Peter Scheer: Can Mainstream Media Match WikiLeaks? Not Likely. Ever since WikiLeaks became a household word, traditional news media have had every reason to try to replicate its technology for receiving leaked documents, via the Internet, on an anonymous and secure basis. Traditional media may be at war with Julian Assange and disagree fundamentally with his methods in vetting and disseminating classified documents, but they can still see the appeal of a technical mechanism to frustrate eavesdropping on journalists and sources. If you're in the investigative journalism business, anything that protects confidential sources, enhancing the security of their communications with reporters, is an obvious benefit. Even more important is the media's desire to neutralize WikiLeaks' advantage in the competition for access to sensitive government records. So, will mainstream media be able to match WikiLeaks' leak technology? Of major U.S. news organizations, the Wall Street Journal is the first to try. Consider the terms of service for SafeHouse. Hmmm.
Abandoned in Guantanamo: WikiLeaks Reveals the Yemenis Cleared for Release for Up to Seven Years In all of the mainstream media analysis of WikiLeaks' recent release of Detainee Assessment Briefs (DABs) from Guantanamo, relating to almost all of the 779 prisoners who have been held at the prison over the last nine years and four months, one group of prisoners has so far been overlooked: the Yemenis. The most unfortunate group of men in Guantanamo, the Yemenis - 89 in total - make up over half of the 172 prisoners still held. In 2006 and 2007, when the majority of the Saudi prisoners were released, as part of a political settlement between the Bush administration and the Saudi government, which introduced an expensive rehabilitation program to secure the return of its nationals, no such deal took place between the US and President Saleh of Yemen. Just 23 Yemenis have been released from Guantanamo throughout its history and those who remain have found themselves used as political pawns. Cleared for Release Since 2004 The Case of Saeed Hatim and a Notoriously Unreliable Witness
05-11 What to Expect in the WikiLeaks Grand Jury Investigation A federal grand jury is meeting at 11 am EST in Alexandria, Virginia. The grand jury is being employed to “build” a case against Julian Assange, the WikiLeaks founder who just won a gold medal for peace and justice from the Sydney Peace Foundation. “The WikiLeaks case is part of a much broader campaign by the Obama administration to crack down on leakers,” writes Carrie Johnson of NPR. The number of people subpoenaed to appear before the grand jury is unclear (and not in any of the few news articles published on the grand jury so far). There are two other federal Grand Juries that are ongoing in the country. The last news reports on the Grand Jury investigating Anonymous came in the beginning of February. There are not many details known. Much further along in the grand jury process is the Grand Jury in Chicago. The activists subpoenaed consider the Grand Jury investigation to be a “fishing expedition.” Grand juries do not typically decline to issue indictments.
Transcript of interview with Julian Assange Transcript of interview with Julian Assange, founder and lead figure of WikiLeaks At the Oslo Freedom Forum – 2010 April 26. 2010 Location: Grand Hotel Oslo, Norway Interviewer: Hans Lysglimt, journalist ( www.twitter.com/lysglimt ) Email: hans at runbox.com Publisher of Farmann Magazine, Oslo Norway YouTube channel: Click on video image to open it in large format in Vimeo: Julian Assange interviewed by Hans Lysglimt from Johannes Aarmo on Vimeo . hanslysglimt@gmail.com (Hans Lysglimt left, Julian Assange right) On April 26. 2010 Julian Assange was invited to speak at the Oslo Freedom Forum ( an annual human rights conference in Oslo arranged by human rights activist Thor Halvorssen. Transcript of the interview: Hans Lysglimt: It is April. 26. 2010 we are here at the Oslo Freedom Forum and I am with Julian Assange, an Australian Internet activist. JA: We have stuff everywhere.
