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The following is the seventh in a series of excerpts from my New York Times bestseller “Stonewalled,” which recounts the government intrusions of my computers. More excerpts to follow.[hr]

Number One has firsthand experience in covert government surveillance. “Reporters used to be off-limits,” he opines. “Even when we had a court order on a bad guy, if a reporter even lived anywhere in the vicinity, we stayed away. You just didn’t go near journalists. It was sacrosanct. Obviously, that’s changed.”

Read excerpt #1 here: The Computer Intrusions: Up at Night

Read excerpt #2 here: Big Brother: First Warnings

Read excerpt #3 here: The Computer Intrusions: Disappearing Act

Read excerpt #4 here: The Incredible, Elusive "Verizon Man"

Read excerpt #5 here: I Spy: The Government's Secrets

Read excerpt #6 here: The Computer Intrusions: The Discovery [hr]

Support the Attkisson v. DOJ/FBI Fourth Amendment Litigation Fund to fight the government computer intrusions[hr]

The following is the sixth in a series of excerpts from my New York Times bestseller “Stonewalled,” which recounts the government intrusions of my computers. More excerpts to follow.[hr]

[hr]To be continued…

[hr]Support the Attkisson v. DOJ/FBI Fourth Amendment Litigation Fund to fight the government computer intrusions[hr]

The following is the fourth in a series of excerpts from my New York Times bestseller “Stonewalled,” which recounts the government intrusions of my computers. More excerpts to follow.[hr]

A diverse group of Constitutional free press and privacy advocates is supporting Attkisson v. Dept. of Justice/FBI to fight the government computer intrusions. Click here to support.[hr]

To be continued…[hr]

The following is the third in a series of excerpts from my New York Times bestseller "Stonewalled," which recounts the government intrusions of my computers. More excerpts to follow.[hr]

| DISAPPEARING ACT

In late December 2012, I take up my friend’s offer to have my computer examined by an inside professional. Arrangements are made for a meeting.
In the meantime, Jeff wants to check out the exterior of my home. To examine the outside connections for the Verizon FiOS line and see if anything looks out of order.
“If you’re being tapped, it’s probably not originating at your house, but I’d like to take a look anyway,” he says.[hr]

Read excerpt #1 here: The Computer Intrusions: Up at Night

Read excerpt #2 here: Big Brother: First Warnings [hr]
“Sure, why not.” I don’t think he’ll find anything but there’s no harm in having him look. Maybe I should be more concerned. What if the government is watching me? What if they’re trying to find out who my sources are and what I may be about to report next?

“I did find some irregularities,” Jeff tells me on the phone after in- specting the outside of my home. “It could be nothing, but I’d rather discuss it in person.” We meet at my house and he walks me to a spot in the backyard just outside my garage. His primary concern is a stray cable dangling from the FiOS box attached to the brick wall on the outside of my house. It doesn’t belong.
“What is it?” I ask.
He picks up the loose end and untwists a cap exposing a tiny glass dome underneath. “It’s an extra fiber optics line,” he tells me. “In ad- dition to your regular line.”
“What’s it for?”
“I’m not an expert, but someone could remove the cap and attach a receiver and download data. Or they could put a tiny transmitter here,” he points to a place under the cap, “and send information to a receiver off site once a day, once a week, or whenever. You need to have this checked out.”
I photograph the cable and decide to begin by asking Verizon reps if they installed the extra line for some unknown reason. For the mo- ment, I’m operating under the assumption that the company will be able to explain everything. So on New Year’s Eve 2012, I place the call to Verizon and describe the mystery cable.[hr]

A diverse group of Constitutional free press and privacy advocates is supporting Attkisson v. Dept. of Justice/FBI to fight the government computer intrusions. Click here to support.[hr]

