Show Notes

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Shane McMillian yawned and checked the time. It was 2:24 am on May 13th, 2016 and, even though he wasn’t supposed to run another diagnostic scan until 2:30, it was more of a flexible itinerary than a strict schedule.

Let’s give her another go, old buddy, he says out loud to no one. Shane was a lone civilian working the overnight shift for the IT company CrowdStrike. The company protected sensitive government data among other things. He hit a few buttons on his desktop and hit enter.

As the system runs its checks, lines of code flash on the screen. Shane sipped his overly acidic black coffee and blinked his eyes as the smell fumigated his nose. As soon as the coffee hit his lips, Shane almost sent it sprinkler style all over the desktop computer when he checked the screen again.

A big, fat error message appeared in red.

No, this can’t be right, Shane muttered, clicking the computer keys. He ran the test again. He must have hit something during the first test, something that messed it up.

He watched the code flash across the monitor again as his heartbeat wildly against his ribcage. Shane waited in quiet expectation, bouncing his leg.

Red again. Error 2035: unauthorized entry detected.

Someone had hacked into CrowdStrike.

Shane threw his cup of coffee to the side and dove into the system. He needed to know where the attacker gained entry and what they wanted. Hopefully, he could find their trail and cut them off before the system was completely breached.

Shane did an internal sweep and noticed something strange in the software. He followed some slight code abnormalities and found that they kept changing.

Whoever broke in was playing a game of cat and mouse.

They were making Shane look over here while they were actually somewhere else. The hacker evaded every move that Shane made an attempt to lock down the system but the hacker didn’t slow down and hopped between different files. The sweat gathered on Shane’s forehead as he worked, Come on, dammit, he cried in frustration.

It was approaching ten minutes of this game and Shane was getting nowhere. He realized that there was no stopping the hacker, not with his skill and ability. There was no choice left; Shane had to pull the plug and take the server offline.

He pushed back from his chair and started running for the basement. Shane loosened his tie, tossing it off to the side as he looked at the stairs and the elevator. There was no time to wait, and he threw open the dark and dirty stairwell doors, and the lights flickered to life.

Shane hopped the stairs two at a time, the panic inside him growing with each step. He entered the basement, where rows of protected servers sat behind locked cages. The long rows were all sectioned off on the ground by a letter and number combination. He was covered in sweat now, sprinting toward the Democratic National Committee’s server that was now under attack in row S, section 13.

With shaking, sweaty hand, Shane lunged for hit the power button and in a second, the light went dim, and the server was completely offline.

Oh fuck, Shane muttered under his breath. The possible damage done by the hacker started to swirl around his brain, the consequences almost too large for him to grasp. Who had hacked the DNC server and what the hell would they do with the information they stole?

On this episode: Hillz versus The Donald, leaking to Wikileaks and foreign governments hacking our elections.

I’m Keith Korneluk and this is Modem Mischief.

Introduction

You're listening to Modem Mischief. In this series we explore the darkest reaches of the internet. We'll take you into the minds of the world's most notorious hackers and the lives affected by them. We'll also show you places you won't find on Google and what goes on down there. This is the story of Guccifer 2.0

ACT 1

By the end of 2015, the Democratic National Committee should have probably noticed the warning signs and taken action toward protecting their databases and servers.  

Anyone who stepped foot in the White House knew there had been a thousand-fold increase in cyber espionage attacks against the United States. For months before the 2016 election kicked off, our government had known that foreign opposition was knocking on our internet doors.

The Russians and the Chinese, in particular, were basically bum-rushing our government online from every possible angle for month after month without recourse. The public, however, was kept in the dark about these attacks. Minor warning flashes went off but there was no press conference that detailed the cyber-espionage attacks that were happening every day. The government figured that, hey, what the people didn’t know wouldn’t hurt them. 

Oh, how wrong they were…

SFX: cameras clicking, a small crowd

It was June 14th, 2016, when DNC Chairwoman, Debbie Wasserman Schultz, gave a curt press briefing that should have set off alarm bells. She sat at the front of the room behind a podium reserved for the White House Press secretary, addressing the cameras more than the crowd.

