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Julian Assange

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Julian Paul Assange (play /əˈsɑːnʒ/ ə-SAHNZH; born 3 July 1971) is an Australian journalist,[5] publisher,[6][7] and internet activist. He is best known as the spokesperson and editor-in-chief for WikiLeaks, a whistleblower website. Before working with the website, he was a hacker, physics and mathematics student, and computer programmer.[8]

Assange founded WikiLeaks in 2006 and serves on the website's advisory board. In this capacity, he has received widespread public attention for his role in the release of classified material documenting the involvement of the United States in the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq, as well as the November 2010 release of classified American diplomatic cables.

He has lived in several countries and has told reporters he is constantly on the move. He makes irregular public appearances to speak about freedom of the press, censorship, and investigative reporting; he has also won several journalism awards for his work with WikiLeaks.

Assange's parents ran a touring theatre company. In 1979, his mother remarried; her new husband was a musician who belonged to a controversial New Age group led by Anne Hamilton-Byrne. The couple had a son, but broke up in 1982 and engaged in a custody struggle for Assange's half-brother. His mother then took both children into hiding for the next five years. Assange moved several dozen times during his childhood, frequently switching between formal and home schooling and later attending two universities at various times in Australia.[9]

Hacking and charges In the late 1980s, he was a member of a hacker group named "International Subversives", going by the pen-name "Mendax" (derived from a phrase of Horace: "splendide mendax," or "nobly untruthful").[9] In response to the hacking, the Australian Federal Police raided his Melbourne home in 1991;[10] he was reported to have accessed computers belonging to an Australian university, the Canadian telecommunications company Nortel,[9] and other organisations, via modem.[11] In 1992, he pleaded guilty to 24 charges of hacking and was released on bond for good conduct after being fined AU$2100.[9][12] The prosecutor said "there is just no evidence that there was anything other than sort of intelligent inquisitiveness and the pleasure of being able to—what's the expression—surf through these various computers".[9] Assange later commented, "It's a bit annoying, actually. Because I cowrote a book about [being a hacker], there are documentaries about that, people talk about that a lot. They can cut and paste. But that was 20 years ago. It's very annoying to see modern day articles calling me a computer hacker. I'm not ashamed of it, I'm quite proud of it. But I understand the reason they suggest I'm a computer hacker now. There's a very specific reason."[6]

Personal life In 1989, Assange started living with his girlfriend and soon they had a son. She separated from him after the 1991 police raid and took their son.[13] They engaged in a lengthy custody struggle.[9]

In 1993, Assange started one of the first ISPs in Australia, known as "Suburbia".[6] Starting in 1994, Assange lived in Melbourne as a programmer and a developer of free software.[12] In 1995, Assange wrote Strobe, the first free and open source port scanner.[14][15] He contributed several patches to the PostgreSQL project in 1996.[16] He helped to write the book Underground: Tales of Hacking, Madness and Obsession on the Electronic Frontier (1997), which credits him as a researcher and reports his history with International Subversives.[17] Starting around 1997, he co-invented the Rubberhose deniable encryption system, a cryptographic concept made into a software package for Linux designed to provide plausible deniability against rubber-hose cryptanalysis;[18] he originally intended the system to be used "as a tool for human rights workers who needed to protect sensitive data in the field."[19] Other free software that he has authored or co-authored includes the Usenet caching software NNTPCache[20] and Surfraw, a command-line interface for web-based search engines. In 1999, Assange registered the domain leaks.org; "But", he says, "then I didn't do anything with it."[21]

From 2003 to 2006, he studied physics and mathematics at the University of Melbourne but does not claim a degree.[9] On his personal web page, he described having represented his university at the Australian National Physics Competition around 2005.[22] He also studied philosophy and neuroscience.[23]

WikiLeaks was founded in 2006.[9][24] That year, Assange wrote two essays setting out the philosophy behind WikiLeaks: "To radically shift regime behavior we must think clearly and boldly for if we have learned anything, it is that regimes do not want to be changed. We must think beyond those who have gone before us and discover technological changes that embolden us with ways to act in which our forebears could not".[25][26][27] In his blog he wrote, "the more secretive or unjust an organisation is, the more leaks induce fear and paranoia in its leadership and planning coterie".[25]

Assange sits on Wikileaks's nine-member advisory board,[28] and is a prominent media spokesman on its behalf. While newspapers have described him as a "director"[29] or "founder"[10] of Wikileaks, Assange has said, "I don't call myself a founder",[30] but he does describe himself as the editor-in-chief of WikiLeaks,[31] and has stated that he has the final decision in the process of vetting documents submitted to the site.[32]

Like all others working for the site, Assange is an unpaid volunteer.[30][33][34][35][36] Assange says that Wikileaks has released more classified documents than the rest of the world press combined: "That's not something I say as a way of saying how successful we are – rather, that shows you the parlous state of the rest of the media. How is it that a team of five people has managed to release to the public more suppressed information, at that level, than the rest of the world press combined? It's disgraceful."[24]

Assange was the winner of the 2009 Amnesty International Media Award (New Media),[37] awarded for exposing extrajudicial assassinations in Kenya with the investigation The Cry of Blood – Extra Judicial Killings and Disappearances.[38] In accepting the award, he said: "It is a reflection of the courage and strength of Kenyan civil society that this injustice was documented. Through the tremendous work of organisations such as the Oscar foundation, the KNHCR, Mars Group Kenya and others we had the primary support we needed to expose these murders to the world."[39] He also won the 2008 Economist Index on Censorship Award.[40]