“Can you tell me if this is something you installed?” I ask. I tell the representative that Verizon has made repeated troubleshooting visits to my house in the past year. Maybe a spare line got left behind.
The Verizon rep puts me on hold for long periods as she contacts one department, then another in hopes of answering my question. Fi- nally, she tells me authoritatively: “That’s nothing that we would have installed or left there. You need to contact law enforcement.”
“Can I email you a photograph and have your technicians look to be sure?” I ask.
I’m not convinced it’s time to call the cops. What would they do, anyway, other than tell me that they don’t know why the cable is there and recommend that I call Verizon? My husband, a former law enforcement official, agrees. Besides, in the unlikely event that there’s a legal tap on my phone, neither Verizon nor the police would tell me.
But the Verizon rep won’t let me send the photo for technicians to review. She insists they have no process that allows a customer to email a picture. For the moment, I give up. We’ll wait until the holi- days are over and get some advice on what we should do.[hr]

Support the Attkisson v. DOJ/FBI Fourth Amendment Litigation Fund to fight the government computer intrusions

[hr]An hour later, my phone rings. A woman identifying herself as a Verizon supervisor says she’s following up on my call and wants to dispatch a technician to my house the next day to take a look. That’s New Year’s Day. I find that unnecessary and somewhat surprising. It’s not always easy to get a service call scheduled quickly, let alone on a holiday when I didn’t even ask for one.
“You don’t have to send anybody out on New Year’s Day,” I tell the supervisor. “Why don’t you let me just email this photograph and you might be able to save yourself the trouble. Maybe it’s just a piece of equipment your technicians installed or left here. Can’t someone look at the picture and see if they can tell?”
“No,” she insists. “We’ll just send a technician out tomorrow.”
I report this to Jeff, who also finds it curious that Verizon would rush out a technician, unsolicited, on New Year’s Day.
“Mind if I come by when he arrives?” he asks.
“That would be great.”
So I begin the first day of 2013 by answering a knock on the door.
The Verizon technician introduces himself and hands me a business card with his first name and phone number handwritten on it.

[hr] To be continued...[hr]

A diverse group of Constitutional free press and privacy advocates is supporting Attkisson v. Dept. of Justice/FBI to fight the government computer intrusions. Click here to support.[hr]

The following is the second in a series of excerpts from my New York Times bestseller "Stonewalled," which recounts the government intrusions of my computers. More excerpts to follow.[hr]

| FIRST WARNINGS

Months before the rest of the world becomes aware of the government’s so-called snooping scandal I already know it’s happening to me.
Snooping scandal.[hr]Read excerpt #1 here: The Computer Intrusions: Up at Night[hr]
As serious as the implications are, the media manages to give it
a catchy little name. Not so much intruding, trespassing, invading, or spying. Snooping. You know, like a boyfriend snoops around on his girlfriend’s Facebook account. Or kids snoop through the closets for Christmas packages. It’s like dubbing HealthCare.gov’s disastrous launch a “glitch.”
In the fall of 2012, Jeff (not his real name), a well-informed acquaintance, is the first to put me on alert. He’s connected to a three-letter agency. He waves me down when he sees me on a public street.
“I’ve been reading your reports online about Benghazi,” he tells me. “It’s pretty incredible. Keep at it. But you’d better watch out.”
I take that as the sort of general remark people often make in jest based on the kind of reporting I do. As in: You’d better watch out for Enron, they have powerful connections. You’d better watch out for the pharmaceutical companies, they have billions of dollars at stake. You’d better watch out for Obama’s Chicago mafia. I hear it all the time.
But Jeff means something more specific.[hr]

A diverse group of Constitutional free press and privacy advocates is supporting Attkisson v. Dept. of Justice/FBI to fight the government computer intrusions. Click here to support.