With the DNC Convention only a few days away, the tension was rising in Washington. Then candidate Donald Trump had been gaining a ton of attention for the Republican pick and the Democratic bid was a race between former First Lady and Secretary of State Hillary Clinton and Vermont Senator Bernie Sanders.

On May 13th, 2016 the DNC server was hacked, Wasserman Schultz said into a microphone. The DNC has asked CrowdStrike, the FBI, and the CIA to investigate.

At the pause, the room came alive with camera shutter clicks and reporters stuck their arms in the air.

Debbie was under explicit instructions to keep her briefing as short as possible. Less talking meant less attention. And she did not want the hack to gain any more attention than necessary.

The reporters, on the other hand, stared back at her like a school of hungry piranhas. Wasserman-Schultz knew most of them by name. She had been around the Hill long enough now to recognize the usual thorns on the beat.

She pointed to Michael Ramos from the Washington Post.

Ramos stood. Who has the capabilities of hacking into a government-controlled server? He asked.

Schultz resisted a smile. She didn’t even need to pay them to ask the right questions. We’re looking into all possibilities but namely, Russia.

Another flurry of hands and reporters shouting their questions at her. Wasserman-Schultz pointed to Joe Uchill from The Hill.

Joe stood, the question already coming out of his mouth as flurry of voices died down. What’s making you look at Russia? Do you have any evidence that they coordinated the hack?

Debbie rolled her eyes. I can’t speak on an ongoing investigation, Joe.

Joe took his seat and the rest of the reporters sprung to life. For her last question, Debbie pointed to Mel Perkins from the Washington Sun. She rocked on her toes as she spoke. Was anything stolen from the server? Have you or the FBI identified a motive?

Debbie nodded, twisting her face into a concerned frown. Once we’ve done a thorough investigation, we will be able to identify a motive and safeguard our democracy. Until then, the public can rest assured that the government is handling the threat.

The room erupted into another frenzy as the DNC Chairwoman leaned in close to the mic. That’s my time. Thank you. 

Reporters left behind started to get a strange feeling. A feeling like maybe there was something more going on than meets the eye. But before the thought could linger, James Carney, the White House Press Secretary, took the podium and began a briefing of his own.

With the quick briefing came the start of a leak that would cause the entire dam to burst wide open.

The next day, there was no news of the event anywhere. Not a single reporter that attended the briefing from the prior day wrote about the DNC hack.

The news seemed to fly right over the heads of the public with minimal news coverage of the virtual threat. There were no public statements from other government employees and seemed as if the hack would go unreported.

That’s because the real story wasn’t something that people, the public or the reporters, could see if they weren’t looking much deeper. For the answers in this story, they would have to dig all the way to the depths of the dark web.

On a deep hacker message board hosted on Reddit, lost in a long thread about the ethics of hacking, was a message.

The user went by the handle DCLeaks and claimed to have been responsible for the DNC hack. 

The response was from another user by the handle Guccifer2.0. He claimed that he and he alone was responsible for the DNC hack and even posted a government document along with his message.

Over the next few days, Guccifer 2.0 posted a slew of government documents to multiple online platforms and on July 18th, 2021, Joe Uchill from The Hill was the first to run a story about Guccifer 2.0. The article published by The Hill included stolen documents directly from the anonymous source.

With the article in The Hill, the dam had officially burst. Every minute that ticked by was another minute that someone read the article, googled Guccifer 2.0 and read the documents for themselves.

Democrats were sent scrambling. They needed to plug the leak before anything got any bigger. Before information came out that they could take back. Guccifer had officially captured the attention of the public and they were starting to demand answers.

The DNC Convention was looming, and Guccifer was exponentially growing in notoriety. To save the convention, the DNC tried everything they could to shut Guccifer down and limit the spread of the documents that he was posting. But the hacker seemed to be invincible.  

