Romanian hacker 'Guccifer' says it was 'easy' to infiltrate Hillary Clinton's personal emails from his small village

  • Marcel Lehel Lazar, 44, reportedly hacked into the email servers of Colin Powell, Sidney Blumenthal, and other power brokers
  • He also insists he got into Hillary Clinton's emails 'twice'
  • 'It was easy' he told Fox News of supposedly gaining access to the Dem frontrunner's emails 
  • He said the missives 'weren't interesting' and were for 'political voting stuff'
  • Clinton's camp denies her server was ever compromised by the hacker 
  • See more news on Hillary Clinton at www.dailymail.co.uk/hillary 

By Kiri Blakeley For Dailymail.com

Published: | Updated:

A Romanian hacker known as 'Guccifer,' who posted unofficial emails sent to then-Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, has revealed how he 'easily' penetrated the Democratic frontrunner's emails.

In interviews with Fox News from a jailhouse in Alexandria, Virginia - where he is being held on cyber crime charges - Marcel Lehel Lazar, 44, told the media outlet that it was simple for him to figure out how to break into Clinton's personal email server, and he did it twice in 2013.

'For me, it was easy ... easy for me, for everybody,' he bragged to the news outlet.

Romanian hacker Marcel Lehel Lazar (above), 44, was extradited to the U.S. from Romania last month, accused of cyber crimes. He claims he 'easily' hacked his way into Hillary Clinton's email and then was grilled by the FBI

Romanian hacker Marcel Lehel Lazar (above), 44, was extradited to the U.S. from Romania last month, accused of cyber crimes. He claims he 'easily' hacked his way into Hillary Clinton's email

Lazar said he first went into journalist and Clinton confidant Sidney Blumenthal's email account by doing extensive research on him and then correctly guessing his security question.

He said Blumenthal's emails were 'interesting', as he was talking about 'the Middle East and what they were doing there', but it's unclear who he was talking to.

Lazar said he then would see emails from political operatives, such as Clinton, and was able to trace their IP addresses and use 'IP scanner' software to see if ports were open and email addresses 'alive.'

He claims he compromised Clinton's emails 'like twice' and said the contents 'were not interesting.'

'I was not paying attention. For me, it was not like the Hillary Clinton server, it was like an email server she and others were using with political voting stuff,' he said.

Lazar, who goes by the cyber handle 'Guccifer' says it was 'easy' for him to break into Clinton's personal email - but he admitted that her emails weren't 'interesting'

Lazar, who goes by the cyber handle 'Guccifer' says it was 'easy' for him to break into Clinton's personal email - but he admitted that her emails weren't 'interesting'

Fox News said it could not independently confirm Lazar's claim, but spoke to security experts who said it seems plausible. 

'This sounds like the classic attack of the late 1990s. A smart individual who knows the tools and the technology and is looking for glaring weaknesses in Internet-connected devices,' Bob Gourley, a former chief technology officer (CTO) for the Defense Intelligence Agency, said. 

Lazar says he is self trained and did most of his hacking from his small village in Romania.  

'Cybersecurity expert Morgan Wright told the outlet, 'The Blumenthal account gave [Lazar] a road map to get to the Clinton server. You get a foothold in one system. You get intelligence from that system, and then you start to move.'

Clinton and her camp deny that her personal email server was compromised by any foreign hackers 

Clinton and her camp deny that her personal email server was compromised by any foreign hackers 

Lazar's victims aren't named in his nine-count indictment, but they reportedly include Colin Powell, Sydney Blumenthal and a Bush family member 

Lazar's victims aren't named in his nine-count indictment, but they reportedly include Colin Powell, Sydney Blumenthal and a Bush family member 

But Gourley also warned that 'Unfortunately, in this community, a lot people make up stories and it's hard to tell what's really true until you get into the forensics information and get hard facts.'

For her part, Clinton denies her personal email server had been compromised by foreign hackers, saying 'No, not at all' when asked by MSNBC.

'There is absolutely no basis to believe the claims made by this criminal from his prison cell,' Clinton's national press secretary, Brian Fallon, told NBC News. 'In addition to the fact that he offers no proof to support his claims, his descriptions of Secretary Clinton's server are inaccurate. It is unfathomable that he would have gained access to her emails and not leaked them the way he did to his other victims.'

He added that her server shows no trace of foreign hacking. 

Clinton's private server contained nearly 2,200 emails containing information now deemed classified, and another 22 at the 'Top Secret' level.

The government has publicly posted about 45,000 pages, with roughly 7600 still left to be released at the end of February, according to NBC News.

Lazar is also accused of hacking into the personal accounts of Colin Powell and a Bush family member, two former U.S. presidents, a former U.S. Cabinet member, a former member of the U.S. Joint Chiefs of Staff and a former presidential advisor. 

He had pleaded not guilty to nine counts of hacking and his trial is set in the Eastern District of Virginia for September 12.

 

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