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Tag: Wikileaks

  • Julian Assange Forms Wikileaks Party, Runs For Australian Senate Seat

    Early last year, Wikileaks founder Julian Assange found that he could technically run for the Australian senate while under house arrest in London. A lot has happened since then, but Assange’s political aspirations have not diminished.

    The Age reports that Julian Assange will be on the ballot for thet Australian Senate in Victoria come election time on September 14. He has been registered under the Wikileaks Party, a newly formed political party comprised of 10 close friends of Assange and pro-Wikileaks activists.

    The newly formed party, according to Assange’s father John Shipton, will be focused on “the democratic requirement of truthfulness from government.” It’s obviously a very Wikileaks-centric platform, but the party has yet to mention how it will use this to appeal to voters who probably have more than just government secrets on the mind.

    So, how does this all work? Assange is currently holed up in the Ecuadorian embassy in London as he evades a state mandated extradition to Sweden. The Age explains that Assange is eligible as an overseas elector:

    Australian citizens living overseas can enrol to vote as an overseas elector, and consequently run as a Senate candidate if they left Australia within the past three years and intend to return within six years of their date of departure.

    The rules make Assange eligible to run, but there’s a very real possibility that he would not be able to return to Australia even if he did win. If that turns out to be the case, he will appoint a Wikileaks party nominee to the seat.

    This is a strage, but not unexpected, turn of events. Assange may just be popular enough to win the election in September. If it’s successful, we may just start seeing Wikileaks parties popping up in countries all over the world, especially Europe. The continent has already seen an increase of applications for the alternative Pirate Party, which has already won a number of seats in various levels of government across Europe.

  • WikiLeaks: Aaron Swartz Was A WikiLeaks Source

    About a week and a half ago, Internet activist Aaron Swartz took his own life, as he faced criminal charges in connection with the alleged systematic downloading of files from JSTOR, with intent to distribute. Charges were dropped by the Justice Department following his death.

    Swartz’ family blamed his death on the justice system, and Anonymous hacked MIT in his honor (he had allegedly used MIT networks for the downloading his legal case dealt with).

    Over the weekend, WIkiLeaks tweeted that it believes Swartz was one of its sources, but can’t prove it due to its anonymity policy.

    WikiLeaks mentioned Swartz again in a tweet on Monday:

  • Place Your Bets Now On How Julian Assange Will Escape The Ecuadorian Embassy

    Julian Assange, founder of Wikileaks, is still holed up inside the Ecuadorian embassy in London. He’s been there since June, and it doesn’t look like he’ll be leaving anytime soon despite being granted political asylum. What if he did leave the embassy though? How would he do it?

    Irish bookie paddypower.com recently set up a betting page for Julian Assange. The site lists the various ways that Assange could escape the embassy and the odds going for each method. Some of the methods, such as a jetpack, are a little ridiculous, but that’s why the odds are set at 100/1.

    Operator of the This Day In Wikileaks blog, M Cetera, has created a pretty awesome gif showing off the more interesting escape plans that Assange could employ to get out of the embassy. My bet is on an official Ecuadorian car, but I wouldn’t be opposed to a dramatic escape via hot air balloon or jetpack.

    Julian Assange bets on escape

    It’s highly unlikely that any of these will actually come to pass. Assange will stay holed up in the embassy until he is allowed to leave for Ecuador. The UK and Sweden aren’t going to let that happen. Ecuador is doing its best to rally other South American countries around Assange’s right to asylum, but much of Europe and the US remain opposed.

    [h/t: Daily Dot]

  • Anonymous To Launch Their Own Wikileaks Competitor

    Anonymous and Wikileaks were the best of buds for the last few years. Members of the hacker collective even risked arrest to obtain emails from Stratfor that were leaked in the GIFiles. That’s why Anonymous wasn’t happy when Wikileaks began to implement aggressive fundraising tactics, including a paywall. In response, Anonymous is creating their own Wikileaks-style site.

    Speaking to The Voice of Russia, a member of Anonymous talks about the future of Wiklleaks and their own approach to the leaking game -TYLER. The representative says that Anonymous has serious concerns in regards to Wikileaks and will publish a paper on what they see as “ethical violations and lack of transparency problems” within the organization.

    Interestingly enough, they see the fate of Wikileaks intrinsically tied to that of Julian Assange. The representative even goes so far as to say that Assange is Wikileaks. Without him, the whole organization would falter. To that end, they are planning TYLER to be there when and if Wikileaks fails.

    So what is TYLER exactly? Anonymous wouldn’t go into much detail, but the representative did say that it won’t be “deployed on a static server.” Instead, TYLER will be “P2P encrypted software, in which every function of a disclosure platform will be handled and shared by everyone who downloads and deploys the software.” It’s their hopes that this system prevents it from ever being shut down.

