WikiLeaks about to hit the fan

US Army says WikiLeaks suspect fit to stand trial
(The Associated Press, April 29, 2011)

The intelligence analyst suspected of illegally passing government secrets to the WikiLeaks website has been found competent to stand trial, the U.S. Army said Friday.

Army spokesman Gary Tallman says a panel of experts completed its medical and mental evaluation of Pfc. Bradley Manning on April 22, and informed Army officials Friday of the conclusion.

Tallman says no date has been set yet for the initial court hearing, and added that the evaluation board's findings "have no bearing on the guilt, innocence, or any potential defenses of the accused."

Manning's case is under the jurisdiction of the Army's Military District of Washington.

The Army private is suspected of obtaining hundreds of thousands of classified and sensitive documents while serving in Iraq and providing them to the website. He faces about two dozen charges, including aiding the enemy. That charge can bring the death penalty or life in prison.

Manning was transferred from a Marine Corps prison near Washington last week to a new facility in the Midwest state of Kansas.

He passed the lengthy physical and psychiatric evaluation given to new inmates there and received final clearance Thursday to live alongside other inmates, according to the facility's commander Lt. Col. Dawn Hilton.

He had been held at the Marine prison for the eight months after his arrest, and the conditions of his incarceration triggered protests and international inquiries.

At that prison, Manning had to surrender his clothes at night and was required to wear a military-issued, suicide-prevention smock. Manning's attorney and supporters said that was unnecessary and argued his living conditions, including his isolation from other inmates, were inhumane.

Pentagon officials consistently said he was being held under appropriate conditions given the seriousness of the charges against him.

Pentagon officials consistently said he was being held under appropriate conditions given the seriousness of the charges against him.

WikiLeaks Founder: "Facebook is the most appalling spy machine that has ever been invented"
(Matt Brian, TheNextWeb.com, May 2, 2011)

Despite awaiting extradition to Sweden on sexual assault charges, Wikileaks founder Julian Assange is still the subject of much media interest.

Russia Today (RT) interviewed Assange, getting his viewpoint on political unrest in Egypt and Libya, particularly probing what the Wikileaks founder makes of social media’s roles in the recent revolutions in both countries. In his interview, Assange focuses particularly on Facebook calling it the “most appalling spy machine that has ever been invented”.

Explaining in more detail, Assange affirms: "Here we have the world’s most comprehensive database about people, their relationships, their names, their addresses, their locations, their communications with each other, and their relatives, all sitting within the United States, all accessible to US Intelligence.”

According to Assange, it doesn’t stop with Facebook. He believes the social network is joined by Google, Yahoo and other major US organisations that have “built in interfaces for US Intelligence”: "It’s not a matter of serving a subpoena, they have an interface they have developed for US Intelligence to use. Now, is the case that Facebook is run by US Intelligence? No, it’s not like that. It’s simply that US Intelligence is able to bring to bear legal and political pressure to them. It’s costly for them to hand out individual records, one by one, so they have automated the process."

The Wikileaks founder then warns Facebook users, stating that if a user adds their friend to Facebook, they are “doing free work for US Intelligence agencies, in building this electronic database for them”.

Facebook rebuts Wikileaks’ Assange’s claims over US intelligence use of data
(Stephen Cox, LakestarMedia.com, May 4, 2011)

Wikileaks founder Julian Assange has taken the chance presented by an interview for Russia Today to fire a broadside at social media giant Facebook.

He was scathing in his criticism of the site, calling it the “most appalling spy machine ever invented.”

He went on to describe Facebook as “the world’s most comprehensive database about people, their relationships, their names, their addresses, their locations, their communications with each other, and their relatives, all sitting within the United States, all accessible to US Intelligence.”

And he added that, every time someone adds a friend to their Facebook page, they were “doing free work for US Intelligence agencies, in building this electronic database.”

