There’s a global electronic battle going on, we’re told, between those who support Wikileaks and those who oppose it. Mastercard, PayPal, and Visa are under attack for refusing to process contributions to Wikileaks, their web sites periodically unavailable because of a massive Distributed Denial of Service (DDoS) attack by thousands of zombie PCs all over the world. Nothing about this makes any sense to me. It’s stupid.
The so-called cyber war (more of a cyber rumble, really — one posse against another) is stupid because neither side can win as they are playing it and neither can lose. Pain can be inflicted, but mainly on innocent bystanders, rather than combatants. And those who caused the war have, for the most part, no idea what they have actually done.
At this point some partisan on either side might start throwing words about like treason, but I think that is inappropriate for many reasons. What it is is embarrassing for the U.S. and other governments. It is inconvenient. It is awkward. But from what I have read so far nothing that has been released goes past those words.
Now look on the other side. Julian Assange is an idiot when it comes to how he, as a would-be world figure, should behave in his private life. He, more than anyone else on Earth, should know there is no privacy, nor should he expect any.
Now to the structure of this current brouhaha between Wikileaks, the Department of State, and the collateral damage it has caused. For the most part, State has handled this all wrong. Retribution is not a smart move here, nor does State have much, if any, power. There are limits to what most governments can do in cases like this. U.S. law prohibits what’s called prior restraint, for example. If I publish something libelous you can sue me for damages after it is published but you can’t sue me to prevent publication. This assumes, of course, that all things can be worked out in a court of law, including putting back into his pants the reputation of Italian Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi.
Not likely.
Nor is it any more likely that asking Mastercard, Paypal, and Visa to stop processing Wikileaks payments will prevent Assange from publishing further. Wikileaks isn’t Cuba or Iran that governments are trying to blockade, it is a few people and a few web servers, that’s all. Sending-in the 8th Air Force to take-out Wikileaks won’t do anything because a single donor could easily support the whole operation. Heck, a garage sale could support Wikileaks. Kim Jung-Il could fund it from his designer sunglasses budget alone.
So the State Department mandated actions of these financial companies are really an expression of U.S. Government anger. It is Patriot Act bluster that is inappropriate and unwise in a case where terrorism is not the issue. Bin Laden may be laughing his ass off in Afghanistan or Pakistan but Wikileaks is not a terrorist enterprise.
These aren’t viable efforts to coerce or undermine Wikileaks in any way. If anything it helps Wikileaks.
And while we’re being so upset, what has been the effect so far of this DDoS attack? From what I heard this morning, it was only the main web sites and some customer service portals that were having problems. DDoS attacks are well know and understood. The funds transfer networks of these companies were completely unaffected. Touring the USS Alabama, you’ll notice large food stores on the outside of the ship. The less critical parts of the ship are more exposed and the critical areas are very well protected. Hit the USS Alabama with a shell and you’ll destroy a lot of potatoes. It is my understanding these DDoS attacks have mainly messed up Mastercard’s potatoes.
The question that isn’t being asked here is whether there is in fact any way for governments to control Wikileaks and what would that way be? I think there are techniques that could be used to effect such control. Want a demonstration? Just get Wikileaks to do what I firmly believe it never will: release 250,000 secret documents from Israel.
1st!
Bad form… unless you did it for the lulz…
And to your point Bob, what evidence do you have that Wikileaks even has info from Israel? Doubtful. I’m sure their data is much more tightly controlled than Western data.
Oh my: aren’t we uninformed. Try google’ing these two names:
Anat Kam
Uri Blau
Hi Bob,
Are you saying that you shouldn’t irritate the Israel government because they just might unleash a horde of hit men on you?
Well, if that was what Bob meant (and I assume it was): Yeah, so?
Israel have a long history of illegal assassinations of unwanted individuals abroad (it even has a sanitized media-name “targeted kills”), so that conclusion would hardly be prejudiced. It’s kind of what happens if you are a militarily aggressive state showing blatant disregard for international law and treaties for decades – people start to assume that you will do the same in the future.
