WASHINGTON EXAMINER - Andrew Kerr, Investigative Reporter & Jerry Dunleavy, Justice Department Reporter - MAY 25, 2022 -
EXCLUSIVE — Records located on a copy of Hunter Biden's laptop suggest he took personal data from his sister-in-law's cellphones over a dozen times between 2017 and 2018 without her consent, according to a former Secret Service agent who has testified in over 100 classified, criminal, and civil matters at the state, federal, and international level as a cyberforensics expert.
The data Biden extracted from iPhones owned by Hallie Biden, the widow of his deceased brother, Beau Biden, included her text messages, photos, notes, call logs, calendar, and over 120 voicemails. Hallie Biden's texts and voicemails that were located on Hunter Biden's laptop were mostly personal in nature, but some indicate she was aware of his foreign business dealings in China.
Konstantinos "Gus" Dimitrelos, a cyberforensics expert commissioned by the Washington Examiner to examine a copy of Hunter Biden's laptop, which was abandoned at a Delaware computer repair shop in April 2019, said Hunter Biden may have violated federal law if he extracted Hallie Biden's phone data and voicemails without her consent. Hunter Biden was not a party to most of the communications he obtained from Hallie Biden's phones. Asked to comment on whether the Hallie Biden phone data on Hunter Biden's abandoned laptop was obtained with her consent, Hunter Biden's attorney declined to respond.
"I confirmed with 100% certainty Hallie Biden's iPhones were accessed and data from the devices was copied to the Laptop and stored in numerous folders and later accessed," Dimitrelos said. "Without legal or authorized consent, the person accessing someone else's computer device and performing the extraction of the data may be in violation of multiple Federal Statutes including 18 USC 1030 and 18 U.S. 2511 for unauthorized access of a computer system or interception of an electronic communication."
Dimitrelos noted that he investigated alleged violations of federal computer fraud and abuse when he served in the Secret Service Electronic Crimes Special Agent Program from 1997 through 2005.
"Typically, the Justice Department treats the unauthorized access into other people’s computers and interception of their communications, hacking and bugging, as serious business," former assistant U.S. attorney Andrew McCarthy told the Washington Examiner.
"Bear in mind, from a national security perspective, that Hunter Biden himself is among the least significant aspect of the Biden investigation," McCarthy added. "To the extent his computer files show potentially unlawful activity, and shady foreign business arrangements, they are grist for blackmail. The Hunter Biden laptop story is not principally about Hunter Biden. It is about the Biden family broadly and the question of whether American interests are vulnerable."
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