Facebook, however, quickly rebutted Assange’s claims, saying that it fought very hard to preserve its users’ privacy. A spokesman said: “There has never been a time we have been pressured to turn over data -- we fight every time we believe the legal process is insufficient.

"The legal standards for compelling a company to turn over data are determined by the laws of the country, and we respect that standard," the Facebook spokesman added.

Wouldn't that be applicable to all "sites"?

A WikiLeaks job interview: Julian will see you now...
(Aled John, The Independent, May 9, 2011)

What would you do if you had to kill one man to save a hundred?" Long pause. "That's an impossible question to answer," I say.

"You've got two minutes to think about it before they all die," he says.

I am near the end of a somewhat unconventional job interview.

WikiLeaks is the organisation. My interviewer is Julian Assange.

It's hard not to feel self-consciously Tinker Tailor... about the whole affair. As I head to an imposing west London address, I wonder what I am walking into.

"You have no connection to either group of people."

I think I know the answer Assange wants. This is the climax of his questioning, covering my family background, parents' upbringing, religious beliefs, economic and social philosophy.

After about 30 seconds of silence, I muster a response.

"Well, if I could rationalise that the greater good would be achieved by saving more lives, then... I guess the man would have to go," I say, lying; unconvincing to myself, but maybe less so to my audience.

How strange to utter the death sentence of an unknown innocent for the "greater good" of the many, to impress in a job interview. This reductionist, moral utilitarianism seems ethically unjustifiable, but what do I know?

I wonder if I'm glimpsing the fringes of Assange's philosophy and it's unsettling. The idea is dangerous.

I look at him, perplexed. The claustrophobia of his house arrest and the siege mentality provoking this philosophy are reflected in his constant talk of being "at war" and echoed by the Stockholm Syndrome-lite relationship between him and his disciples. What risks are we to take for Assange's goal of ultimate transparency?

"Good answer," he says.

A few months ago I was forwarded an email, titled "Recruiting for WikiLeaks". I've worked as a junior journalist for a prominent news organisation for the last year, as WikiLeaks' impact has burned across the world. They were involved in big, interesting movements – cultural shifts, imperious challenging of authority for the notion of complete transparency. It was the sort of work I probably thought I wanted to be involved in: "Successful candidates will be disciplined, articulate, quick-witted, capable of multi-tasking and accustomed to lack of sleep. Ability to start immediately is essential."

This notice, to join the "press office of WikiLeaks London", was vague.

Not so sure how my CV would reflect how little sleep I get, however. It seemed strange they would interview a recent graduate with no PR experience for a role in an organisation that consistently gets attacked from big hitters, such as the US State Department.

Sitting there with Assange, it strikes me how small and disorganised the operation seems. Fewer than 10 people work there full-time and my role would consist largely of trawling through media reports about WikiLeaks and Assange. Do I want to spend my day monitoring public sentiment for and against this former hacker? Not really.

I suggest that Assange's profile and ego, compounded by his notorious court case, have overshadowed the work they do. He spoke of a desire to become recognised as a viable media publishing brand, bitterness that, not since the initial releases, have the British press taken on its stories for front page splashes and anger at its portrayal by the BBC. I suggest that people would be less suspicious if WikiLeaks revealed its workings and exemplified the transparency for which it calls. This was not an idea to which they warmed.

For all the initial excitement, I leave bewildered and deflated. Realising the vanity that had driven me to think of becoming involved in WikiLeaks, I resolve not to pursue it.

I suggest that people would be less suspicious if WikiLeaks revealed its workings and exemplified the transparency for which it calls. This was not an idea to which they warmed.

Anonymous hacked by one of its own
(Madalena Araujo, Cnet UK, 10 May 2011)

Infamous hacktivist group Anonymous has been hacked by one of its own. In a message posted to the AnonOps.in site, the group claimed a former member organised the attack, taking over its AnonOps.ru and .net communications sites and publishing names and IP addresses of users online.

