IRS Workers 'Accidentally' Erased Backups of Lois Lerner's Emails

[AuH20]

Wut?

http://apnews.myway.com/article/20150625/us--irs-lost_emails-47ff44b9ff.html


WASHINGTON (AP) — Investigators are blaming mistakes by IRS employees — not a criminal conspiracy — for the loss of thousands of emails related to the tax agency's tea party scandal.

IRS workers erased 422 computer backup tapes that "most likely" contained as many as 24,000 emails to and from former IRS official Lois Lerner, who has emerged as a central figure in congressional investigations, according to IRS's inspector general.

The workers erased the tapes a month after IRS officials discovered that an untold number of Lerner's emails were lost. The IG says the workers were unaware of a year-old directive not to destroy email backup tapes.

[thoughtomator]

amazing how desperately suicidal a backup tape can be when you really need it

[asurfaholic]

Oh, they made a mistake. I see, well ok then , have a nice day.

[phill4paul]

I accidentally didn't file.

[ZENemy]

I accidentally didn't file.

I accidentally lost all my records for the last 10 years.

Ive been doing IT for 10 years, I have never ever, ever, ever, ever deleted a back up and if I did I would not be employed in IT anymore.

[timosman]

I accidentally lost all my records for the last 10 years.

Ive been doing IT for 10 years, I have never ever, ever, ever, ever deleted a back up and if I did I would not be employed in IT anymore.

The government really takes incompetence to a new level. Why not ask NSA for the copies ? They supposedly have everything.

[phill4paul]

I accidentally lost all my records for the last 10 years.

Ive been doing IT for 10 years, I have never ever, ever, ever, ever deleted a back up and if I did I would not be employed in IT anymore.

"We just got the new hires where do you want them."
"What are their backgrounds?"
"Tax law."
"Put them in IT."

[ZENemy]

"We just got the new hires where do you want them."
"What are their backgrounds?"
"Tax law."
"Put them in IT."

lol


https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iDbyYGrswtg

[kpitcher]

Who was fired over this? If not the actual idiots who deleted the files then at least the supervisor(s) responsible for them should have been canned. (I know it's probably not even a slap on the wrist)

Was the directive an actual law or just internal policy?

[muh_roads]

The NSA should have a backup copy.

[Ronin Truth]

BULLSHIT!

[mello]

I wonder if anyone is keeping a chronological list of every time the government has "accidentally" destroyed or misplaced damning material that would hurt/embarrass the government? I do not believe for a second that it was an accident. My dream is that find out who ordered the deletion and have him/or sent to prison.

[Brian4Liberty]

Lois Lerner’s Hard Drive Was SHREDDED (http://dailycaller.com/2015/06/25/lois-lerners-hard-drive-failed-due-to-an-impact-irs-stopped-technician-from-retrieving-lerners-emails/)
By Patrick Howley - 06/25/2015


Former Internal Revenue Service official Lois Lerner’s hard drive most likely crashed due to “an impact of some sort,” like somebody hitting it or smashing it, according to new congressional testimony.

Then the hard drive was shredded and its pieces were sold for scrap.

Lerner’s laptop, which crashed on June 11, 2011 between 5 and 7 PM, was sent to an IT technician two days later. The Hewlett-Packard technician looking at her laptop determined that the hard drive failed because of an impact of some sort.

“When asked about the possible cause of the hard drive failure, the HP technician opined that heat-related failures are not seen often, and based on the information provided to him, the hard drive more than likely crashed due to an impact of some sort,” according to testimony from the Treasury Inspector general’s investigation of the hard drive, which was submitted today to the House Committee On Oversight and Government Reform. “However, because the HP technician did not examine the hard drive as part of his work on the laptop, it could not be determined why it crashed.”