It’s not a cyber war it’s a publicity war. Think what you will about the rights or wrongs about Wikileaks’ motives but my God, are they winning the publicity war.
The Ddos attacks by the ‘Payback’ crew are but peripheral skirmishes but they are certainly punching above their weight in terms of media coverage.
Most of the media coverage seems to be missing the real point here. In 2010, we are all connected, we are reliant on the Internet and that connectivity, ease of access and minimal cost to broadcast means that we can all reach the world in an instant. If the broadcast is embarrassing, salacious, or amusing it will reach a lot of people very very quickly.
The message for any individual, organisation or government is this: The gap between what you say you do and what you actually do is shrinking, and will continue to do so.
I’m amazed that it’s taken so long for this message to sink in.
J
Exactly right John. And this worries all those who aspire to act for us; speak for us; and control us. It has worried them for all time. But the coming of the Internet is of course their biggest worry ever – and as you say, it is forcing ‘the gap’ ever smaller. I really believe that one day these events will be looked back on as a watershed in the relationships between governments and their people – the moment when those who aspire to rule us began to realise the game had changed. Sadly I don’t have much faith in them reacting well to this revelation and many are going to have to be dragged kicking and screaming into the new world by subjecting them to such embarrassments time and again. Now let’s have some really good stuff on Berlusconi please!
This Wikileaks thing reminds me of the movie Hopscotch. I wonder what incident caused this vendetta to get going in the first place?
Wikileaks has released the information on all of the embassy staffs. This puts their lives in great danger. The founder got arrested for a good reason, and wikileaks should be shut down completely.
Duh….embassy staff are required to register with the host country. They have diplomatic passports. They work out of a building with a big US flag out front. Some of them even get their pictures in the newspaper when they meet with people.
My – well a well reasoned argument………..
Who put US companies in charge of dispensing ‘justice’ ??
He got arrested for a sexual offense in Sweden. You seem to imply that you have evidence that he’s guilty. How sure are you of this really?
One of the questions that I have is this: how do we even know that ANYTHING in this latest batch is authentic? These cables are nothing more than ASCII. The *only* thing that gives that site any credibility is the government issuing statements against these cables.
Seriously – what’s the difference between what’s happening right now and THIS:
From: Bob
To: Mark
Date: 2010-12-08 12:03:45
Subject: RE:That money you owe me
Mark,
Please consider this email as LEGAL DOCUMENTATION that I will give you eleventy-billion dollars.
Best Wishes,
Bob
P.S. – You are the coolest guy in the world.
> From: Mark
> To: Bob
> Date: 2010-12-07 15:12:32
> Subject: That money you owe me
>
> Bob,
>
> Just wondering if I could get that money you owe me…
>
>Mark
>
>
Now, if your response was anything more than, “Ha ha! Very funny!” then people might think, “Hey Bob – give that kid his money!”
Yes, Julian is behaving like a jackass attention whore. No, the State department should not have dignified this with a response (other than, perhaps, “wiki-who?”).
I’m not a crypto expert but I presume what you are seeing is the end result of decrypted data in text form. I’m sure the comm channels in addition to the content are both secured to fend off intrusion.
I am sure their very ancient telegraph lines are encrypted. I am sure they have state of the art paper shredders on each end. It is also quite evident they keep all their messages on their PC’s and file servers with little or no data security. If is clear you can copy 200,000 documents without anyone noticing.
When you get your money back from Bob, don’t forget the money you owe me.
This is funny considering that Bob’s actual first name is Mark.
I honestly don’t know if any crimes were committed or not. I must admit I feel bad for the State Department. They are using a communication system from the stone age. They have bone heads managing their data and its security. Forget the leaks — to show this technology (or lack thereof) is embarrassing.
It was not too long ago the world discovered the FBI had basically no computer system and no email. Communications were by FAX and were painfully slow.
I have done IT work for the US government. It is like being a 3 year old just given $50 and turned lose in a candy store. I really don’t like the work. I like to do good things and give my customers value. As a tax payer and shareholder I am appalled so much is spend so poorly.
And no one will get fired for it.