[hr]“You know, the administration is likely monitoring you—based on your reporting. I’m sure you realize that.” He makes deep eye contact for emphasis before adding, “The average American would be shocked at the extent to which this administration is conducting surveillance on private citizens. Spying on them.” In these pre–NSA snooping scandal, pre–Edward Snowden days, it sounds far-fetched. In just a few months, it will sound uncannily prescient.
“Monitoring me—in what way?” I ask.
“Your phones. Your computers. Have you noticed any unusual happenings?”
Yeah, I have. Jeff’s warning sheds new light on all the trouble I’ve been having with my phones and computers. It’s gotten markedly worse over the past year. In fact, by November 2012, there are so many disruptions on my home phone line, I often can’t use it. I call home from my mobile phone and it rings on my end, but not at the house. Or it rings at home once but when my husband or daughter answers, they just hear a dial tone. At the same time, on my end, it keeps ringing and then connects somewhere, just not at my house. Sometimes, when my call connects to that mystery-place-that’s-not- my-house, I hear an electronic sounding buzz. Verizon can’t explain the sounds or the behavior. These strange things happen whether I call from my mobile phones or use my office landlines. It happens to other people who try to call my house, too. When a call does manage to get through, it may disconnect in mid-conversation. Sometimes we hear other voices bleed through in short bursts like an AM radio being tuned.

One night, I’m on my home phone, reviewing a story with a CBS lawyer in New York and he hears the strange noises.
“Is (click) your phone tapped (clickity-click-bzzt)?” he asks. “People (clickity-bzzt) seem to think so (click-click),” I say. “Should we speak (click-click) on another line?”
“I don’t think a mobile phone is any better (bzzzzzt) for privacy,”
I tell him.

Our computers and televisions use the same Verizon fiber optics FiOS service as does our home phone and they’re acting up, too. And the house alarm sounds at a different time every night. When I scroll through the reason code to reset the alarm panel, it always indicates the same problem: trouble with the phone line. Two a.m. one night. Three forty-seven a.m. the next. No rhyme or reason.
The television is misbehaving. It spontaneously jitters, mutes, and freeze-frames. My neighbors aren’t experiencing similar interruptions. I try switching out the TV, the FiOS box, and all the cables. Verizon has done troubleshooting ad nauseam during the past year and a half. To no avail.

Then, there are the computers. They’ve taken to turning them- selves on and off at night. Not for software updates or the typical, automatic handshakes that devices like to do periodically to let each other know “I’m here.” This is a relatively recent development and it’s grown more frequent. It started with my personal Apple desktop. Later, my CBS News Toshiba laptop joined the party. Knowing little about computer technology, I figure it’s some sort of automated phishing program that’s getting in my computers at night, trolling for passwords and financial information. I feel my information is sufficiently secure due to protections on my system, so I don’t spend too much time worrying about it. But the technical interruptions get to the point where we can’t expect to use the phones, Internet, or television normally.

Around Thanksgiving, a friend tries to make a social call on my home phone line. I see his number on the caller ID but when I pick up, I hear only the familiar clicks and buzzes. He calls back several times but unable to get a clear connection, he jumps in his car and drives over.
“What’s wrong with your phone?” he asks. “It sounds like it’s tapped or something.”
“I don’t know,” I answer. “Verizon can’t fix it. It’s a nuisance.”
“Well, if it’s a tap, it’s a lousy one. If it were any good, you’d never know it was there.”

Numerous sources would tell me the same thing in the coming months. When experts tap your line, you don’t hear a thing. Unless they want you to hear, for example, to intimidate you or scare off your sources.
Well, it’s silly to think that my phones could really be tapped. Or my computers, for that matter. Nonetheless, I tell the friend who’d tried to call my house about the computer anomalies, too.
“If you want to get your computer looked at, I might know someone who can help you out,” he offers. Like so many people in Northern Virginia, he has a trusted connection who has connections to Washington’s spook agencies. I say I’ll think about it.