If Guccifer was blocked on one platform, he sprang up on another until he created his own website and Twitter account. On his own website, Guccifer again claimed responsibility for the DNC hack and started posting a flurry of documents to prove it.

Journalists began looking more seriously at the anonymous profile claiming credit for the hack. Who was this Guccifer? What did anyone know about him and his online history? 

It was revealed by a Washington journalist that Guccifer 2.0 was copycat of sorts. The original Guccifer was a Romanian hacker by the name of Marcel Lehel. Back in 2013, Lehel hacked into government officials' email accounts and started blackmailing them.

Lehel was arrested in 2014 by the Romanian government and extradited to the US to face federal charges for his crimes and he was still in jail. Could the original Guccifer and Guccfier 2.0 be connected? By agenda, political ideology, or something else entirely? It was hard for the public to ignore the connection.

After all, it was anyone’s guess who Guccifer 2.0 could be. After bouncing around from platform to platform, it was on Twitter and his own website that Guccifer found a permanent home. He tweeted out documents at random, calling on reporters and journalists to publish the most damning of the documents.  

But it was early in June when Guccifer found that instead of reaching out to the media to post documents, someone had reached out to him.

In Guccifer 2.0’s private messages, Julian Assange, the owner and operator of WikiLeaks, made himself known. WikiLeaks was an uber-popular information source for online sleuths and fierce googlers alike. Anyone familiar with Assange knows that he is always looking for ways to keep himself in the political whistle-blower game.

Guccifer I’m a big fan of your work, Assange wrote. I want to reach out with a proposition.

Guccifer had plenty of time, space, and opportunity for propositions. What’s that? The hacker typed back.

I’d love to post some of the documents on WikiLeaks. Assange’s message read. I think it can help spread your message.

Up until this point, Guccifer was baiting the press to post the stolen documents. Everyone wanted a comment for their article and Guccifer hadn’t been shy. But posting a dump of the DNC’s documents would cause a massive political tectonic shift. If Guccifer took Assange up on his offer, it would mean blasting the Democratic National Convention out of the water and sending Democrats scrambling. He had come this far and was most definitely interested in causing a little anarchy.

I’ll send them on an encrypted drive. Guccifer sent back.

A moment later, another message from Assange came through.

If you have anything particularly damaging to Hillary Clinton… Let’s just say I’d like to share them while the iron is hot. Assange wrote.

Guccifer read the message but didn’t respond. He didn’t need to. The documents he shared would speak for themselves.

One July 22nd, less than 24 hours after the Twitter messages were exchanged, Assange published over 20,000 documents Guccifer had given him to publish on WikiLeaks. The flood of documents was one of the largest cyber-security hacks that our government has ever seen.

All Assange had to do now was sit back and watch the show. One view on the page rolled in and then another. Assange posted the dump to the WikiLeaks twitter and viewers started hopping onto the site by the 20’s 50’s and soon, the 100’s.

Just like that, Guccifer went from being an underground informant to a nationally recognized whistleblower. The public went from being mostly in the dark about the hack to being suddenly confronted by it. Any work that the Democrats had done to contain the hack had instantly come apart. The news was out and there was no more hiding on the part of Dems or for Guccifer.

The Democrats were floored by the data dump and jumped straight into code-red level clean-up. They needed to do damage control and they needed to do it fast.

It began with several Democratic bigwigs attempting to push forward their internal investigation. They wanted the Feds or the CIA to come forward with conclusive evidence that the hacks were carried out by Russia and put the credibility of this rogue hacker down the drain.

Different branches of the government and law enforcement immediately started probing the leaked documents for incriminating evidence or documents that could be deemed a National Security risk, thereby able to force WikiLeaks to remove it. The document sifting would take time and man hours to complete but the team was assembled and began looking over the documents the very same day.

Meanwhile, other Democrat officials took to the internet to stop the spread of the leaked classified documents. Much to their dismay, there wasn’t much the government could do. Institutions had gone up against Assange before, but he played the card of whistle-blower all too well for the government to try and meddle. On this front, the Democrat's hands were tied.