Well if it’s wrong for China to ask google to filter searches on Tibet, how can it be right for the State Department to persecute Assange – not for leaking, the leakers can and probably should be punished for breech of duty if found out – but merely for publishing what has been handed to him without any inducement on his part other than a vague promise that he may publish parts of it on the internet. If his actions, both in fact and in spirit, aren’t protected by the First Amendment, then what the hell is?
Hmm … if Assange is Australian, how does he have any First Amendment rights? Thought that was just for US citizens.
Well I looked it up and US Constitutional rights apply to all people, not just citizens.
They are more a shield, not a sword. They stop the government (or should stop the government) from doing things.
https://www.hrcr.org/chart/remedies+application/scope_of_application.html
United States Constitution
There is no provision on juridical persons. As for natural persons, key rights-related provisions including the Bill of Rights (the first 10 Amendments), and the 14th Amend. due process and equal protection clauses, are phrased as applying to “all persons.” These rights therefore have been construed as offering substantial protections to non-citizens residing within the U.S.
It’s quite simple. Assange set up an organization to enable these leaks and then fished for them. This is not first amendment rights, but an illegal activity. Attempting to get others to break the law for your gain is a crime. It’s one of the reasons Assange can be charged, but not the New York Times.
I would be more pro-Assange if the documents he leaked actually provided some evidence of illegal activity. They don’t. This is not the Pentagon Papers, but merely frank diplomatic cables revealing what the U.S. thought of many of the people they were dealing with.
All the release can do is embarrass the U.S. and make it harder to for anyone in the world to carry out any sort of diplomacy. And, the alternative of diplomacy is war.
That’s exactly why espionage charges are so dubious.
There’s essentially no intelligence content – just a lot of gossip.
Humiliating for some, but not damaging like the Pentagon Papers.
It is when he threatened to release files on the banks the hammer came down.
Exactly. Everything so far has just been mildly amusing fluff. Wikileaks’ power lies in the threat of what they _might_ publish. So far it is just a shot across the bow.
I wonder who’s going to play Assange in the upcoming movie. You know it’s coming, right? 😉
William Hurt.
What Julian Assange was stupid, probably illegal, but not treasonous, and for one good reason: He’s not a U.S. citizen. Treason can only be applied to your own citizenry.
However, what Mr. Assange did was quite dangerous and stupid. And could have had far reaching consequences. And, for what? There was no smoking gun. There was no hidden illegal activity — just a bunch of frank and embarrassing diplomatic cables.
Back in 1980, General Chun Doo-hwan overthrew the transitional Korean government that looked like it was heading towards democratic reforms. He gave himself the job as President and jailed dissidents. Leading opposition figure Kim Dae-jung was sentenced to death.
President Reagan, to the shock of people on the left and right, invited General Chun to the White House with the privilege as the first foreign leader to meet the new President. In a Rose Garden conference, Reagan praised General Chun as a great anti-communist leader and American ally.
Only later, did we learn the truth. Kim Dae-jung was about to be killed by the Chun government. While Kim laid naked and bound on the floor waiting to be put on a helicopter, so his body could be thrown into the Sea of Japan, the American diplomatic effort went into full gear. A secret agreement was made to allow Chun the honor of being the first foreign leader to visit the new President in exchange for Kim’s life.
Before the Rose Garden ceremony, President Reagan secured an agreement to allow Kim to be released from prison and come to the United States as a political exile. This allowed Kim to continue his work for a Democratic South Korea.
Kim later served as the President of Korea, helping reform the political system and strengthening democratic rule there. What would have happened if someone decided to leak the diplomatic cables during the negotiation between General Chun and the White House? Would Chun have spared Kim’s life? What would have happened to the democratic movement in South Korea?
What Assange did could have endangered a lot of lives and caused problems with conflicts between various world leaders. He has made it more difficult to use diplomacy. He had revealed the extent of Iran’s neighbor’s hatred towards the current Iranian government and has probably helped Ahmadinejad hold on power and hurt the democratic opposition there.
And, all just to scratch a personal itch to embarrass the United States.
