Besides exclusively using a secret email account to conduct official government business, it’s likely that Hillary Clinton also used unauthorized electronic equipment—an iPad and an iPhone—as Secretary of State after being warned not to, a veteran State Department official told Judicial Watch this week.
On at least half a dozen occasions Clinton’s top aides asked the State Department’s Office of Security Technology to approve the use of an iPad and iPhone, according to JW’s inside source. Each time the request was rejected for security reasons, the source confirms. The only mobile device that meets the agency’s security standards is the BlackBerry, JW’s source said, adding that the Office of Security Technology—Bureau of Diplomatic Security’s Directorate of Countermeasures must approve all equipment such as cameras, phones and communication devices for all officials.
Evidently set on using the popular Apple devices, Clinton repeatedly challenged the ban and asked management in the Office of Security Technology to allow their use. The executive secretariat responsible for all communications and information technology always rejected the requests, JW’s source affirms. “From day one Hillary was trying to get the iPhone and the iPad approved,” the State Department official told JW. “She kept trying and trying to get us to approve the iPhone and the iPad, but we wouldn’t do it. Technology security experts tested the iPhone and the iPad several times because she constantly wanted them approved, but it never happened.”
The longtime State Department employee reveals that it’s common knowledge among government security tech experts that Apple devices don’t meet strict security standards so agency insiders were puzzled that the Secretary of State was hell-bent on using them. “There was a lot of head-scratching,” JW’s source revealed. Every State Department employee goes through a rigorous security training that includes strict warnings about using non approved equipment or personal email like Clinton did throughout her tenure as the president’s chief foreign affairs officer, the agency insider said.
Clinton’s persistent efforts to persuade the State Department’s technology security experts to approve the use of her favorite Apple devices led those in the division to conclude that she did in fact go through with it. “My guess is she did it and wanted approval after the fact,” JW’s source said. “But no waivers were ever issued.” JW reached out to the State Department for a comment on this latest potential scandal surrounding its former leader, but failed to get a response.
In the meantime, JW has launched a full-scale investigation into Clinton’s secret email system and has filed a number of Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) requests that will likely end up being litigated in federal court. Prior to the email scandal JW already had nearly a dozen active lawsuits in federal court that could be affected by Clinton and her staff’s use of secret email accounts to conduct official government business. Among them is a public-records request for communications between the former Secretary of State and her Chief of Staff, Huma Abedin with Nagla Mahmoud, wife of ousted Egyptian President Mohammad Morsi.