It was much too early for anything to determine what the fallout would be, for the hacker or the government itself.

The entire country watched in quiet horror and anticipation as news of the hack spread, and the story of Guccifer continued to unfold like a train going off its tracks.

ACT 2

 It took a few days with a few employees working over 24 hours straight, but it was determined that in the flood of posted documents, none gave the exact coordinates of where any bodies were buried. Still, several main documents from the massive government data dump would threaten the legitimacy of the Democratic party and the election process itself.

With the Democratic Convention lingering only a day away, the DNC had a massive clean-up on their hands if they wanted to get their campaign back on track.

The first of the damning documents was an email exchange focused on Debbie Wasserman Schultz. Schultz was the DNC Chairwoman at the time of the highlighted correspondence. In the email, Schultz attacked Jeff Weaver, Campaign Manager for Bernie Sanders, calling him an “ass” and a “liar.”

This looked really bad for the DNC, who seemed to favor Clinton’s campaign over Sanders. However disconcerting that discovery was for Democrats, it was easily brushed off in the media after the Republican’s presidential candidate, Donald Trump, was recorded saying, “grab her by the pussy.” To much of the public, Schultz’s statements seemed like a snobby 7th-grade grudge.

SFX: Greg note: Experiment with me saying the “grab her by the pussy” and pulling footage of Trump saying it. Which is more impactful.

If that lone email by Wasserman-Schultz was the only damning evidence, then the entire hack might have been brushed under the rug. Other documents posted though, brought to light additional concerning behavior on the part of Democrats.  

Several other correspondences, involving Schultz again, discussed an attempt to undermine the Sanders campaign since Bernie seemed to be holding his own in early rounds of voting. Three different email threads showed that the DNC was potentially working to undermine the political ground that Sanders was setting.

The first correspondence highlighted Sanders’s faith, saying that the DNC could undermine him by highlighting his alleged atheism, although Sander has repeatedly said he’s Jewish. The hope was to cause a rift between Sanders and his voters. A specific message by a low-level DNC employee noted that calling Sanders out on his faith might make a several-point difference in the polls.

Another email thread contained a second strategy the DNC could employ to sink the Sanders campaign. The idea was to build a narrative that Sanders was inept, disorganized, and an irresponsible choice for President’s office. It seems that the DNC leadership wasn’t feeling the Bern.

Since the emails had originated from the fingers of Dems themselves, these documents did not look good. The public was equal parts shocked, anxious, and enthralled.

The hack was the first time in our history that Americans realized just how technologically vulnerable our government can be, how fragile our political system is, and how easily public images and political agendas could be manipulated.

On July 24th, Democrats frantically tried to spin the story, cover up the solicitous hacking disgrace, and save face for the convention only a day away and the impending presidential campaign. They needed to point the finger at someone. People needed an enemy to blame, someone that would relieve the media pressure and public scrutiny thrust upon them.

On July 25th, the DNC Convention began in center city, Philadelphia. Schultz began the convention by announcing that the FBI, CIA, and CrowdStrike were all investigating the cyber-attack on the DNC’s email server and the leaked confidential documents. Too bad for her, the damage was already done.

Throughout the DNC, Schultz and Clinton publicly stated that they believed Russia Intelligence Agencies were behind the hack and leaked data. The woman asserted that it was impossible for Guccifer alone to hack into their server. Such a layered and complex security system would require a team of hackers to get inside without triggering any of the internal alarms or securities. But unlikely doesn’t mean impossible, a theme that Republicans seemed to latch onto.

Each day of the convention served as a witch-hunt for the illusive online hacker with Democrats all but calling for Guccifer’s head on a stick. As much as the Democrats attempted to take control of the narrative and steer it far away from them, their effort was moot. Guccifer 2.0 had officially claimed the spotlight and nothing the Democrats did could drown him out. Republicans were eager to pull up front-row seats as the Democrats floundered. They were simply waiting for their moment to strike. 