    The hacker collective plans to launch TYLER on December 21, 2012. Anonymous says they chose the date for the publicity, not because they believe in any end of the world predictions. The launch of TYLER will also coincide with Project Mayhem, a movement that Anonymous hopes will inspire wide spread street protests and the publishing of embarrassing state secrets.

    For now, Wikileaks continues to operate as Julian Assange battles for his right to political asylum. The site would most likely continue to operate even if he were to be extradited to Sweden as well. It will be interesting to see who publishes the better information as Wikileaks is notorious for taking a long time between receiving and publishing information. Anonymous would most likely throw caution to the wind and publish any information that’s seemingly legitimate.

  • Wikileaks Angers Anonymous By Implementing A Paywall

    Wikileaks has always been about the free distribution of information. In every interview and speech, the site’s founder Julian Assange speaks on how important freedom of speech and information is to a democracy. That may be the site’s mission, but Wikileaks is incredibly underfunded. They may have found a way to fix that problem.

    If you went to check out the GIFiles on Wikileaks last night, you would be greeted by this:

    Wikileaks Paywall

    The paywall coincides with a new GIFiles release containing over 200,000 emails from Stratfor regarding Obama, Romney and their respective parties. The emails could garner significant interest from US citizens as we head into the final stretch of the election.

    All of this would be perfectly acceptable if it was just an ad asking for support. People are angry because Wikileak isn’t asking for support, they’re demanding it. The above image is a legitimate paywall that you can’t get behind unless you donate money. One of Wikileaks’ biggest allies wasn’t too happy with it.

    Anonymous, or at least the guy who runs the @YourAnonNews Twitter feed, was livid last night in regards to the paywall.

    The sentiments expressed here were widespread throughout Twitter with many users angry that Wikileaks would force donations. It appears that the anger got through to the Wikileaks staff as they reportedly suspended the paywall. Some people, such as yours truly are still seeing it, but others are getting to the site with no problems.

    In their defense, Wikileaks had this to say about the paywall:

    UPDATE: The paywall appears to have been taken down. Users can now access the GIFiles normally without having to donate.

  • Wikileaks Finds A Friend In Anonymous With #OpFreeAssange

    Wikileaks and Anonymous have been close for quite some time now. Many of the recent leaks that have come out of Wikileaks were obtained by members within Anonymous. With Julian Assange under fire at the Ecuadorian embassy, Anonymous have taken it upon themselves to back him up with their usual tactics.

    Computer World UK is reporting that Anonymous attacked various UK government Web sites with DDoS attacks. It’s called #OpFreeAssange and it’s a protest against the UK’s handling of the Assange situation. After being granted asylum by the government of Ecuador, the UK says that they will still arrest Assange if he steps out of the embassy.

    Anonymous took down the Web sites for the Ministry of Justice, the Department for Work and Pensions, the Home Office and the Prime Minister. Like most Anonymous protests, the main goal is to draw attention to the issue. The government isn’t going to give Assange a free ride just because Anonymous hacked a couple of Web sites.

    While the fight is taking place in the UK, it was started in Sweden. Anonymous is hoping to rile up the citizenry of Sweden to demand that the authorities stop their campaign against Assange. They took down the site for Primavi (it’s still down) and defaced it with a message and the YouTube video of Assange’s speech from the embassy.

    As of this writing, the UK sites are all back up and functioning properly. There appears to be a countdown clock pointing to when Anonymous will resume their DDoS attacks, however, so expect the sites to go back down in about 5 hours. Like I said, it won’t do them any good as far as influencing the outcome of all of this. We’ll just have to wait and see what comes out of a meeting of South and Central American countries later this week.

  • Wikileaks Says Assange Will Go To Sweden If Certain Conditions Are Met

    Wikileaks, and its Australian founder Julian Assange, have been under fire for the past two months. He has been holed up inside the Ecuadorian embassy since his bid to stay his extradition to Sweden was denied. It all came to a head late last week when Ecuador granted asylum to Assange and the U.K. threatened to storm the embassy.

    According to Wikileaks, all of this could be avoided if they could just get a simple guarantee from Sweden. A spokesperson for Wikileaks said that Assange would gladly go to Sweden for questioning if they were able to guarantee that Assange wouldn’t be extradited to the United States. He’s wanted in Sweden for questioning over alleged sexual misconduct.

    This particular case is made all the more strange as Ecuadorian government sources revealed that Sweden refuses to question Assange at the embassy. Sweden claims they only want to question him and that can be done anywhere. He’s not been formally convicted of any crime yet so why extradition? Wikileaks will tell you that the U.S. wants to extradite Assange from Sweden to stand trial under the Espionage Act.

    Ecuador’s Foreign Minister claims that they are providing asylum to Assange because the countries that “have a right to protect him have failed him.” It’s assumed that he means Australia and the U.K. as both countries are in support of Assange being extradited to Sweden. It’s made all the more problematic since Assange will not be receiving any aid from his home nation of Australia.