The hard drive was later shredded, according to testimony.
...
Meanwhile, the IRS Criminal Investigation Division reported that it could have retrieved the data from Lerner’s hard drive, but IRS management told investigators that such an effort “was not worth the expense.”
...
The IRS is in possession of thousands of Lerner emails discovered recently at a storage facility in West Virginia, but refuses to turn the emails over the Oversight Committee.

The IRS claims that it is still trying to “de-duplicate” the emails so that Oversight won’t have to sort through multiple copies of the same emails. The IRS claims that “de-duplicating” Lerner’s emails could take a long time.
...
More: http://dailycaller.com/2015/06/25/lois-lerners-hard-drive-failed-due-to-an-impact-irs-stopped-technician-from-retrieving-lerners-emails/

[moostraks]

BULLSHIT!

Deserves repeating...they could be a bit more creative with their excuses rather than acting like a 5 year old with their hand in the cookie jar. :mad:

[timosman]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=L4YfKIDBgQM

[Texan4Life]

BULLSHIT!

yep

It is so obvious that they intentionally destroyed evidence its ridiculous.

[timosman]

yep

It is so obvious that they intentionally destroyed evidence its ridiculous.

As long as they do not admit any wrongdoing people will believe them, no matter how ridiculous their excuses sound.

[Occam's Banana]

Lois Lerner’s Hard Drive Was SHREDDED (http://dailycaller.com/2015/06/25/lois-lerners-hard-drive-failed-due-to-an-impact-irs-stopped-technician-from-retrieving-lerners-emails/)
By Patrick Howley - 06/25/2015


[...] The IRS is in possession of thousands of Lerner emails discovered recently at a storage facility in West Virginia, but refuses to turn the emails over the Oversight Committee.

The IRS claims that it is still trying to “de-duplicate” the emails so that Oversight won’t have to sort through multiple copies of the same emails. The IRS claims that “de-duplicating” Lerner’s emails could take a long time.

:rolleyes: Anyone competent in Perl could quickly & easily whip up a custom script to sort out duplicate emails in no time.

It's sorta what computers (and Perl) do best ...

My only question is: what bullshit excuse are they going to trot out after this "de-duplicate" nonsense runs its course?

My money is on Chinese or Russian hackers breaking in and deleting the emails after they've been "de-duplicated" ...

Seriously, though - in reality, I have absolutely no doubt that what they are actually doing is sorting through the emails to get rid of the most damning evidence. That's something that a computer script can't do. It would have to be done "by hand" - and it really would take a lot of time to do it for thousands of emails. This "de-duplication" bullshit is just cover for that ...

[Brian4Liberty]

:rolleyes: Anyone competent in Perl could quickly & easily whip up a custom script to sort out duplicate emails in no time.

It's sorta what computers (and Perl) do best ...

My only question is: what bullshit excuse are they going to trot out after this "de-duplicate" nonsense runs its course?

My money is on Chinese or Russian hackers breaking in and deleting the emails after they've been "de-duplicated" ...

Seriously, though - in reality, I have absolutely no doubt that what they are actually doing is sorting through the emails to get rid of the most damning evidence. That's something that a computer script can't do. It would have to be done "by hand" - and it really would take a lot of time to do it for thousands of emails. This "de-duplication" bullshit is just cover for that ...

You are probably right.

Good old Perl. Merge/purge....

[kpitcher]

Maybe the IRS is waiting to hire the Clinton staffers that have valuable experience in sorting through emails

[Dr.3D]

"Not even a smidgen of corruption"

[timosman]

You are probably right.

Good old Perl. Merge/purge....

Perl is an overkill for this. A recipe using formail(part of procmail) was posted in 2004:

http://www.realgeek.com/forums/removing-duplicate-emails-389293.html

[Ronin Truth]

Is the cover up always more incompetent than the crime, or is it just more insulting?

Actually my dog ate the Email backups. :rolleyes:

[Warrior_of_Freedom]

Is the cover up always more incompetent than the crime, or is it just more insulting?

Actually my dog ate the Email backups. :rolleyes:

Let's see you explain to the IRS your dog ate your tax return