Posted on 07/22/2014 3:10:50 PM PDT by kristinn
Washington, DC – Despite early refusals to make available IT professionals who worked on Lois Lerner’s computer, Ways and Means Committee investigators have now learned from interviews that the hard drive of former IRS Exempt Organizations Director Lois Lerner was “scratched,” but data was recoverable. In fact, in-house professionals at the IRS recommended the Agency seek outside assistance in recovering the data. That information conflicts with a July 18, 2014 court filing by the Agency, which stated the data on the hard drive was unrecoverable – including multiple years’ worth of missing emails.
“It is unbelievable that we cannot get a simple, straight answer from the IRS about this hard drive,” said Ways and Means Committee Chairman Dave Camp (R-MI). “The Committee was told no data was recoverable and the physical drive was recycled and potentially shredded. To now learn that the hard drive was only scratched, yet the IRS refused to utilize outside experts to recover the data, raises more questions about potential criminal wrong doing at the IRS.”
It is also unknown whether the scratch was accidental or deliberate, but former federal law enforcement and Department of Defense forensic experts consulted by the Committee say that most of the data on a scratched drive, such as Lerner’s, should have been recoverable. However, in a declaration filed last Friday by the IRS, the agency said it tried but failed to recover the data, but is not sure what happened to the hard drive afterwards other than saying they believe it was recycled, which, according to the court filing means “shredded.”
Further complicating the situation, the Committee’s investigation has revealed evidence that this declaration may not be accurate. A review of internal IRS IT tracking system documents revealed that Lerner’s computer was actually once described as “recovered.” In a transcribed interview on July 18, IRS IT employees were unable to confirm the accuracy of the documents or the meaning of the entry “recovered.”
“It is these constant delays and late revelations that have forced this investigation to go on so long,” Camp added. “If the IRS would just come clean and tell Congress and the American people what really happened, we could put an end to this. Our investigators will not stop until we find the full truth.”
Background:
After the Supreme Court released its January 2010 decision in Citizens United, the IRS spent three years responding to Democrat complaints and calls to stop activities of conservative groups. The IRS in Washington, DC took these complaints as marching orders to subject Americans to harassment for their beliefs by subjecting applicants to extraordinary delay and inappropriate questions, audits, and by making their confidential tax information public.
At a May 10, 2013 legal event, Lerner admitted that the IRS had targeted conservative groups for extra scrutiny based on their names and policy positions. Initially, President Obama vowed to work with Congress to “get this thing fixed.” Likewise, upon assuming leadership of the agency, IRS Commissioner Koskinen said his goal was to “find problems quickly, fix them promptly, make sure they stay fixed, and be transparent about the entire process.” Unfortunately, the Administration’s professed eagerness to help Congress investigate the targeting quickly waned and it began obstructing the Committee’s investigation.
The most egregious recent example is the delay in notifying Congress of Lerner’s lost emails. On June 13, 2014, over 13 months into the investigation, and one month after the Committee was promised it would receive all Lerner emails without qualification, Congress learned that potentially thousands of Lerner emails were destroyed by the IRS. The IRS purportedly notified Congress in a letter sent to provide an update on the pace of production. Buried in the third attachment of the 27-page letter was the revelation that over two years’ worth of Lerner’s emails to and from individuals outside the IRS were lost due to an apparent computer crash that occurred in mid-2011. In later correspondence with the Committee, Treasury and the White House admitted learning of the lost emails in April 2014, two months before the IRS informed Congress.
The Committee immediately began investigating the matter. On the following Monday, the IRS’ Deputy CIO told staff that the agency was unable to retrieve information from Lerner’s malfunctioning hard drive, even after sending it to experts at the IRS’s Criminal Investigations unit. When pressed by investigators about any other computer issues, the IRS admitted that six other IRS employees involved in the political targeting also experienced computer crashes.
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The system and political elites and their media that run it are corrupt. They are not held accountable but we are.
I believe that a sense of panic is growing within the administration and wise members of that administration are planning for their exits with whatever respect that they can salvage. These scandals have been devastating.
Partly disassemble drive, scratch disk, reassemble. Simple really.
THE DATA IS NOT STORED ON THEIR LOCAL HARD DRIVE.
It is stored on a server that gets backed up daily. And that server has at least one or more backup servers as well. In other words they are replicated in more than one location. The reason for this is for catastrophic events like hurricanes or fire.
Now, why won't anyone ask the question:
"What would happen if a computer was lost in a fire, flood, stolen or any other event?"
I've been in IT for 30 years and have lots of experience with data recovery and networking. Simply put, they are ALL lying and covering for their king. They should all be in prison by now.
You didn’t read my post.
Since you’ve been in IT for 30 years, perhaps you can answer my question:
Hard drives DO store valuable information. Sensitive information. And I’m not talking e-mails. Sensitive memos. Spreadsheets. etc
If someone as important as the Director of the IRS had a crashed hard drive, wouldn’t you expect that the cost would be justified to recover that information?
The Director of the IRS would be expected to have sensitive information on her computer that SHOULDN’T be backed up to a server.
Why wasn’t any data recovery done on her hard drive?
I know a great deal about hard drive infrastructure. There is no way to scratch one without not only removing it from the chassis but you must then cotort around the protective casing.
“scratched” as in repeatedly hit with a hammer and stabbed with an icepick.
We were required by law to keep things depending on what they were any where from 1 week to perpetuity. Most of the Gov't stuff was a minimum of 7 years. My point is, I am not sure what sort of tech they are using. But I can virtually(pardon the pun), guarantee, there are backups, somewhere.
**Lois “Marcy” Lerner.
My wager is 08/23/14 @ 10:30AM with the tie breaker being the clock. Any takers?**
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Ahh, the good ol’ days, when the unwanted just turned up on a park bench...
And Chandra Levey just jogged for health reasons.
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