    Regardless of who’s right and who’s wrong, it’s still crazy to think that all of this has been caused by a Web site. The Wikileaks debate just proves the power of the Web – for good or for bad. It just so happens that a hacker turned journalist from Australia turned out to be the catalyst. He also tends to further fan the flames whenever he speaks, like yesterday’s speech from the Ecuadorian embassy. We’ll continue to monitor the situation and see if anything comes out of the first international incident caused by a Web site.

  • Julian Assange Demands That The U.S. Stop Persecuting Wikileaks

    It’s official – Julian Assange has been granted asylum by the South American country of Ecuador. Unfortunately for Assange, it’s looks like the U.K. government isn’t going to let him go. He’s been locked up inside the Ecuadorian embassy for almost two months now. The Wikileaks founder made a public appearance yesterday afternoon to address his being granted asylum and what he views as a “witch hunt” against whistleblowers.

    Assange made his speech from the balcony of the Ecuadorian embassy because he would be arrested on sight if he were step out of the building. He even referenced as much in the beginning of his prepared speech by saying, “I speak to you from up here, because I cannot be down there.”

    From there, Assange praised his supporters who came out to protest the police presence in front of the embassy on Wednesday night. He claims that the police would have raided the embassy if it wasn’t for his supporters Tweeting and live streaming the events to the world.

    He also praised Ecuador and its president, Rafael Correa, for taking “a stand for justice.” He also praised Ecuadorian Foreign Minister Ricardo Patino for upholding “the Ecuadorian constitution and its notion of universal rights.”

    After the numerous thanks were out of the way, Assange directly addressed his situation and the situation of others around the world who are being persecuted for being whistleblowers. He said that a threat against Wikileaks is a threat against “the freedom of expression and the health of all our societies.”

    He also said that this moment is integral for the United States and its continued prosperity. He questioned if the U.S. would “return to and reaffirm the values, the revolutionary values it was founded on” or would the country “lurch off the precipice dragging us all into a dangerous and oppressive world.”

    At that point, Assange directly addressed President Obama. He demanded that the administration “renounce its witch-hunts against Wikileaks” and “dissolve the FBI investigation.” He demands that the country must also “vow that it will not seek to prosecute our staff or our supporters.”

    He also came out in support of Whistleblowers and said that “the U.S. administration’s war on whistleblowers must end.” He called upon the U.S. government to pardon all the whistleblowers that have been detained during the current administration and that they must be compensated for their troubles.

    Finally, he made a special note to single out Private Bradley Manning who has been in detention for 815 days. He was arrested on charges of leaking confidential military documents to Wikileaks. He said that Manning is “a hero and an example to us all and one of the world’s foremost political prisoners.”

    As of this writing, Assange is still inside the Ecuadorian embassy. It remains to be seen if he will get to leave the country or not. There will be meetings among Latin and South American countries this week on the topic of Assange. For its part, the U.K. is not backing down on its threat to extradite Assange to Sweden.

    We’ll continue following this story and will update if anything happens. For now, here’s the video of Assange’s speech from yesterday:

    [h/t: The Independent]

  • Julian Assange Granted Asylum As UK Police Surround Ecuador Embassy

    We brought you word a few days ago that Julian Assange was to be granted asylum to Ecuador. The country’s president, Rafael Correa, quickly tweeted that the news was fake and that a decision would be made Thursday morning. It’s now Thursday morning and that decision has been made.

    Ecuador has announced that they are granting Julian Assange asylum. They claim that Assange can get in a car and drive to the airport under their protection.

    The news comes after a tough night that had the UK police lined up outside of the Ecuadorian embassy. The UK government claimed that they could invoke a law that would allow them to revoke Ecuador’s embassy status. That would allow the police to raid the embassy and arrest Assange. Ecuador says that no national law can supersede international laws such as the Geneva Convention. The country also said that any such action would be viewed as a “hostile act.”

    As many people on Twitter pointed out, this may be the first time that an International incident was caused over a Web site. Julian Assange was the founder of WikiLeaks, but is wanted in Sweden for questioning over rape charges. Many people saw the extradition to Sweden as just a stepping stone for extradition to the U.S. where Assange would face charges under the Espionage Act.

    As expected, Twitter has exploded with the news. Here’s a few of the choice Tweets:

     

    As the last Tweet points out, safe passage for Assange is going to be the big issue today. There are rumors going around on Twitter that Ecuador has granted Assange not only asylum but citizenship and diplomatic immunity as well. Under international law, the UK government would have to let him go. They’ve already proved that their willing to risk an International incident by threatening Ecuador so who knows what’s going to happen next. We’ll continue to follow the story as it develops.

