the Biden administration in particular, because he has not been out of government for very long, his personal knowledge of the interagency process — the way in which information relating to national security is collected, analyzed, and disseminated throughout various agencies and departments — is quite extensive," said Heather Heldman, a managing partner at the advisory firm Luminae Group and a former State Department advisor. "President-elect Biden and those around him certainly know what questions to ask and of whom to ask them on day one. And that is a stabilizing factor."The former Justice Department official agreed, saying they were more troubled by how disorganized the Trump administration has been over the past four years, and especially in the past few weeks."This administration, in particular, has been so erratic with its foreign policy, and all of that might change again with last week's decapitation strike at the Pentagon," the former official said. "For Biden, in terms of at least knowing what we ourselves are doing — not what the virus is doing or what terrorists are doing or what cyber actors or Russia are doing — we don't even know, publicly, exactly where our forces are. And that basic information strikes me as lost now."<h2>'These are opportunities for the bad guys'</h2>Political instability in the US is a boon for foreign adversaries like Russia and China, particularly as it relates to national defense.NSA Director Paul Nakasone told reporters that foreign adversaries interfered less than they had before the 2018 midterm elections. But The New York Times reported that Russia, which meddled in the 2020 and 2016 elections in Trump's favor, <a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/nyt-russia-plans-to-help-trump-exacerbating-disputes-election-results-2020-10" target="_blank" rel="noopener">planned to assist the president this time</a> by "exacerbating disputes around the results.""A guy like Putin has very little money because Russia's economy is in the tank. The only stuff Putin can do is cheap stuff, like using the internet to mess with our elections," Deitz said. "It's effective but it's cheap. What's happening now is another opening for Russia to muck around."China, meanwhile, has begun developing artificial archipelagos as part of an effort to claim sovereignty over the South China Sea. The US has pushed back with its Pacific fleet as a warning to China that the area is part of international waters.But Trump's refusal to concede the election, as well as the turmoil at the Pentagon following Trump's decision to replace Defense Secretary Mark Esper with a loyalist, Chris Miller, is an opportunity for China to reassert dominion over the South China Sea.Indeed, the perception of a lack of organization within the US government "can give the impression to nefarious foreign actors that there's a point of vulnerability they can seek to exploit," Heldman said. "I don't think something of that nature would come to fruition, but it's certainly a thought that must have crossed the minds of America's adversaries."The former Justice Department official said: "There's a piece of me that hopes our adversaries realize that whatever the leadership is, there are dedicated and talented FBI investigators and military service members and civil servants across the government who will detect misbehavior and form our response to it."Heldman agreed."Do I wish this controversy didn't exist? Yeah, absolutely," she said. "That being said, is Joe Biden going to be significantly disadvantaged because he's not getting the PDB today? I don't think so because he has a very talented team of national security advisers around him. Beyond that, that intelligence sharing is going to continue, cooperation with our most strategic national security allies is going to continue, and the responsibilities of people who work in the US intelligence community or people who are in the military, those responsibilities are not going to change."

You Searched For "paul nakasone" and got 7 results

Chinese hackers have been hammering the US Navy, and admirals are in the crosshairs

Ryan Pickrell

The 2020 election catastrophe that wasn't

Grace Panetta,Sonam Sheth

Trump, GOP launch broad attack on Russia probe foundations

PTI

Trump just fired the US's top cybersecurity official, who spent weeks striking down the president's conspiracy theories about election fraud

Sonam Sheth

Trump keeps conflating Russian meddling and collusion, and experts worry it could have a devastating effect on national security

Sonam Sheth

The NSA publicly released a tool for cracking software wide open, and hackers are loving it - so long as the NSA makes good on its promise not to use it to spy on them

Rosalie Chan

'He's in vengeance mode': Intelligence veterans sound the alarm over Trump's post-election 'bloodlust' and 'decapitation strike' at the Pentagon

Sonam Sheth