Did WikiLeaks Almost Blow the bin Laden Operation? Two weeks ago, WikiLeaks released its so-called “Gitmo Files”—hundreds of pages of classified documents detailing intelligence that captured terrorists provided the United States. As I point out in this morning’s Washington Post, the documents WikiLeaks made public included a file on Abu Faraj al-Libi, one of several CIA detainees who helped lead the agency to Osama bin Laden’s courier. While it garnered little attention at the time, the Abu Faraj document WikiLeaks exposed contained explosive information that could very well have tipped off al Qaeda that the CIA was closing in on bin Laden. The document says that Abu Faraj “reported on al-Qai’da’s methods for choosing and employing couriers, as well as preferred communications means” and described him as the “communications gateway” between bin Laden and his operatives in Pakistan. If al Qaeda leaders had read this classified document before Navy SEALs reached bin Laden’s compound, the results could have been disastrous.
The WikiLeaks Grand Jury and the still escalating War on Whistleblowing - Glenn Greenwald The contrast between these two headlines from this morning tells a significant story: From The Guardian (click image to enlarge): As Julian Assange wins the Sydney Peace Prize for “exceptional courage in pursuit of human rights,” NPR reports that “a federal grand jury in Virginia is scheduled to hear testimony on Wednesday from witnesses” in the criminal investigation of his whistle-blowing group, as “prosecutors are trying to build a case against [the] WikiLeaks founder [] whose website has embarrassed the U.S. government by disclosing sensitive diplomatic and military information.” The NPR story — based in part on my reporting of a Grand Jury Subpoena served two weeks ago in Cambridge — explains what has long been clear: that “the WikiLeaks case is part of a much broader campaign by the Obama administration to crack down on leakers.” And that does not count the impact of these revelations on the people most touched by them. As the ACLU succinctly put it: There you have it.
Wikileaks: Sri Lanka 'rejected rebel surrender offer' 10 May 2011Last updated at 17:46 The death of Velupillai Prabhakaran two years ago marked the end of the war The Sri Lankan government rejected a surrender offer by Tamil Tiger rebels at the end of the war, reports released through the Wikileaks website say. They say that Defence Secretary Gothabaya Rajapaksa dismissed US pressure to allow a mediated surrender with the words "we're beyond that now". The leaked US cables suggest requests for the International Red Cross to go into the war zone were refused. Sri Lanka's government has repeatedly denied all these accusations. The Sri Lankan civil war came to an end in May 2009 with the death of their leader Velupillai Prabhakaran after the Tamil Tigers made a last stand in the north-east of the island. Correspondents say that although Padmanathan was abroad at the time, it would not have been unusual for him as rebel head of foreign relations to make the offer. 'Energetically refused'
Case Against WikiLeaks Part Of Broader Campaign hide captionA federal grand jury is scheduled to hear testimony Wednesday in the government's criminal investigation into WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange. Carl Court/AFP/Getty Images A federal grand jury is scheduled to hear testimony Wednesday in the government's criminal investigation into WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange. A federal grand jury in Virginia is scheduled to hear testimony Wednesday from witnesses in one of the government's biggest criminal investigations of a national security leak. Prosecutors are trying to build a case against WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange, whose website has embarrassed the U.S. government by disclosing sensitive diplomatic and military information. The WikiLeaks case is part of a much broader campaign by the Obama administration to crack down on leakers. A Worrisome Development National security experts say they can't remember a time when the Justice Department has pursued so many criminal cases based on leaks of government secrets. Other Cases
FBI Raids Pro-Wikileaks Hackers The FBI conducted 40 raids yesterday and seized computers from members of the loosely organized group of hackers called Anonymous, and several members have posted their stories in online forums. Ars Technica uncovered the tales on a private online forum. Several people posted pictures of kicked-in doors. The reports could be fake, or exaggerated, but the FBI did serve 40 warrants in the case yesterday. The FBI was collecting evidence in the group's denial of service attacks against MasterCard, Visa, PayPal, and Amazon. Denial of service attacks are annoying to their victims, and can cause real financial damage. But Anonymous suspects a political motive in the raid. The attacks are punishable by up to 10 years in prison, according to the FBI. Join the conversation about this story »