Embarrassment of the government is very much a right protected by the First Amendment. Where does the Constitution give the government a right to be immune from embarrassment? What would be the point of free speech in that case? I think Assange is in exactly the same position as the New York Times or any other paper, large or small, respectable or ridiculous. If the New York Times cannot be prosecuted for reporting on this, as you point out, mere diplomatic gossip, then neither should Assange.
David – You make a valid point about Korea, but I think you miss the mark on Iran. Israel know knows that many of their less than friendly neighbors have similar feels with regards to Iran. What if this drives an understanding or a dialogue to everyone’s benefit (excepting Iran of course). If a large majority of the Middle East can come to agreement with Israel, wouldn’t that be worth the embarrassment in the long run?
What is a “cable” any how? Is it like more like a telegram, an email, or a memo?
I must admit i missed your last point. Why wouldn’t Wikileaks reveal information about Israel if they had access to it? As for what the government can do, there isn’t a lot. They could have them all declared terrorists, and use the tools they have tried to assemble for use against terrorists, but the data is already out in the wild. I would love to hear you elaborate on what you think could be done to control a site like Wikileaks.
As for Julian Assange, he is an arrogant moron with a vendetta against the United States. The benefit/cost ratio of the leaks is very low. Take the war diaries: they tell us that war is hell, innocent people die, and the military makes mistakes sometimes. No duh. However, they also reveal a lot about exactly how operations are being conducted. That is information that can be used by our enemies. It is best left under wraps until those enemies have been vanquished.
Far more concerning to me is not the diplomatic gossip, which an earlier commenter has already demonstrated as harmful, but things like the list of sites valuable to the security of the United States. I have an academic interest, yes, but there are people out there with a murderous interest. People who have already demonstrated their willingness to slaughter. It is the items like that which could potentially be the most harmful. And it is not just the Taliban and Al Qaeda that could use such information. I shudder to think what the Zetas drug cartel could do if information about operatives in Mexico were revealed.
I think it is important that the press uncover misdeeds, corruption, and wrongdoing. all the leaks of US documents have failed to uncover any such wrongdoing, while makeing it easier for true misdeeds to be committed.
That’s what the Chinese say when they demand google filter its searches, that it would disturb the peace and, to paraphrase, the alternative to peace is war. Besides, no one has proved wikileaks has caused any harm other that just say so, which is not proof to me. Nor has Assange published everything he has received. That would be in his 1.3GB “insurance file” the full unredacted set of everything he has received, encrypted by 256 bit AES. It’s been seeded on torrents all summer and he says the password will be released if anything “happens” to him.
The claim that publishing that list of places important to U.S. interests is like giving a shopping list to the terrorists is quite laughable. I’ve seen quite a few articles from people much more credible than I that point out that the list reveals nothing that any terrorist could not find on his own with very little effort.
As far as putting operatives in danger: despite claims made that the release of the Afghanistan and Iraq documents would do just that, after a few months of study of the released material, the Pentagon reluctantly admitted that the data had been properly scrubbed by Wikileaks before the release, and no such details were revealed. Wikileaks seems to be taking the same precaution of scrubbing the data in the diplomatic cables.
Safest place for Assange right now is a jail in Sweden
But he has not been charged with any crime and the word is he will only be held in a Swedish goal for as long as it takes for the US of A to get the paperwork in place to ship him to Guantanamo
Has anyone actually bothered to read Julian Assange’s essays stating his philosophy?
It’s very interesting… and a lot different from what people imagine.
See
http://goo.gl/Hlo6u
“The more secretive or unjust an organization is, the more leaks induce fear and paranoia in its leadership and planning coterie. This must result in minimization of efficient internal communications mechanisms (an increase in cognitive “secrecy tax”) and consequent system-wide cognitive decline resulting in decreased ability to hold onto power as the environment demands adaption. Hence in a world where leaking is easy, secretive or unjust systems are nonlinearly hit relative to open, just systems. Since unjust systems, by their nature induce opponents, and in many places barely have the upper hand, mass leaking leaves them exquisitely vulnerable to those who seek to replace them with more open forms of governance.” – Julian Assange
To Assange the contents of the leaks are secondary. His primary aim is to make governments and large organizations so paranoid about leaks that they are not able to use electronic media and the internet effectively for secret operations.