The moment for Republicans would come on day two of the DNC Convention. Both Schultz and Clinton were reinforcing their early claims that Russia was behind the attack, although they needed law enforcement to catch up.

When Trump heard the DNC’s claims that Russia was behind the attack, his entire campaign quickly refuted the allegation. Trump had publicly admired Putin, saying that he seemed like a leader that Trump could negotiate with, among many other soundbites.

As pressure between the two sides began to build, the Kremlin even came forward to personally deny the claims that they had hacked the DNC. The back and forth between Republicans and Democrats soon devolved from a civil political discourse to two toddlers throwing a tantrum and pointing their fingers at one another.

The petty back-and-forth came to a head on June 27th when Trump flat-out confronted Hillary Clinton about a private email server she used as secretary of state in 2013. Trump called on the “so-called Russian hackers” to find the deleted emails off that server because he was sure there was treasonous information.

Before Trump's accusation, no one had ever heard about Clinton’s use of a private email server. The disclosure added another layer of mystery and urgency to this public case. Instead of focusing their attention on the DNC, the attention was put squarely on the shoulders of Hillary Clinton.

Was Trump merely attempting to ramp up the media circus around the Clintons, or was there some other information he was genuinely trying to unearth as part of his campaign strategy? Either way, Trump was playing with fire as he spoke directly to the hacker. Could the two be working together or was the demand more for show?

Republican prodding only served to draw more anger and public attention to the hack. The entire Trump campaign continued screaming that Russians were in no way, shape, or form responsible for the breach. Meanwhile, Democrats starkly opposed that narrative, as official statements from the FBI, CIA, and CrowdStrike were finally released.

All three investigations into the hack conclusively pointed toward Russian Intelligence as the culprit behind the leaked government documents. Democrats were desperate at this point to drown out the voices of Republicans but it would seem that their efforts would be too late. No one was listening to the official reports when the speculation was far more interesting.

The story of Guccifer 2.0 and the DNC hack had taken on a life of its own. There truly ain’t no rest for the wicked as Guccifer continued to work directly with multiple media outlets and release more stolen documents during August, September, and October. It was clear that Guccifer wanted the emails published as far and wide as possible. If the lone hacker’s goal was to create political mayhem, then it was rightfully achieved.

Everyone couldn’t help but wonder, what was Guccifer’s endgame?

While most of the documents leaked were merely bureaucratic bullshit, DNC Chairwoman Wasserman- Schultz resigned after the leaked emails showed her bias toward the Clinton Campaign and disdain for Sanders. Sanders’s supporters were already having a tough time embracing Clinton.

The friction and anxiety of both the public, watching in horror, and the government, battling for the highest office in the land, was coming to a head. The heat created from the finger-pointing, the personal attacks, and name-calling meant the pot was ready to bubble over. Everyone watched with bated breath, waiting expectantly for Guccifer to drop some bomb of an email or crazy audio loop that would crash the government and completely tarnish the election as it stood.

Even with all the publicity that Guccifer was getting people had a hard time believing that a lone civilian, in his mom’s basement, was really responsible for a crime this significant. How was one single man able to shake the foundation of an entire government without pulling a trigger? And, most importantly, who was this person, and what was the government’s plan to stop him?

The primaries flew by in a blur with Clinton and Trump listed on the final ticket as November quickly approached. Just when everyone expected one last explosion of documents from Guccifer 2.0, a man who had been both praised and demonized, all was quiet on the net.

Trump was voted in as President of the United States in November 2016. The public waited to see what Guccifer might have to say about that, since it seemed as though Trump remained an ally instead of a target during Guccifer’s cyber-raids.

Everyone waited. And waited. And just when the world thought that Guccifer couldn’t be more prolific… the hacker disappeared.

After the presidential campaigns were over and President Trump took office, Guccifer apparated back into his faceless, shapeless form as nothing more than a ghost.

After Trump was voted into office, the Republicans all but dropped the case of Guccifer and the Russians. Then-President Trump didn’t entertain any further investigations and actively shut down multiple requests to have the hack more thoroughly investigated.

