Photo David Kernell – Sarah Palin Email Hacker?

This blog seems to have the best information: http://blogs.knoxnews.com/knx/silence/

20-year-old David Kernell is at the center of an online investigation into who broke in to the email account of Republican vice presidential candidate Sarah Palin and posted some of the contents to Wikileaks.

According to a report from The Tennessean, Tennesse state representative Mike Kernell told a reporter that his son, David, is the individual believed to be among those reponsible for the hacked account.

According to the newspaper, David Kernell is a student at University of Tennessee-Knoxville. The FBI and Secret Service have yet to publicly identify David Kernell as a suspect.

Here is what the hacker apparently stated:

 I am the lurker who did it, and I would like to tell the story,” one person wrote in an account circulated on the Web.

In postings under the name “Rubico,” he wrote that he reset Palin’s e-mail password using her birth date, ZIP code information and where she met her husband, Todd.

When the security question was posed on her Yahoo! account, the hacker answered, “Wasilla high,” and tapped into her e-mail.

He had easily used public information to outsmart Yahoo!’s security system.

“It took seriously 45 minutes on wikepedia [sic] and google to find the information. Birthday? 15 seconds on wikepedia, zip code? Well she had always been from Wasilla, and it only has 2 zip codes (thanks online postal service!),” the hacker boasted.

“The second was somewhat harder, the question was ‘where did you meet your spouse?’ Did some research, and apparently she had eloped with Mr. Palin after college.

“I found out later through more research that they met at high school, so I did variations of that, high, high school, eventually hit on ‘Wasilla high.’ ”

“I promptly changed the password to popcorn and took a cold shower,” he said.

“Earlier it was just some prank to me, I really wanted to get something incriminating which I was sure there would be, just like all of you anon out there that you think there was some missed opportunity of glory, well there WAS NOTHING, I read everything, every little blackberry confirmation… all the pictures, and there was nothing, and it finally set in, THIS internet was serious business, yes I was behind a proxy, only one, if this shit ever got to the FBI I was fucked, I panicked, i still wanted the stuff out there but I didn’t know how to rapidshit all that stuff, so I posted the pass on /b/, and then promptly deleted everything, and unplugged my internet and just sat there in a comatose state.”

Screen Shots Sarah Palin’s Private Email

Anonymous (from the message board 4Chan), has gained access to Sarah Palin’s personal yahoo email account.   Here are the screen shots from the email that was hacked.

CLICK TO ENLARGE EACH IMAGE:

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Hackers Get Sarah Palin’s Private Email

Read Sarah Palin’s Email.

UPDATE: Has the hacker been ID’d?

From Wiki Leaks:

A group of hackers that hit the Church of Scientology’s site earlier this year have apparently cracked the Yahoo Mail account belonging to Gov. Sarah Palin, the GOP nominee for Vice President, according to documents and screenshots posted on the Web.

A security expert called the practice of using private e-mail accounts “incredibly dangerous” for public officials like Palin.

The group, which calls itself “Anonymous,” announced that it had gained access to Palin’s Yahoo account in a message last night to WikiLeaks, a site that regularly posts confidential documents. Among the files passed to WikiLeaks — which the site had posted for download — were five screenshots from the gov.palin@yahoo.com, an address book and two digital photos of Palin’s family.

One of the account’s screenshots shows a short exchange in July between Gov. Palin and Lt. Gov. Sean Parnell, who is running against Democrat Ethan Berkowitz for the state’s lone Congressional seat. In her reply, Palin called Anchorage-based conservative radio host Dan Fagan “inconsistent and purposefully misleading” in his comments about Parnell.

Another screenshot displays the text of a message to Palin from Amy McCorkell, who Palin appointed to the Governor’s Advisory Board on Alcoholism and Drug Abuse in October 2007. According to a press release issued by Palin’s office at the time, McCorkell, like Palin, lives in Wasilla, Alaska and is formerly a private legal investigator, an office worker and fitness instructor.

In the message dated Sunday, McCorkell said: “I am reading the paper and have thoughts and prayers going your way……don’t let the negative press wear you down! Pray for me as well. I need strength to 1. keep employment, 2. not have to choose. Lately I just pray may God’s will be done.”

The day before, the New York Times had published a story critical of Palin’s hiring practice as governor. The story did not mention McCorkell, but said that Palin had appointed at least five former high school classmates to state positions since she took office.

Palin has come under criticism for using private e-mail accounts to conduct state business, with some alleging that she and others in her administration have used them to skirt message retention and public records laws. The Bush administration has been accused of doing the same thing.

“Using private account for government or business use is incredibly dangerous,” said Adam O’Donnell, director of emerging technologies at message security vendor Cloudmark Inc. “There’s a reason why you have an official account. It’s so that you can apply proper security management to the account.”

Earlier this year, the Anonymous group launched several attacks against the Web site of the Church of Scientology, claiming it wanted to “save people from Scientology by reversing the brainwashing.”

The Republican National Committee and the McCain-Palin campaign had no immediate comment.