    [Image Credit]

  • Julian Assange Granted Asylum To Ecuador [Rumor]

    The biggest political event this year isn’t the presidential race or that Mitt Romney chose Paul Ryan as his running mate. The biggest event that could have repercussions for years to come is the Julian Assange extradition case. If the U.S. had their way, Assange would be extradited to Sweden for questioning over an alleged “rape.” It looks like the U.S. isn’t going to get their way though.

    A government official from Ecuador told The Guardian that the country “will grant asylum to Julian Assange.” Assange has been holed up inside the Ecuadorian embassy in London for the past two months after his bid to avoid extradition was denied by the Supreme Court.

    We must still classify the news as rumor for now, but President Correa of Ecuador said that he will make an announcement regarding Assange’s asylum bid this week. The president was reportedly looking deeply into the political ramifications of granting asylum to somebody that the U.S. desperately wants to get ahold of.

    According to The Guardian, Assange may not be in the clear even if he’s granted asylum. He’s safe while he’s inside the embassy, but it’s fair game as soon as he steps outside. The police have an outstanding warrant on Assange for violating his bail conditions. It seems unlikely that the police would just let Assange leave the country.

    So what will happen if Assange does make it to Ecuador? He will be protected by their government, as he is now, but it would cause a huge stink among the governments that want a piece of him. It might even be enough to throw the coverage off of the current presidential race in the U.S. to nothing but Assange. The WikiLeaks founder would probably like nothing more.

    UPDATE:

    Ecuador’s President Rafael Correa just Tweeted out that the rumors about Assange being granted asylum are false. He also says that no decision has been made. He’s waiting for a report from his Foreign Minister:

  • WikiLeaks Back Up After Nine Days Of Sustained DDoS Attack

    WikiLeaks was in a bad place for a while. They were under a sustained DDoS attack that had lasted for nine days. It seems that the worst of it is now over as WikiLeaks is back up after making some improvements.

    On the official WikiLeaks Twitter account, the group announced that they were back up thanks to increased capacity installations:

    After getting back up, WikiLeaks decided to taunt their attackers into launching another DDoS attack at them:

    As we mentioned, WikiLeaks went down after they began publishing Stratfor emails on TrapWire. It’s a massive surveillance system that aims to stop terrorist attacks before they happen. It achieves this through monitoring surveillance footage from around the world that analyzes behavior patterns and license plates. For more on what WikiLeaks dubs “The Spyfiles,” check out their press release.

    What about AntiLeaks, the group claiming responsibility for the attacks? The group’s Twitter account has been quiet for the past 12 hours. Their next targets appear to be the Ecuadorian state television livestream. It remains to be seen if they will attack WikiLeaks again in the future. We’ll keep an eye out to see how the war between WikiLeaks and AntiLeaks plays out.

  • WikiLeaks Has Been Down For Nine Days Following Massive DDoS Attack

    WikiLeaks is no stranger to being brought down by DDoS attacks. The Web site has been attacked multiple times, usually after a major leak. This past week has been a little difference because the Web site and all its mirrors have been down for nine days. What did they leak this time that caused such an uproar and who’s behind such a massive attack?

    WikiLeaks says that they’ve been under attack since revealing TrapWire. According to a leak from Stratfor, TrapWire is a massive surveillance system operated by a private security company called Abraxas. Its goal is to collect information from security cameras around the nation and feed them into a central database. For more on TrapWire, check out this lengthy and comprehensive post that cuts through all the conspiracy theories that have popped up since its unveiling.

    WikiLeaks claims that their servers are being attacked by 10 Gbps of bogus traffic per second. If true, this is one of the largest DDoS attacks on record. Having lasted for nine days, it might also be the longest sustained DDoS attack on record.

    A group called AntiLeaks claims responsibility behind the attack. The group claims that Wikileaks is a terrorist organization. The DDoS attack is apparently their way of making sure that the group can’t release any more cables. Here’s a statement from AntiLeaks leader, DietPepsi:

    You can call me DietPepsi. I am the leader of AntiLeaks. We are not doing this to call attention to ourselves. We are young adults, citizens of the United States of America
    and are deeply concerned about the recent developments with Julian Assange and his attempt at aslyum in Ecuador.

    Assange is the head of a new breed of terrorist. We are doing this as a protest against his attempt to escape justice into Ecuador. This would be a catalyst for many more like him to rise up in his place. We will not stop and they will not stop us.

    When asked how long AntiLeaks would keep up its DDoS attack, the group simply said, “Forever.” It’s hard to say how possible that goal really is, but they have kept WikiLeaks down for over a week. Only time will tell if they’ll be able to keep WikiLeaks down for longer than two weeks.

    It’s hard to actually say who is behind AntiLeaks. There are probably many people in the pro-WikiLeaks camp who think it’s somebody within the U.S. government. There also also some who think that this is all just another self-serving media stunt like their fake NY Times editorial.

