The CIA Won't Admit It Uses Slack

While other federal agencies admit everything, up to spending tens of thousands a year to maintain channels like #churchfart, the CIA will neither confirm nor deny.

Given its traditional missions, which include subverting democracy around the world and providing U.S. leaders with unreliable intelligence analysis, it’s understandable that the Central Intelligence Agency would be among our less transparent federal agencies. Now, though, it’s gripping even more tightly to inconsequential information about what it gets up to than the ultra-secretive National Security Agency—and for no evident reason.

Last year, VICE filed a Freedom of Information Act request asking for any Slack domains in use by the CIA. The NSA, responding to a similar request, admitted that it had records responsive to the request—that the agency uses the demonic chat app, in other words—but said it couldn’t release them because they were a state secret. Recently, the CIA replied to our request by saying this:

CIA can neither confirm nor deny the existence or nonexistence of records responsive to your request. The fact of the existence or nonexistence of such records is itself currently and properly classified

In its response to our request, the CIA cited broad provisions in federal law that allow it to keep all sorts of information from the public by claiming it has to do with “intelligence sources and methods,” which can mean anything from the identity of a spy in a foreign leader’s inner circle to the podcasts a random bureaucrat listens to while driving to work. The agency is within its rights to do this, but it’s just another in a long list of examples of why federal classification laws should be changed to give more weight to the public’s right to get answers to even stupid questions relative to the right of public employees to keep what they do and how they do it entirely secret.

(VICE has asked Slack if the CIA is a Slack customer; we'll update if they reply.)

The General Services Administration’s response to a request for records about their Slack usage provides an example of the good results yielded by federal agencies being transparent about what they’re doing. Asked for a list of its Slack domains, the GSA provided it; the agency then provided a seemingly up-to-date list of its Slack channels, which you can read here. This is how we know that in addition to boring-sounding channels like “#md_css2017rhsdatapull,” the GSA has the following channels, which don’t sound boring at all:

#esperanto

#hate

#yo

#sportsball

#andrewwk

#discuss-tacos

#bechdel-test-post

#save-ferris-internal

#churchfart

#discuss-craisins

#critique-mighty-ducks

#critique-captn-planet

Further, the GSA provided materials related to its contract with Slack, which you can read here. This is how we know that the agency agreed to pay $54,000 for 300 users to use what appears to be an off-the-shelf version of the service for a year.

Is the CIA paying tens of thousands of dollars a year in public money so that spies can put secrets on a fundamentally insecure platform? Are they talking in channels like #churchfart, or perhaps in ones like #jfk-assassination-secrets, #false-flag-ops, or #ufo-disclosure? Probably the former, and perhaps the latter; for now, they don’t have to say.

https://www.vice.com/en_us/article/v74ymx/the-cia-wont-admit-they-use-slack

>>8207263

>>8207362

All news is clown cover news.

omnis cave

>>8207583

The 20 Questions with Vladimir Putin

Andrei Vandenko: Is there a chance that you come to terms with Zelensky?

Vladimir Putin: What about?

Andrei Vandenko: About peace, about friendship.

Vladimir Putin: Hope is the last thing to die. Yes, there is a chance. But unfortunately, after his return from Paris he started talking about the necessity to revise the Minsk Agreements. This begs the question.

Nevertheless, we managed to agree on the exchange of detained persons and we now managed to agree on gas.

Andrei Vandenko: Does the fact that today we are not friends with Ukraine represent a loss for us?

Vladimir Putin: Yes, of course, but as I have repeatedly said I believe that we are one and the same people.

Andrei Vandenko: The Ukrainians don't like it very much either.

Vladimir Putin: I don't know whether they like this or not but if you look at the reality that is true. You see, we had no difference in our languages until the 11th, 12th and 13th centuries.

And only as a result of Polonization, the part of the Ukrainians who lived in the territory under the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth, only around the 16th century the first language differences appeared. In general, the Ukrainians [with an accent on the first a] were called the people who lived …

Andrei Vandenko: History is history, but now we are talking about the present day.

Vladimir Putin: To talk about today or tomorrow we need to know history, need to know who we are, where do we come from, what unites us.

What unites us is…

In fact, it has always been independent, completely. There has been only spiritual unity and mentioning. The Patriarch of Moscow has been mentioned, recalled all the time in churches. That's it! It has been the only thing uniting the Russian Orthodox Church and the Ukrainian Orthodox Church of the Moscow Patriarchate. But they needed to cut the cords that bind. Why?

You say people do not understand. They simply do not know it. If they know, they will understand better. They should be told that. Why should one be embarrassed? Is it insulting for people?

Some time passed. As a result of people sharing the border with the Catholic world, with Europe, a community of people feeling to some extent independent from the Russian State began to emerge. How should we feel about that? I have already said: we should respect that. But we should not forget about our shared community.

Moreover, in the modern world our joint efforts give us huge competitive advantages. And, vice versa, division makes us weaker.

The Ukrainian factor was specifically played out on the eve of World War I by the Austrian special service. Why? It is well-known – to divide and rule. Absolutely clear.

Nevertheless, if it happened this way, and a big part of the Ukrainian population got a sense of their own national identity and so on, we should respect that. We should proceed from the reality but not forget who we are and where we come from.

By the way, the fathers of the Ukrainian nationalism, they never spoke about the urgent need to break up with Russia. Strange as it may seem, but their major works of the 19th century say that Ukraine is: a) multinational and should be a federal state, and b) should build good relations with Russia.

Today’s nationalists seem to have forgotten that. I will tell you why they have forgotten that. You know why? Because the interests of the Ukrainian people are not the main issue on their agenda.

How can it be the interest of the Ukrainian people if the break-up with Russia has led to loss of space engineering, shipbuilding, aircraft engineering and engine manufacturing; it is virtually the deindustrialization of the country that is happening. How can it be among interests?

The World Bank demands to stop cross-subsidizing. What's good in it? Or, they make them export round wood from the Carpathians. Soon the Carpathians will turn bald.

Why do this if, by joining efforts, we increase our competitive advantages manifold? Why lose it? Why throw everything away, what for?

Because the Ukrainian leaders or those who got power pursued their self-interests. And what were they? It was not even to earn more by robbing the Ukrainian people but to retain what has been plundered before. This was the main objective.

So, where is the ‘dough’? Pardon my French. Where is the money? In foreign banks. What do they need to do for this? Show that they serve those who have this money.

Hence, the only thing they sell is Russophobia. Because some like dividing Ukraine and Russia, they believe it's a very important mission. Because any integration of Russia and Ukraine, along with their capacities and competitive advantages, would lead to the emergence of a rival, a global rival for Europe and the world. No one wants it. That's why they'll do anything to pull us apart.

http://en.kremlin.ru/events/president/news/62835