On one particular night, the computer is closed and on the floor next to my bed. I hear it start up and, as usual, I shake myself awake. I lift my head and see that the screen has lit up even though the top is shut. It does its thing and I roll over and try to go back to sleep. But after a few seconds, I hear the “castle lock” sound. That’s what I call the sound that’s triggered, for example, when I accidentally type in the wrong password while attempting to connect to the secure CBS system.
They’re trying to get into CBS, I think to myself. Hearing the castle lock, I figure they’ve failed. Gotten locked out. Nice try. Only later do I learn that they had no trouble accessing the CBS system. Over and over.

When I describe the computer behavior, my contacts and sources ask me when I first noticed it. I don’t know. I didn’t pay much attention at the time. On the Apple, I figure it was at least 2011. Maybe 2010. My husband would sleep through it. Later, I’d remark to him that the computer woke me up last night.
“Do you think people can use our Internet connection to get into our computers at night and turn them on to look through them?” I’d ask him, thinking only of amateur hackers and spammers.
“Of course they can,” he’d say matter-of-factly.[hr]

Support the Attkisson v. DOJ/FBI Fourth Amendment Litigation Fund to fight the government computer intrusions[hr]

The second week of December 2012, my Apple desktop has just had a nighttime session. A night or two later, it’s my CBS News laptop. I look at the clock next to the bed. The green glow of 5:02 a.m. blinks back at me. Later than usual. Considering the discussions I’m now having with my contacts who think I may be tapped, I decide it might be useful to start logging these episodes. But no sooner do I begin this task than the computers simply . . . stop. It’s as if they know I’ve begun tracking them and the jig’s up. The first time I attempt to formally log the activity would be the very last time I’d notice them turning on at night. This time frame, when I noticed the activity halts, December 10 through December 12, 2012, later becomes an important touchstone in the investigation.

[hr] To be continued...[hr]

The following is an excerpt from my New York Times bestseller "Stonewalled," which recounts the government intrusions of my computers. More excerpts to follow.[hr]

| Big Brother |
My Computer’s Intruders
"Reeeeeeeeeee.”
The noise is coming from my personal Apple desktop computer in
the small office adjacent to my bedroom. It’s starting up. On its own.
“Reeeeeee . . . chik chik chik chik,” says the computer as it shakes itself awake.
The electronic sounds stir me from sleep. I squint my eyes at the clock radio on the table next to the bed. The numbers blink back: “3:14 a.m.”
Only a day earlier, my CBS-issued Toshiba laptop, perched at the foot of my bed, had whirred to life on its own. That too had been untouched by human hands. What time was that? I think it was 4 a.m.
Some nights, both computers spark to life, one after the other. A cacophony of microprocessors interrupting the normal sounds of the night. After thirty seconds, maybe a minute, they go back to sleep. I know this is not normal computer behavior.[hr]

A diverse group of Constitutional free press and privacy advocates is supporting Attkisson v. Dept. of Justice/FBI to fight the government computer intrusions. Click here to support.

[hr]My husband, a sound sleeper, snores through it all. Half asleep, I try to remember how long ago my computers first started going rogue. A year? Two? It no longer startles me. But it’s definitely piquing my curiosity.
It’s October 2012, and I’ve been digging into the September 11
terrorist attacks on Americans at the U.S. mission in Benghazi, Libya. It’s the most interesting puzzle I’ve come across since the Fast and Furious gunwalking story, which led to international headlines and questions that remain unanswered.
Solving these kinds of puzzles is probably the challenge that drives me most. There’s nothing like an unsolved mystery to keep me at the computer or on the phone until one or two in the morning. Most mysteries can be solved, you just have to find the information. But too often, the keepers of the information don’t want to give it up . . . even when the information belongs to the public.
Now my computers offer a new mystery to unravel. I already had begun mentioning these unusual happenings to acquaintances who work in secretive corners of government and understand such things. Connections I’d met through friends and contacts in the northwest Virginia enclaves. Here, so many work for—or recently retired from—one of the “alphabet agencies.” CIA. FBI. NSA. DIA. They’re concerned about what I’m experiencing. They think something’s going on. Somebody, they tell me, is making my computers behave that way.[hr]

CBS News confirms Attkisson's work computer remotely attacked.