Everyone was left to wonder, who was Guccifer 2.0? Was he merely a pawn in a larger government conspiracy, or was he trying to expose corruption to balance the scales of power? It was clear that Guccifer had chosen a side in American politics, a side that was willing to ignore his transgressions as long as it furthered their own agenda.  

Even though Guccifer was gone, questions and speculations continued to swirl around the Republican party and the length of their involvement with the cyber-criminal. Trump repeatedly denied any involvement in the hack and made it clear he wouldn’t be devoting government resources to investigating it.

As much as the Trump campaign fought to put Guccifer 2.0 and the hack behind them, the Democrats refused to let the issue rest. Unbeknownst to Trump, something big was brewing behind closed doors that would threaten his entire campaign and the legitimacy of his election to the oval office.

ACT 3

 The FBI, CIA, and CrowdStrike had all conducted their own, independent investigations into the DNC hack, and all found Russia to be at the center of it. The question remained, though, how did Guccifer fit in?

Could he be a rogue American government employee set on dismantling the political system from the inside out? Was he a Russian hacker turned spy or was Guccifer 2.0 something else entirely?

The infamous hacker dropped a bomb on the American political system and swiftly disappeared after the election. While the media cycle has a short attention span, the public wasn’t just about to disregard the hack and the implications it could have on other parts of the political system.

The Democrats claimed that Republicans were colluding with the Russians in an attempt to harm the Democrat’s campaign and further the Republican agenda. For weeks and then months after the 2016 election Nancy Pelosi, Hillary Clinton, and other Washington politicians called for a deeper formal investigation into the hack. The goal was to illuminate the identity of Guccifer 2.0 and determine the extent of potential collusion between Russia, Guccifer 2.0, and the Republican party.

If the President wouldn’t take action and investigate the hack, Democrats would maneuver around him.

On May 17th, 2017, Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein decided to put an end to the rumors and speculation by appointing a Special Counsel Investigation into the DNC server hack. Rosenstein asked former FBI Director Robert Mueller to head the investigation. Mueller was charged with determining the extent of Russian interference in the 2016 election, unearth possible American collusion with the Russian government, and find the person claiming to be Guccifer 2.0.

With Trump parading his own narrative, Meuller truly had his hands full. In addition to managing the public opinion of the case, the investigation itself was a fucking mammoth of a thing for one man to lead. Not only did Meuller look through tons of evidence from the FBI that pointed to Guccifer 2.0 being a Russian agent, but he also had to interview all of Trump’s staff, thoroughly investigate their backgrounds, friends, and foreign connections, and more.

Mueller started his investigation at the very beginning, with the CrowdStrike hack on May 13th, 2016, and began piecing apart the timeline in an effort to confirm or deny Guccifer’s alleged identity.

During his prolific postings, Guccifer claimed that he had no sides in the American political landscape. He contended that he was a Romanian man who simply wanted to balance power between governments and their people.

Guccifer also made it clear that he hated when his work was attributed to the Russian government. Yet, even as Guccifer tried to pose himself in the middle of the scales of power and having no real side or interest in politics, the evidence Meuller uncovered started pointing to a different story.

During an online exchange with Guccifer posted by the media outlet Vice, Meuller found that Guccifer did not speak in fluent Romanian. Meuller determined that it was more likely that the person acting as Guccifer was, in fact, Russian pretending to be Romania.

To that effect, at some point during Guccifer’s slower posting season, his WordPress website seemed to switch hands. Overnight, Guccifer went from a person who couldn’t tell the difference between the different spellings of there, their, and they’re and began using phrases like “foreign actors” and “I made some conclusions.”

Meuller concluded that it was likely Guccifer’s website was being run by a team of Russian agents. Whoever was originally assigned to post on the website was probably kicked off the account and an Agent with better English took it over. This conclusion was drawn since it seemed unlikely to Meuller that Guccifer could improve his English that dramatically in less than 20 hours.

