Pence Used Personal Email for Official Business as Governor

And his AOL account was hacked, 'Indianapolis Star' report says
By Evann Gastaldo,  Newser Staff
Posted Mar 3, 2017 1:04 AM CST
Pence Used AOL Email for Official Business as Governor
Vice President Mike Pence administers the oath of office to Energy Secretary Rick Perry on Thursday in DC.   (AP Photo/Andrew Harnik)

As governor of Indiana, now-VP Mike Pence "routinely" used his personal AOL email account to conduct public business, reports the Indianapolis Star, which obtained 29 pages of Pence emails via a public records request. Pence criticized Hillary Clinton during the 2016 presidential campaign over her own email scandal, accusing her of potentially allowing hackers to get a hand on classified info, and now experts are expressing the same concerns about his emails—though, as the Star notes, his emails wouldn't have dealt with national security issues at the same level Clinton's did. Some of the topics Pence discussed with advisers via personal email: the governor's residence's security gates, Indiana's response to global terrorist attacks, Pence's attempts to block Syrian refugee resettlement, and an FBI update about several terror-related arrests.

Cybersecurity experts say hacking is a concern when personal email is used, and the Star notes that Pence's AOL account was actually hacked last summer. In response to the Star's story, Pence's office released a statement insisting he "fully complied with Indiana law regarding email use and retention," and Pence's spokesperson called any comparison between this issue and the Clinton email scandal "absurd." The current Indiana governor's office declined to release other Pence emails due to confidentiality issues. "It's one thing to have an AOL account and use it to send birthday cards to grandkids," says one computer security expert. "But it's another thing to use it to send and receive messages that are sensitive and could negatively impact people if that information is public." Much more at the Star. (More Mike Pence stories.)

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