    Beyond the initial facts, nothing is really clear at the moment. It’s almost like the Internet has enabled a world like the one we see in comic books. I never thought that WikiLeaks would encounter a group called AntiLeaks, let alone do battle with them in cyberspace. Combine this with Trapwire and we have ourselves a great cyberpunk novel.

    We’ll continue watching WikiLeaks over the next few days. It’s only five days until AntiLeaks has kept the WikiLeaks down for two weeks. At that point, I think it would be safe to say that AntiLeaks is a legitimate group.

    [h/t: RT]

  • Fake NY Times Article Hurts WikiLeaks’ Credibility

    Journalism has many rules that its practitioners must abide by. There are the usual rules like don’t plagiarize and always confirm your sources, but there’s one that I think is the most evil sin of them all – making up stories and passing it off as news. WikiLeaks was the center of a controversy this week involving such a scenario.

    If you haven’t heard about it yet, there’s a fake New York Times op-ed piece floating around the Internet. It’s reportedly written by Bill Keller, former executive editor for the NY Times, and it comes out in defense of Wikileaks and the NY Times reporters who wrote stories on the leaks. You can read the fake op-ed over at the fake NY Times Web site.

    If you checked out the Web site, you can understand why people would have been fooled. It’s one of the most elaborate fake Web sites ever constructed. I consider myself to be pretty good at spotting fakes and I was caught with my proverbial pants down just like everybody else.

    In fact, we all thought it was real until Keller himself set the record straight on Twitter:

    So who was behind the fake NY Times article? It turns out that Wikileaks themselves were behind it the entire time. Here’s the full rundown of events leading to the fake op-ed from a pastebin post tweeted from the official Wikileaks account.

    1. Block New York times campaign starts late March.

    2. BlockNYTimes campaign “wrests control” back over http://blocknytimes.org and starts new twitter account @block_nytimes.

    3. Sunday morning, Anonymous & another other accounts start to tweet “Bill Keller opinion” article about bank blockade.

    4. Bill Keller twitter account with one “I” switched for “l” starts tweeting article, asking NYTimes journalists to reweet.

    5. NYTimes tech editor falls for it, re-tweeting to 125k followers. As do many others.

    6. A variation on the PayPal blog gives a statement on the Block NYTimes / WikiLeaks issue.

    7. Nine hours ago, @journalismfest tweets WikiLeaks, A Post Postscript by @nytkeller.

    8. Bill Keller apparently himself fooled(!) in the early morning retweets the “hoax” article tweet from @journalismfest.

    9. Bill Keller apparently discovers his error 5 hours later and GOES INTO CAPS MODE.

    10. Inexplicably Bill Keller @nytkeller then tweets “I am now a world expert in dressage. Ask me anything.”

    11. Bill Keller @nytkeller then deletes the tweet showing he was fooled and later the bizarre “dressage” tweet.

    12. WikiLeaks takes credit for NYTimes banking blockade hoax. But who else involved?

    Assange:”If the NYTimes cannot act with honnor to defend their ‘sources’ from economic censorship then we’ll just have to do it for them”

    Yes. We admit it. WikiLeaks (Assange & co) and our great supporters where behind the successful NYTimes banking blockade hoax on @nytkeller.

    What is not a hoax, is that WikiLeaks is under illegal economic censorship by US financial insitutions and NYTimes says nothing. The rats.

    I make it no secret that I believe in the mission of Wikileaks, even if I don’t necessarily agree with their methods. I used to be on their side, but now I’m not so sure.

    I fancy myself a journalist from time to time, especially after studying under some of the greatest journalists I know at the University of Kentucky. I hold myself up to the ideals that they strive for. Creating fake op-eds and assuming the identity of a journalist as a prank or protest is not what a real journalist does. The folks at WikiLeaks should be ashamed of themselves for their little stunt.

    The fight for a more open government and transparency is important, but WikiLeaks is not part of that fight anymore as far as I’m concerned. They have proven that they’re more concerned with petty fame than any kind of real journalistic integrity.

  • Jeremy Renner Rumored For Julian Assange Role In Upcoming Wikileaks Film

    There have been few organizations in recent memory that have changed the way we receive news (and few that have stirred up as much controversy) than Wikileaks. Unsurprisingly, there are numerous films in the works that focus on Wikileaks and its founder Julian Assange – both on the documentary and drama ends of the spectrum.

    You can add another to the list of rumored Wikileaks movies, as Deadline is reporting that DreamWorks is still in the process of developing their own film.

    And apparently, they’re eyeing Jeremy Renner for the Julian Assange role.

    Renner, of course, burst on the scene with his Oscar-nominated performance as an emotionally scarred bomb technician in the film The Hurt Locker. Recently, you’ve seen him in The Avengers, and you’ll soon see him in the The Bourne Legacy.