This means that the use of electronic media for secret operations by large organizations is throttled, while opponents of such secret operations have free use of electronic media.
This shifts the balance of power in the direction away from large secretive organizations.
Thanks for posting that. I’m with Assange on this one, not Big Brother.
Actually if that’s Assange’s purpose it won’t work.
1. There is no evidence use of electronic communications are the cause of these leaks. Electronic transmission and storage can be securely encrypted. The weak link in the chain is the human factor. Someone with privileged access leaked it. If anything the government will rely on more electronic communication and less human intervention because of this.
2. If Hollywood gossip is any guide, reporting on a network communications will not make the network collapse. The is more hollywood gossip now, with gossip reporting than ever before.
3. Corporate and political elites can use the leaks to leak misinformation and make other communications of use to them. In othe rwords the leaks are not a force outside of the network, they are simply additional nodes and channels within a larer network.
I wonder whether you are misunderstanding the point (or maybe I am).
Precisely because the humans are the weak link, the secure transmission and storage doesn’t matter. The messages must be presented to humans in the clear, and, at that point, are vulnerable to leaking. Information that is not made available to humans cannot be used to further the planning of the secret, unjust organizations. Any move they make toward more locking up of the communications decreases their operational efficiency, which it the goal Assange is aiming at.
Well, isn’t that nice. Is North Korea his next target? or Iran?, or are they just benevolent compared to the imperialistic USA?
Now here’s a good development for everyone who believes that the Internet should be used as a check on secrecy and unrestrained power.
A ‘better’ spinoff from WikiLeaks will be starting up as early as next week.
From Forbes, http://goo.gl/zG91r
Advantages of OpenLeaks:
* Not based around the personality of one man.
* Hopefully better technical quality of the site.
* Steady flow of leaks rather than big data dumps.
* Info released only through existing news media or NGOs, after fact-checking and redaction.
Perhaps OpenLeaks will be the first of many such spinoff sites.
What a stupid idea. What if the designated media refuses to publish it?
And why not just hand it over without going through the middleman?
@Pete
‘What if the designated media refuses to publish it?’
If the organization chosen by the leaker doesn’t publish it after a designated time, then it gets turned over to others.
‘And why not just hand it over without going through the middleman?’
Umm… anonymity?
So the media can’t revel their sources even if they are pressured, their offices raided, etc. Important in many countries where freedom of the press is not well established.
Ok I found two pdfs by Assange (from 2006) on what he is trying to accomplish. They are here:
http://iq.org/conspiracies.pdf
http://web.archive.org/web/20070110200827/http://iq.org/conspiracies.pdf
I think that the whole Wikileaks issue bears some careful thought and that the questions that it raises are going to keep us all wondering for a while. One of the saddest things is that incidents like these current leaks seem to give the US Government the opportunity to behave like a spoiled child. Come on, they knew what was in those cables the minute they arrested source and went back through his access logs … so we’ve have what, six months to formulate a response?
And this is the best we can do?
As for 4chan and Anonymous, you’re right that their effects are not significant but they are generating a huge amount of publicity and inevitably creating more interest in some circles in hacking networks … this is not a good thing if you’re the US government – but might be entertaining if you are Wikileaks. So the US Government is shooting themselves in the foot again … we do seem to be rather good at this don’t we?
Say what you will, Wikileaks may be annoying, they may be a bunch of money grabbing bastards but they don’t seem to be breaking US laws – which does make prosecution difficult. Add to that the Secretary of Defense Robert Gates statement that “Every other government in the world knows the United States government leaks like a sieve, and it has for a long time.”
Now, if Wikileaks to tell us who was on the grassy knoll – then I’d be interested – but so far they’ve been telling us stuff that simply confirms what most sensible people have believed for a long time.
As for the Israelis – honey traps, kidnapping and sanctioned murder have been some of their specialties for years – but in today’s world, even they are finding out that it’s getting harder to pull these things off – witness their public murder of Mahmoud al-Mabhouh in a Dubai hotel recently. Mass embarrassment all around and it didn’t take Wikileaks to do that.
