Durham probe alias: Tech Executive-1
Country of origin: South Africa, born 1954
Occupation: Computer Scientist/Computer Security
- Created a website hosting company (Genuity), and (UltraDNS), which was sold to Neustar for just under $62 Million in 2006. Retired from Neustar as Senior Vice President and Security Chief Technology Officer in 2021.
- Awarded FBI Director's Award for Cybersecurity in 2013 for discovering the "Butterfly Botnet" which infected 11 million computers.
- Joffe's 13+ patents include innovations for establishing secure internet domain names and detecting compromised computers.
- Allegedly was involved with Merchandiser' Warehouse, who was sued by the state of Iowa in 1998 for a scheme involving grandfather clocks. (Link behind a paywall)
- Allegedly warned about Stuxnet or something like it in 2010
- Named to Federal Communications Commission's Communications, Security, Reliability and Interoperability Council, June 16, 2015
At a glimpse: "A powerful and influential player in the tech world, Joffe tasked a group of computer contractors connected to the Georgia Institute of Technology with finding “anything” in internet data that would link Trump to Russia and make Democratic “VIPs happy,” according to an August 2016 email Joffe sent to the researchers. The next month, the group accused Trump of maintaining secret backchannel communications to the Kremlin through the email servers of Russia-based Alfa Bank. Those accusations were later determined to be false by the FBI, Special Counsel Robert Mueller, the Justice Department inspector general and a Senate intelligence panel."
Associates:
- April D. Lorenzen, Identified as “Originator-1”. She, like her colleague Joffe, is a key subject of the investigation and faces a host of legal issues, the sources close to the case said. Emails the investigators uncovered reveal that Lorenzen discussed “faking” internet traffic with the Georgia Tech researchers, although the context of her remarks are unclear.
Prosecutors suggested Lorenzen was trying to create an “inference” of Trump-Russia communications from DNS data that wasn’t there. - L. Jean Camp, a colleague of Lorenzen who features prominently in the project to link Trump to the Russian bank, but who is not referenced in the indictment. An Indiana University computer science professor who posted the dodgy data on her website and helped propagate the conspiracy theory in the media. “This person has technical authority and access to data,” she said of “Tea Leaves,” the originator of the data, vouching for her friend Lorenzen while hiding her identity.
Camp is a Democratic activist and major Hillary Clinton booster and donor. Federal campaign records show she contributed at least $5,910 to Clinton’s 2008 and 2016 campaigns, including thousands of dollars in donations around the time she and the Clinton campaign were peddling the Trump-Alfa conspiracy theory. - Manos Antonakakis, “Researcher-1” referenced in the indictment. Antonakakis is the “Researcher-1” referenced in the indictment whom the grand jury said remarked in an email that “the only thing that drives us is that we just do not like [Trump.]". The Georgia Tech researchers named as “investigator” on the project.
- David Dagon, the Georgia Tech researcher named as “investigator” on the project.
ARTICLES
NY Post - Who is Rodney Joffe
Washington Times - FBI saw through Democrats' Alfa hoax
NY Times - Trump Server Mystery Produces Fresh Conflict
Washington Examiner - Identity of 'Tech Executive' in Durham indictment over Alfa Bank Claims revealed.
Real Clear Investigations - Durham Probes Pentagon Computer Contractors in Anti-Trump Conspiracy