    Also attached to the film is Bill Condon, director of Kinsey, Dreamgirls, and Twilight Saga: Breaking Dawn (Parts 1 & 2).

    The film would likely be based on at least two book about Wikileaks, WikiLeaks: Inside Julian Assange’s War On Secrecy, by David Leigh and Luke Harding, and Inside WikiLeaks: My Time With Julian Assange At The World’s Most Dangerous Website, by Daniel Domscheit-Berg. Dreamworks bought the right to those books back in March of 2011.

    You can be sure than any film about Wikileaks will not only tackle the controversial organization, but Julian Assange’s various legal struggles as well. At least, we would hop so.

  • Wikileaks Dumps The Syria Files, Over 2 Million Emails Leaked

    Syria is in a bad place right now. The violence has been terrible for quite some time, but the countless deaths of civilians has only recently captured the attention of the West. To help expose what’s been happening in the country, a group of revolutionaries shared leaked emails with Western press back in March. Wikileaks is now finishing the job.

    The latest release from Wikileaks is called the Syria Files and it hopes to shed some light not only on the current conflict, but the politics and decisions that led up to the violence that now consumes the country. Over 2 million emails from over 680 Syria-related domains cover the history of the region from August 2006 to March 2012.

    Wikileaks is once again partnering with press outlets around the world to share the information contained in the documents. Wikileaks themselves will be presenting much of the information, but the AP, alongside other international press outlets, will be publishing their own stories based on the leaks over the next two months.

    Julian Assange, currently fighting extradition to Sweden and seeking asylum in Ecuador, said that the material in the leaks is not only relevant to Syria:

    “The material is embarrassing to Syria, but it is also embarrassing to Syria’s opponents. It helps us not merely to criticise one group or another, but to understand their interests, actions and thoughts. It is only through understanding this conflict that we can hope to resolve it.”

    What Assange means is that the emails reveal the part that other countries have been playing in the conflict. It was only until recently that people started to pay attention to the conflict, but it has been going on for over a year now. It’s not beyond the realm of reason to assume that one or two of the major powers have had a hand in the conflict. We won’t know for sure until the emails start getting published though.

    Wikileaks also revealed that 42,000 of the leaked emails were infected with viruses or trojans. Those emails may have been traps set by the Syrian Electronic Army, the group that targeted Syrian protesters with fake Facebook phishing attacks. Weirdly enough, the same group also attacked the LinkedIn blog. Maybe the emails will provide further clarification on why the Syrian government hates social networks so much.

    If you want to take a look at the Syria Files, just head over to Wikileaks to check them out. Here’s hoping that these leaks will have a positive impact and help stop hostilities in Syria.

  • Julian Assange Still Seeking Asylum in Equador

    WikiLeaks Founder Julian Assange is still waiting for clearance from Ecuador’s government to grant him asylum. Assange is wanted in England on charges of sexual assault, but fled to the Ecuador embassy to avoid arrest. Police are not allowed to enter the embassy without the permission of the Ecuadorian government, who is now in the process of deicing if they will allow him to be granted asylum.

    The former computer hacker is wanted for skipping bail to avoid extradition to Sweden, where the charges are filed. They can allow him to live in equador (in which case he still runs the risk of being arrested on the way to the airport). They can allow British police to enter the Embassy, therefor allowing him to be arrested, or they could let him stay at the Embassy indefinitely.

    Right now the Ecuadorean authorities are waiting for information they requested from the UK, United States and Sweden before they make a decision, which could take a few days. In the meantime, Assange is given a a small furnished room to reside in.

    [source: reuters]

  • Julian Assange Applies For Political Asylum In Ecuador

    It was only a few weeks ago that Julian Assange, founder of Wikileaks, lost his appeal to the UK Supreme Court. It seemed like it was all but certain that he would be extradited to Sweden over charges of sexual assault. Then the unthinkable happened, Assange fled to the Ecuador embassy in London and filed for political asylum.

    The Independent is reporting that Assange fled to the Ecuador embassy on Tuesday afternoon. He applied for political asylum under the United Nations Human Rights Declaration. It is clear that Assange feels his extradition and charges he faces in Sweden are politically motivated. If granted asylum, he would be protected by Ecuador’s government against what he views as political attacks.

    The Ecuador embassy confirmed the application for asylum and said that he would remain under their protection at the embassy until they finish processing his request. While they are protecting Assage, it would seem that the Ecuadorian government isn’t trying to make enemies of those who want the Wikileaks founder. The embassy issued a statement stating they are not intending to interfere in the “judicial processes of either the United Kingdom or Sweden.” They also will apparently speak with delegates from the UK, Sweden and the US on the matter.