Trump continued to starkly defend the Russians which raised red flags with Meuller’s investigation. Meuller and many Americans started to wonder, was there another agenda at play here?

As Meuller methodically went through the meek evidence he was presented, cracks began to emerge in the cement wall that was erected around then-President Trump.

The first person to enter the hot seat of speculation was Roger Stone. Stone is a long-time friend of Trump and a man with Richard Nixon’s portrait tattooed on his back. Seriously, Google it. The FBI approached Stone as part of the Special Counsel investigation. They wanted to know if he had contact with any Russians at all, ever.

Stone adamantly denied having anything to do with Russia, repeatedly attesting his innocence. A few months and many hours of internet digging later, it was brought to light that Stone had lied. Twitter records showed that Stone was involved with the Russians when he had a private Twitter conversation with Guccifer.

Stone’s initial message went straight to Guccifer 2.0 and said, keep up the great work!

Guccifer saw the message and typed back, I’m a big fan of your work Mr. Stone. Please tell me if I can help you anyhow.

You can retweet that the election is rigged against Trump! Stone replied.

Guccifer’s message came in only a minute later and contained one word: done.

Sure enough, two short weeks later, Guccifer did, in fact, tweet about how the election was rigged against Trump at the height of political tensions.

With the entire public (and now political and criminal) eye on him, Stone began spewing his own version of events like a broken record, saying that he didn’t know that Guccifer was related to Russia at the time and that he thought the contact was merely with a Trump supporter.

Stone was the first from Trump’s circle to appear on the chopping block, but he certainly wouldn’t be the last. As Meuller continued his Special Investigation, he battled against Trump at nearly every turn.

You see, President Trump didn’t like the idea of an investigation happening out of his realm of control. He was so insistent that Russia wasn’t behind the hack that he put forward his own unsubstantiated theory. Trump began claiming that the hack was a hoax created by the Democrats to try and entrap the Republican party. To fuel Trump’s own claim, he created a team to investigate it.

The team was led by Peter W. Smith, a wealthy investment banker and a long-time Republican eager to expose democrats for the dirty criminals they are. In September of 2016, Smith gathered a team to search for Clinton’s alleged private email server and expose Democrats as the driver of the hack.

The investigative team Smith put together included Charles Johnson, the CTO of Business Insider Media, Pax Dickinson, an alt-right activist, and Royal O’Brien, a self-proclaimed dark web expert.

The team began communicating with several groups of hackers, all claiming to have access to the contents of Clinton’s private email server. Two of the five groups were Russian, and Guccifer 2.0 was allegedly among them. Simultaneously, the team began digging into possible suspects for the handle Guccifer.

As the team worked to identify who had the information they were looking for, Smith was found dead in a hotel room at 61 years old. In a suicide note, he made it clear that this was a decision he had made himself and not a part of any government conspiracy plot. With Smith’s death sending waves of anxiety through the Republican ranks, the investigative team disbanded.

Trump and just about every staffer allowed near a mic parroted the same phrase: there was no collusion with Russia. 

It felt like political brainwashing while the investigation was slowly gathering evidence that starkly opposed the Republican’s narrative. As Trump attempted to maintain the facade of control, the people he trusted the most were falling around him.

First, George Papadopoulos, a campaign advisor to Trump was arrested for making false statements to the FBI in regards to his contact with Russian government officials.

Next, Paul Manafort, Trump’s campaign chairman was indicted on a total of 25 different counts by Mueller’s team. The main reason for the indictments was Manafort’s collusion with Russian spies and lying to Federal Investigators.

Then there was Rick Gates, Trump’s business partner. Gates worked closely with Manafort and was indicted on similar charges as his peer.

Next to fall was Michael Flynn, Trump’s National Security Advisor who repeatedly lied to the FBI regarding his involvement with Russia and pled guilty to the charges.

Then indictments surfaced for Konstantin Kilimnik, a Trump campaign aid and long-time business associate of Manafort and Gates. During the Special investigation, Kilimnik was based in Russia and charged alongside Manafort with attempting to obstruct justice by tampering with witnesses.