Wherefore and whyto:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZYspXgSQTy4
Sorry about that. Here’s the title for the youtube link.
Julian Assange – Oslo Freedom Forum 2010 (Part 1 of 2)
Wherefore and whyto:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZYspXgSQTy4
Francis you missed the mark completely in your last post.
that a human weak link is needed is immaterial. all the data is in electronic form. Because it is it is vulnerable to being leaked. The goal here is to prevent the government from keeping records in a meaningful way so that they can not be exploited agaisnt the government or to make it os hard to get access to records that it is impractical for the government to function. the evidence of “electronic communications are the cause of these leaks” These were apparently all downloaded by the one disgruntled soldier. it they were not electronic communications he could not have transported them out without attracting attention. Can you see someone carting out crates of documents and nobody noticing vs a single tumb drive in his pocket?
And to compare to Hollywood gossip is off base since gossip in Hollywood may get one actor a job or prevent him from getting one. In politics it may prevent a country from sharing information and get a plane full of people blown up.
I dont think Assange is a terrorist. I just dont think what he did is noble or right. Simply because you CAN do something does not mean you should. And if what he is doing is so wrthwhile and legal then why is he using extorsion threatening to harm banks to prtect himself? Why not start with simple arguments about the worth of what he is doing?
Well I was responding to Assange’s purported strategy of making the government’s network of secrecy and lies collapse, via technology. I don’t think it will happen.
Is what he is doing right or wrong? . . . hummm. First off, I think he has a right to do it. But still, is it right or wrong? At this point I can’t say. I’m not trying to be evasive. It’s a difficult question. If I came across classified information today, I would turn it in. If I was a German living in the Third Reich, and a Jewish person asked for refuge, I hope I would give them a hiding place, as some Germans did. I guess I’m saying I would have to deal with things on a case by case basis and perhaps make inconsistent choices.
The internet is still new and is rearranging the ways human beings interact. It will affect governments everywhere: China, Iran, the USA. No way around that, and no, the great firewall of China is not really stopping anything, nor is the State Department. So where does that leave us? The internet gives more power to the people and less to the government, and that MUST be a good thing. Short of shutting down the internet I don’t think any government can stop any of this.
I agree Francis, and I would add that I don’t think it would be possible to ‘shut down the internet’ – some might dream of it, but it can only be a dream. Like ‘John’ said right up the page somewhere, I feel that the longterm result of this will be a narrowing, however slight, of the gap between what those who aspire to rule us say they are doing, and what they are actually doing. What these rulers are finding out the hard way is because of the internet it becomes harder and harder every day to pull the wool over anyone’s eyes, and less and less easy to pass anything off as ‘some wild conspiracy theory’ – the Establishment’s most effective tactic of the last twenty years.
No, that probably wouldn’t be good for Wikileaks. Israel has absolutely no sense of humor about that kind of thing.
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I don’t understand the US Govt, the pundit or the hacker response. Everyone seems to be digging themselves into a deeper hole.
The govt is mostly being embarrassed… about what it said, about its crappy security, etc. Anything the govt says and does publicly just increases the embarrassment. Why not just grit your teeth, be silent, and improve security? When you are digging a verbal hole, stop talking.
My cynicism causes me to suspect the people calling for killing Julian are just pandering to an audience. Maybe they have good intentions, or are even right, but I don’t see how they would fix anything at this point, and they scare me.
The hacker attacks are as misguided as the govt statements. They are a good way of teaching firms to not touch controversial groups. “If you help someone I like, then stop, I will punish you. But, if you refrain from any help, you are safe.”
Security is a valid concern, but it appears that horse has already left the barn in this case (the insurance file we’ve heard about). Worry about the next case.
The disproportionate response to the actions of Wikileaks, and the unpleasant emotions this appears to have elicited from government and individuals alike, sound more like the rantings of a cornered child with a guilty conscience than the proud nation that we once looked upon as the USA.