[hr]They’re also worried about my home phone. It’s practically unusable now. Often, when I call home, it only rings once on the receiving end. But on my end, it keeps ringing and then connects somewhere else. Nobody’s there. Other times, it disconnects in the middle of calls. There are clicks and buzzes. My friends who call hear the strange noises and ask about them. A CBS lawyer reviewing a story with me asks, half-jokingly, “Is your phone tapped?” My whole family’s tired of it. Verizon has been to the house over and over again but can’t fix whatever’s wrong.
On top of that, my home alarm system has begun chirping a nightly warning that my phone line is having “trouble” of an unidentified nature. It chirps until I get out of bed and reset it. Every night. Different times.
I’m losing sleep.

[hr]Click here to support: Sharyl Attkisson 4th Amendment Litigation Fund[hr]
I’m the one who tries to get information from the keepers and I can
be relentless. That kind of tenacity doesn’t always make friends, not even at CBS News, which has built an impressive record for dogged reporting in the tradition of Edward R. Murrow, Eric Sevareid, and Mike Wallace. But that’s okay. I’m not in journalism to make friends.
My job is to remind politicians and government officials as to who they work for. Some of them have forgotten. They think they person- ally own your tax dollars. They think they own the information their agencies gather on the public’s behalf. They think they’re entitled to keep that information from the rest of us and—make no mistake— they’re bloody incensed that we want it.
The Benghazi mystery is proving especially difficult. The feds are keeping a suspiciously tight clamp on details. They won’t even say how long the attacks went on or when they ended. What they do reveal some- times contradicts information provided by their sister agencies. And some of the most basic, important questions? They won’t address at all.
For months, the Obama administration has dismissed all questions as partisan witch-hunting. And why not? That approach has proven successful, at least among some colleagues in the news media. They’re apparently satisfied with the limited answers. They aren’t curious about the gaping holes. The contradictions. They’re part of the club that’s decided only agenda-driven Republicans would be curious about all of that. These journalists don’t need to ask questions about Benghazi at the White House press briefings, at Attorney General Eric Holder’s public appearances, or during President Obama’s lim- ited media availabilities. It might make the administration mad. It might even prompt them to threaten the “access” of uncooperative journalists. Other journalists simply think it would be rude—maybe even silly—to waste time pursuing a topic of such little consequence.
There are so many more important things going on in the world. But still, I’m curious.
What did the president of the United States do all that night
during the attacks? With Americans under siege and a U.S. ambas- sador missing—later confirmed dead—what actions did the com- mander in chief take? What decisions did he make?
I’m making slow but steady progress in finding answers to some of the mysteries. Some of my sources are in extremely sensitive positions. They say lies are being told. They’re angry. They want to set the re- cord straight. But they can’t reveal themselves on television. It would end their careers and make them pariahs among their peers. Little by little, with their help, I’m piecing together bits of the puzzle.
Those involved in the U.S. response to the attacks tell me that the U.S. government was in sheer chaos that night. Those with knowledge of military assets and Special Forces tell me that resources weren’t fully utilized to try to mount a rescue while the attacks were under way. Those with firsthand knowledge say that the government’s interagency Counterterrorism Security Group wasn’t convened, even though presidential directive requires it. Others whisper of the State Department rejecting security requests and overlooking warning signs in the weeks leading up to the attacks.[hr]

A diverse group of Constitutional free press and privacy advocates is supporting Attkisson v. Dept. of Justice/FBI to fight the government computer intrusions. Click here to support.

[hr]There are those in government who don’t like it that the sources are talking to me. “Why are they speaking to reporters,” they grumble to each other, “revealing our dirty laundry, telling our secrets?” These are powerful people with important connections.
I start to think that may be why my computers are losing so much sleep at night.[hr]

More excerpts to come... [hr]