Updated: US ambassador to Russia disputes claim sent message to Snowden

[think]

20. Have we killed the messenger yet? HB Gary would love to know....

More facts emerge about the leaked smear campaigns

New emails cause a Palantir employee to be placed on leave, and more focus is needed on Hunton & Williams

Tuesday, Feb 15, 2011 04:16 AM CDT - By Glenn Greenwald

(updated below - Update II – Update III – Update IV)

As I noted on Friday, the parties implicated in the smear campaigns aimed at WikiLeaks supporters and Chamber of Commerce critics have attempted to heap all the blame on HBGary Federal (“HBGary”) and its CEO, Aaron Barr. Both Bank of America and the Chamber — the intended clients — vehemently deny any involvement in these schemes and have harshly denounced them. The other two Internet security firms whose logos appeared on the proposals — Palantir Technologies and Berico Technologies — both issued statements terminating their relationship with HBGary and insisting that they had nothing to do with these plots. Only Hunton & Williams and its partner, John Woods — the central cogs soliciting these proposals — have steadfastly refused to comment.

Palantir, in particular, has been quite aggressive about trying to distance itself. They initially issued a strong statement denouncing the plots, then had their CEO call me vowing to investigate and terminate any employees who were involved, then issued another statement over the weekend claiming that “Palantir never has and never will condone the sort of activities that HBGary recommended” and “Palantir did not participate in the development of the recommendations that Palantir and others find offensive.” Such vehemence is unsurprising: the Palo-Alto-based firm relies for its recruitment efforts on maintaining a carefully cultivated image as a progressive company devoted to civil liberties, privacy and Internet freedom — all of which would be obviously sullied by involvement in such a scheme.


http://www.salon.com/2011/02/15/palantir/

Firm targeting WikiLeaks cuts ties with HBGary - apologizes to reporter
by Steve Ragan - Feb 11 2011, 01:55

~Snip~

Some of the things mentioned as potential proactive tactics against WikiLeaks include feeding the fuel between the feuding groups, disinformation, creating messages around actions to sabotage or discredit the opposing organization, and submitting fake documents to WikiLeaks and then calling out the error.

“Create concern over the security of the infrastructure. Create exposure stories. If the process is believed to not be secure they are done. Cyber attacks against the infrastructure to get data on document submitters. This would kill the project. Since the servers are now in Sweden and France putting a team together to get access is more straightforward,” the proposal said.

Moreover, reporter Glenn Greenwald, who writes for Salon.com, was singled out in the proposal as a person offering a level of support to WikiLeaks that needed to be disrupted. This disruption would include making Greenwald, and others in similar situations, choose between professional preservation and cause.

Our original coverage on this topic can be viewed here.

On Thursday evening, Dr. Alex Karp sent The Tech Herald a statement on the events and information presented in the story.

“As the Co-Founder and CEO of Palantir Technologies, I have directed the company to sever any and all contacts with HB Gary,” the statement starts...

~Snip~

Full article:

http://www.thetechherald.com/articles/Firm-targeting-WikiLeaks-cuts-ties-with-HBGary-apologizes-to-reporter/12767/