    If Assange’s request for asylum is not granted, however, he could be in more trouble than before. The Independent is also reporting that Assange has breached his bail conditions by going to the embassy. His bail conditions stated that he had to remain at a specific address from 10 p.m. to 8 a.m. Since he stayed overnight at the embassy, he violated the bail conditions and is now wanted by the police.

    All of this is just one more crazy layer on top of the already crazy Wikileaks saga. It’s anybody’s game now and nobody knows where it’s going to end up. Will Assange be granted asylum and find himself taking it easy in Ecuador? Or will his request be rejected and end up behind bars in Sweden? We probably won’t know anything for a few days, but we’ll let you know as soon as we do.

  • Julian Assange Loses UK Supreme Court Appeal

    We received word last week that a decision would me made today in regards to Julian Assange’s bid to avoid extradition. It would appear that he he has lost that bid as the UK Supreme Court issued their verdict today and they are letting the extradition go ahead.

    Here’s the judgement from the document released by the UK Supreme Court:

    The Supreme Court by a majority of 5 to 2 (Lady Hale and Lord Mance dissenting) dismisses the appeal and holds that an EAW issued by a public prosecutor is a valid Part 1 warrant issued by a judicial authority within the meaning of section 2(2) and 66 of the 2003 Act.

    As we reported, Assange’s lawyers were challenging whether or not the Swedish public prosecutor could be considered a “judicial authority” when issuing a European arrest warrant. That argument obviously failed before the court. In their decision, the court says that the Vienna Convention extends “judicial authority” to prosecutors.

    “…the Supreme Court is not bound as a matter of European law to interpret Part 1 of the 2003 Act in a manner which accords with the Framework Decision, but the majority held that the court should do so in this case. The immediate objective of the Framework Decision was to create a single system for achieving the surrender of those accused or convicted of serious criminal offences and this required a uniform interpretation of the phrase ‘judicial authority’. There was a strong domestic presumption in favour of interpreting a statute in a way which did not place the United Kingdom in breach of its international obligations.”

    The two dissenters – Lord Mance and Lady Hale – said that the framework decision was unclear. In their statement, the two said:

    “In this case, the correct interpretation of ‘judicial authority’ in the Framework Decision, a question of EU law, was far from certain. Thus if Parliament had intended to restrict the power to issue EAWs to judges or courts, that would not have required a deliberate intention to legislate inconsistently with the Framework Decision. As the words in the statute were ambiguous, it was appropriate to have regard to ministerial statements, and those statements showed that repeated assurances were given that an issuing judicial authority would have to be a court, judge or magistrate.”

    After the verdict was made, RT reports that Assange’s legal team requested a 14-day extension. It’s reported that Assange’s defense lawyer, Dinah Rose, argued that the court’s decision was made based upon legal precedents that were not discussed during the appeal. In this case, the legal precedent is the

    So what’s next for Assange? Fair Trials International put together a informative document that details what the future holds for the Wikileaks founder. They say that Assange’s only hope at the moment is to appeal the decision to the European Court of Human Rights, but Fair Trials says that his extradition being stopped is very unlikely.

    As for Assange’s trip to Sweden, Fair Trials says that he can expect to be arrested upon landing in Sweden and then held in detention until his first court hearing. From there, it’s unlikely that he will be granted bail so he will most likely be stuck in detention until his actual court date. Fortunately, Sweden usually gets prisoners through the court system fairly quickly and Assange will have access to his lawyer throughout all of this.

    For their part, Wikileaks has been rather quiet since the ruling came this morning. Their Twitter account announced the verdict and gave out some resources regarding the trial. There has been no formal announcement from Assange or anybody on his legal team.

    It looks like the fight against extradition is not over yet. We’ll keep an eye out for any developments today and throughout the week. It will be interesting to see the reaction from both sides of the debate.

    [Lead image: Protests outside of Supreme Court this morning courtesy of @_cypherpunks_]

  • Julian Assange To Find Out If He’s Being Extradited Next Week

    It’s been a long time since Julian Assange was arrested for an alleged rape and sexual assault in Sweden. According to Wikileaks, he’s been detained in house arrest for 533 days. He’s been in and out of court hearings, starting a TV show, running for Australian government positions and even guest starring on the Simpsons. It’s those court hearings that are the most important though and we should finally hear a verdict next week.

    The Guardian is reporting that the U.K. supreme court will finally decide on whether or not Assange should be extradited to Sweden. The verdict is expected to come Wednesday, but they’ve been putting off this verdict for long enough already. I wouldn’t be surprised if it was delayed once again.

    For those who are just joining us, the case is pretty simple. Swedish prosecutor Marianne Ny issued the original European Arrest Warrant for Assange. The Wikileaks founder’s lawyers argue that Ny outstepped her authority to issue such a warrant. During the appeal proceedings in February, the defense argued that Ny “lacks the impartiality and the independence from both the executive and the parties which constitute essential features of the exercise of judicial authority under domestic and European law.”