The also disproportionate (though in the opposite direction) response of the USA to the US based financial entities that masterminded (whether knowingly or unknowingly) the greatest and most successful terrorist act known in our lifetime, the Global Financial Crisis. A crisis that has thrown millions of their own citizens out of work and brought much of the world to its knees – Yet the guilty remain at liberty, substantially unregulated / unmonitored, and many rewarded for their behavior.
By any measure surely the greatest embarrassment is the changing global perception of what the USA stands for in the modern world. I for one would relish having my faith in the USA restored by seeing it focused on bringing the global terrorists residing within its boarders to justice and ignoring this Wiki Stirrer.
A wikileaks for financial malfeasance would really be interesting and possibly be of greater interest to the average person. Of course it would be open to manipulation, or just as I was saying about the original wikileaks, the leakers simply become additional nodes withing in the network of information and disinformation.
Now Assange is apparently saying supportive things about Netanyahu . . .
https://www.atimes.com/atimes/Middle_East/LL14Ak01.html
“In an odd twist to the WikiLeaks affair, positive words for Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu from Julian Assange, the organization’s founder, have fueled speculation that Israel conspired to release the US diplomatic cables. The claim is too politically motivated and simplistic to do justice to the complexity of the gray areas where the interests of powerful international players and anarchist hackers cross.”
What the State Department doesn’t seem to realize is there is nothing special about Wikileaks per se. Even if it could be stopped, and it can’t short of bringing down the internet, why not viki-leaks, bob-leaks, joe-leaks, 12345-leaks etc.? Anyone can hang out their shingle and make a vague promise to publish leaked information. Heck, the real leaker and can find any friend or stranger to do it. Since the object is to leak, the leaker doesn’t even have to trust the publisher. The leaker could send it to a variety of potential publishers, knowing that at least a few of them will publish anything of interest simply to get traffic. Assange has let the cat out of the bag.
Or maybe the State Department realizes everyone can publish leaks and the reals problem, if you wanted to intentionally leak information, is to establish the credibility of the leaker. How do you do that? Attack them of course. Attack their funding sources (no effect as they don’t need much money to setup a website anyway). Attack their site’s servers (ultimately ineffective anyway). Want to make the show even more credible ? – terminate (do in) the leaker. Of course you don’t want to let them in on this part of the plan, or they won’t want to play. 🙂
When governments are taking too much pressure for poor performance the best way to divert attention is focus attention somewhere else and to demonize something or someone.
Go and declare another meaningless war on some terrorist! One which you’ve no chance of winning.
Opportunity to create more laws and law enforcement agency!
“America is a country where, thanks to Congress, there are 40 million laws to enforce 10 commandments.”
1. US citizens stole confidential if not classified information to feed Wikileaks.
2. The enabler for this or prime motivator is Assange whose intent defines his actions, were he not a private citizen but a foreign power encouraging US citizens to behave in this manner this would be considered espionage probably 3. As to the Israel issue, do look up Anat Kam and Uri Blau, Israeli citizens who acted illegally and stole military secrets. Blau a reporter fled to the UK for asylum until his lawyers came to a plea bargain for return of all classified materials to Israeli Counter-Intelligence and the IDF.
Some of the information stolen by Blau and Kam was current and actionable and endangered the lives of Israeli soldiers etc. As an Israeli who served in the Army I have nothing but the utmost contempt for them and their ilk.
If anything the Israeli courts and law enforcement/ security services have been to mild in their treatment.
4. It’s time for the US Government to take a long hard look at their procedures on data security and do away with the antiquated, irresponsible systems of behaviour that enabled this to occur.
As a matter of interest, how many people who have recently embarrassed the US administration in non-criminal ways have subsequently been accused of sex crimes? I’m pretty sure I can remember at least two others.
Assange = poop-sock
Hiya, I was reading an additional factor about this on one more blog. Interesting. Your perspective on it is diametrically contradicted from what I read earlier. I’m nonetheless pondering of the opposite elements of view, but I’m leaning to a excellent extent toward yours. And irrespective, that is certainly what is so perfect about current democracy as well as the market of ideas online.
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