Finally, Michael Cohen, Trump’s personal lawyer, was indicted over his connections to Russian officials and lying to the Feds about his connections in Moscow. Cohen was directed to actively work alongside Russian officials to build a new Trump Tower in Moscow which he hid from investigators among other inconsistencies.

All the conspirators were either fired by Trump in an attempt to remain “clean,” or they quit once they were notified that they were under investigation. Most of the men indicted pled their innocence as they were whisked off to jail.

The investigation into Russia’s cyber-hack was concluded on March 22, 2019. The report found that it was, in fact, Russia that was behind the hack and release of thousands of classified documents to the public.

In addition to the Trump staff on the indictment, Meuller also released the names of 13 Russian GRU officers for tampering with the 2016 election.

Where there is smoke there is fire and Republicans were certainly setting the political stage ablaze. Government officials began spinning out, speculating who the next person to fall might be. Wondering anxiously if any of the men indicted by Meuller could actually be Guccifer 2.0 himself?

ACT 4

The Meuller investigation ended without an indictment against Guccifer. The report concluded that even though Trump’s campaign obviously welcomed Russian interference in the 2016 election, there wasn’t enough evidence to bring conspiracy charges against Trump or his associates.

Even though Meuller didn’t feel there was enough information to prosecute Trump himself for Obstruction of Justice or collusion with the Russian government, he let Congress decide whether they wanted to investigate the matter further. Congress quickly declined.

Trump went on to pardon all the staff that Meuller listed in his indictment. The ones who were put in jail for their crimes against the country were released, and their records expunged.

The Democrats made a public apology to Bernie Sanders and his entire campaign. They took their loss on the chin and were sent back to their corner of the ring with their tails tucked between their legs. They handled the hack, the leak, and the aftermath poorly. Two Democrats themselves came forward after the election, saying that the Democratic Primary was rigged. They both quickly backtracked on their stances, but the questions can’t be unasked, and their statements unsaid.

Robert Meuller resigned a few days after the case was concluded. He wanted to make it clear that there was, without a doubt, interference in the 2016 election. That the hacking of our government should have everyone’s attention. But there was a larger takeaway than corrupt political officials.

The investigation made the public painfully aware that as we sleep and eat, there are undoubtedly foreign spies on our soil. Not marching around in spy uniforms or pretending to be the All-American family next door. No, these spies take on a faceless shape existing only in code names and a series of digits. They sit in the corner, cloaked in darkness, waiting. Waiting to wade through every call, text, email, and note you have saved on your laptop or even on your phone. These kinds of spies are looking to infiltrate our democracy, influence American political outcomes, and shake our entire nation to its core. You don’t have to look far to find them. Some of them are hiding in plain sight. Wreaking havoc on social media, masquerading as concerned citizens. Others are more sinister.

As for Guccifer 2.0 today, he remains unknown and inactive. A ghost on the internet that will forever remain a fossil and figure of mystery. 

I’m Keith Korneluk and you’re listening to Modem Mischief.

Credits

Thanks for listening to Modem Mischief. Don’t forget to hit the subscribe or follow button in your podcast app right now so you don’t miss an episode. This show is an independent production and is wholly supported by you, our listeners and the best way to support the show is to share it. Tell your friends, your enemies, DM an ex-lover on the ‘gram. And another way to support us is on Patreon. For as little as $5 a month you’ll receive an ad-free version of the show plus monthly bonus episodes exclusive to subscribers. Modem Mischief is brought to you by Mad Dragon Productions and is created, produced and hosted by me: Keith Korneluk. This episode is written and researched by Dmytryk Carreno. Mixed and mastered by Greg Bernhard aka that Bitchin’ Bearded Bear. The theme song “You Are Digital '' is composed by Computerbandit. Sources for this episode are available on our website at modemmischief.com. And don’t forget to follow us on social media at @modemmischief. Thanks for listening!