    The Swedish authorities argue that they don’t need to be “independent and impartial” when in the “preliminary stages of an investigation.” Sweden apparently thinks that extraditing an Australian citizen from the U.K. to Sweden is part of a preliminary investigation. I don’t know what preliminary means in Sweden, but I’m pretty sure it doesn’t mean a full-fledged extradition that assumes Assange is guilty without trial.

    Seven justices will be deciding the Assange case according to The Guardian. They speculate that the large number of justices means that the U.K. is taking the issue very seriously. That could be why they have taken so long to decide this particular case.

    If Assange does lose the appeal, he still has one avenue available to him. He can take the case up to the European Court of Human Rights which only has 14 days to respond to the appeal. This isn’t the first time the ECHR has shown up recently as one of the founders of The Pirate Bay has appealed to it as a last ditch effort to avoid fines and a prison sentence.

    If the U.K. Supreme Court does deliver a verdict next Wednesday, we’ll be sure to let you know. The outcome of this case has a lot riding on it. Not only will the outcome immediately affect Assange, but it could have an effect on future extradition proceedings.

    [lead photo courtesy of acidpolly on flickr]

  • Friends of Wikileaks Social Network Launched

    A new social network has popped up, and its mission is to support Wikileaks. The website Friends of Wikileaks (FoWL) will not connect members with friends, but will connect them with like-minded individuals. The goal of the site is to connect people who support Wikileaks and its mission. From the website:

    Friends of WikiLeaks is a network of people from across the globe who defend WikiLeaks, its people, its alleged sources and its mission. We publicly and privately promote WikiLeaks and individuals and organisations aligned with the mission of WikiLeaks. This site will help you to join with people like you in your area and across the world. You will make new friends and new allies, care for treasured values and fight in common cause.

    The site is now in beta, and users can sign up to become part of the network. Once the network grows to an appropriate size, all members will be given six “candidate friends” from their geographical region and six other “candidate friends” from around the world that speak their same language. Members will always have only 12 friends in their network, and inactive members can be kicked out of a group. Through these connections, FoWL hopes to create a sprawling, active, and worldwide network of Wikileaks supporters. The website has created a video to demonstrate the concept:

    FoWL is not a subsidiary of Wikileaks and doesn’t deal with the dissemination of sensitive information. The network simply seeks to unite disparate groups or individuals who share Wikileaks’ values of open information and the exposure of corruption. How, exactly, members of FoWL will support Wikileaks is left up to them. A large network of Wikileaks supporters could be very effective in organizing action, and if the social network garners a large number of members it will provide a powerful statement of approval for Wikileaks. However, this could come at the cost of the anonymity which often helps Wikileaks thrive.

    (via BGR)

  • WikiLeaks Is Also Taken Down By DDoS Attack

    The Pirate Bay was not the only one feeling the brute force of a massive DDoS attack yesterday. WikiLeaks was also being attacked, and unlike The Pirate Bay, nobody has come forward claiming responsibility yet.

    We were first alerted to the WikiLeaks takedown by the organization themselves. They tweeted out the details yesterday with two separate mirrors to their domain. One was up and running while the other was completely down.

    WikiLeaks
    @wikileaks     WikiLeaks has been under sustained DDOS attacks over the last 72 hours. http://t.co/NByASgoj is good, http://t.co/sf5x6ACU is flooded
    20 hours ago via web · powered by @socialditto
     Reply  · Retweet  · Favorite

    The Pirate Bay confirmed the message as well on their Facebook page while they were under attack. They make mention of “The year of the storm” which was a blog post written back when its founding members had their appeal denied. In that post, The Pirate Bay predicts that the clash between the Internet and governments would come to a head in 2012. With the Facebook post, we can assume that the attack on The Pirate Bay and WikiLeaks is seen as the beginning of what some may call the World War Web.

    The Pirate Bay 16 hours ago

    Wikileaks.org is also under attack.This sure is the year of the storm…As predicted here: https://thepiratebay.se/blog/204 Powered by socialditto  264 likes · 143 comments

    There is a valid reason for some people to want The Pirate Bay taken off the net. A lot of people in government feel that it threatens lives of those who are operating overseas when they release cables and other sensitive documents. WikiLeaks may have even been involved in the execution of an accused spy.

    As ZDNet points out, it’s a little suspect that WikiLeaks and The Pirate Bay get attacked at the same time. It could all be coincidence, but there are enough people who want both sites gone to warrant a collective assault on these sites.

    DDoS has always been the tool of attack for Anonymous and other fringe groups. It’s never really been publicly used by governments to attack Web sites they don’t like. The tables could be turning on these groups, however, if a government or other group feels like fighting fire with fire.

    At this point, we just don’t know who is behind these attacks. Who knows? Maybe WikiLeaks was also taken down because of a lack of porn. Stranger things have happened.