After receiving media attention worldwide when Sony claimed it was unwittingly involved in hacking the PlayStation Network, it seems Anonymous now has its own crisis to deal with.

"We regret to inform you today that our network has been compromised by a former IRC-operator and fellow helper named 'Ryan'," the group claimed.

The hacker brigade strongly advised users to stay clear of the AnonOps network and added: "He decided that he didn't like the leaderless command structure that AnonOps Network Admins use. So he organised a coup d'etat."

After stealing the IP addresses of hundreds of the message board's users, the mysterious Ryan reportedly launched denial-of-service attacks against AnonOps.ru and AnonOps.net, the platforms that provide communications for the group. It is where hundreds of supporters have collaborated when they brought sites such as PayPal and Bank of America offline, and commanded the cyber attacks in support of WikiLeaks last year.

Anonymous is still under attack. Going to AnonOps.net diverts to a page with the title 'LOL ANONOPS DEAD' followed by some rather unpleasant language.

Despite repeatedly denying responsibility for the hack, Anonymous has been in the spotlight since the Chairman of Sony Computer Entertainment, Kazuo Hirai, wrote to US authorities suggesting the group played a role in Sony's massive data breach.

WikiLeaks: US opens grand jury hearing
(Ed Pilkington, The Guardian, 11 May 2011)

The US government has opened a grand jury hearing into the passing of hundreds of thousands of state secrets to WikiLeaks – the start of the process of deciding whether to prosecute the website and its founder, Julian Assange, for espionage.

The first session of the grand jury is understood to have begun in Alexandria, Virginia, with the forced testimony of a man from Boston, Masachusetts. The unidentified man was subpoenad to appear before the panel.

The terms of the subpoena – first revealed by the Salon blogger Glenn Greenwald – gave a clear indication that the jury has been convened specifically to consider whether to approve the prosecution of Assange and Wikileaks.

It said the hearing was investigating "possible violations of federal criminal law involving, but not necessarily limited to, conspiracy to communicate or transmit national defence information in violation of" the Espionage Act.

The Act, which was introduced in 1917 just after the US entered the first world war, was modelled on Britain's Official Secrets Act.

It was most famously applied, unsuccessfully, in 1971 against Daniel Ellsberg, who leaked the Pentagon papers on the Vietnam war.

The subpoena also reveals that the grand jury is considering approving a prosecution on grounds of "knowingly accessing a computer without authorisation or exceeding authorized access" and "knowingly stealing or converting any record or thing of value of the United States or any department or agency thereof".

That would appear to point more in the direction of Bradley Manning, the US military intelligence specialist currently facing court martial as the suspected source of the WikiLeaks documents.

The US has had a hard time so far trying to make charges, other than against Manning, stick in the WikiLeaks saga.

The Espionage Act has never been applied successfully against a non-government party, and to have a reasonable chance of prosecuting Assange or WikiLeaks as an organisation, the authorities would need to be able to prove to the satisfaction of a jury that they had actively encouraged or assisted the source of the leaks to transmit unauthorised material.

The FBI has been focusing its investigations aggressively on the hacker community of Boston, around the technology university MIT, in the hope of gaining information on how Assange made contact with his source. Wednesday's hearing is likely to be part of that effort.

The public radio network NPR pointed out that the WikiLeaks grand jury is just one of a spate of federal investigations into leaking that constitutes a major crack down by the Obama administration.

There are currently five separate criminal prosecutions relating to official leaks under way, a surge in activity that national security experts say is a worrying attack on the rights of whistle blowers.

The WikiLeaks grand jury, comprising of between 16 and 24 jurors, will sit in total secret. It will act as a kind of pre-trial, considering the prosecution evidence and calling witnesses, before finally deciding on whether or not to advance a prosecution.

How strange to utter the death sentence of an unknown innocent for the "greater good" of the many, to impress in a job interview. This reductionist, moral utilitarianism seems ethically unjustifiable, but what do I know?