Assange was awarded the 2010 Sam Adams Award by the Sam Adams Associates for Integrity in Intelligence.[41][42] In September 2010, Assange was voted as number 23 among the "The World's 50 Most Influential Figures 2010" by the British magazine New Statesman.[43] In their November/December issue, Utne Reader magazine named Assange as one of the "25 Visionaries Who Are Changing Your World".[44]

On 12 November he was leading in the poll for Time magazine's "Person of the Year, 2010".[45]

Assange has said he is constantly on the move, living in airports.[46] He has lived for periods in Australia, Kenya and Tanzania, and began renting a house in Iceland on 30 March 2010, from which he and other activists, including Birgitta Jónsdóttir, worked on the 'Collateral Murder' video.[9] He has appeared at media conferences such as New Media Days '09 in Copenhagen,[47] the 2010 Logan Symposium in Investigative Reporting at the UC Berkeley Graduate School of Journalism,[48] and at hacker conferences, notably the 25th and 26th Chaos Communication Congress.[49] In the first half of 2010, he appeared on Al Jazeera English, MSNBC, Democracy Now!, RT, and The Colbert Report to discuss the release of the 12 July 2007 Baghdad airstrike video by Wikileaks.

On 3 June he appeared via video conferencing at the Personal Democracy Forum conference with Daniel Ellsberg.[50][51] Ellsberg told MSNBC "the explanation he [Assange] used" for not appearing in person in the USA was that "it was not safe for him to come to this country."[52] On 11 June he was to appear on a Showcase Panel at the Investigative Reporters and Editors conference in Las Vegas,[53] but there are reports that he cancelled several days prior.[54] On 10 June 2010, it was reported[55] that Pentagon officials are trying to determine his whereabouts.[56][57][58][59][60][61] Based on this, there have been reports that U.S. officials want to apprehend Assange.[62] Ellsberg said that the arrest of Bradley Manning and subsequent speculation by U.S. officials about what Assange may be about to publish "puts his well-being, his physical life, in some danger now."[52] In The Atlantic, Marc Ambinder called Ellsberg's concerns "ridiculous", and said that "Assange's tendency to believe that he is one step away from being thrown into a black hole hinders, and to some extent discredits, his work."[63] In Salon.com, Glenn Greenwald questioned "screeching media reports" that there was a "manhunt" on Assange underway, arguing that they were only based on comments by "anonymous government officials" and might even serve a campaign by the U.S. government, by intimidating possible whistleblowers.[58]

On 21 June 2010, Assange took part at a hearing in Brussels, Belgium, appearing in public for the first time in nearly a month.[64] He was a member on a panel that discussed Internet censorship and expressed his worries over the recent filtering in countries such as Australia. He also talked about secret gag orders preventing newspapers from publishing information about specific subjects and even divulging the fact that they are being gagged. Using an example involving The Guardian, he also explained how newspapers are altering their online archives sometimes by removing entire articles.[65][66] He told The Guardian that he does not fear for his safety but is on permanent alert and will avoid travel to America, saying "[U.S.] public statements have all been reasonable. But some statements made in private are a bit more questionable." He said "politically it would be a great error for them to act. I feel perfectly safe but I have been advised by my lawyers not to travel to the U.S. during this period."[64]

On 17 July, Jacob Appelbaum spoke on behalf of WikiLeaks at the 2010 Hackers on Planet Earth (HOPE) conference in New York City, replacing Assange due to the presence of federal agents at the conference.[67][68] He announced that the WikiLeaks submission system was again up and running, after it had been temporarily suspended.[67][69] Assange was a surprise speaker at a TED conference on 19 July 2010 in Oxford, and confirmed that WikiLeaks was now accepting submissions again.[70][71][72] On 26 July, after the release of the Afghan War Diary Assange appeared at the Frontline Club for a press conference.[73]

On 20 August 2010, an investigation was opened against Assange in Sweden in connection with an allegation that he had raped a woman in Enköping on the weekend of 14 August after a seminar, and two days later had sexually harassed a second woman he had been staying with in Stockholm.[74][75] Shortly after the investigation opened, however, chief prosecutor Eva Finné overruled the prosecutor on call the night the report was filed, withdrawing the warrant to arrest Assange and saying "I don't think there is reason to suspect that he has committed rape". He was still being investigated for harassment, which covers reckless conduct or inappropriate physical contact.[76] The second woman was a member of the Swedish Association of Christian Social Democrats, a Christian affiliate of the Swedish Social Democratic Party, who organized a seminar and news conference in Sweden for Assange. She was acting as Assange's spokeswoman and hosting him as a guest in her home during his stay in Sweden.[77] Assange said "the charges are without basis and their issue at this moment is deeply disturbing"; his supporters claim he is the victim of a smear campaign.[78] Assange denies any wrongdoing but admits to having had unprotected but, he says, consensual encounters with two women during a visit to Sweden in August.[77][79] He was questioned by police for an hour on 31 August,[80] and on 1 September a senior Swedish prosecutor re-opened the rape investigation saying new information had come in. The women's lawyer, Claes Borgström, a Swedish politician, had earlier appealed against the decision not to proceed.[81] Assange has said that the accusation against him is a "set-up" arranged by the enemies of WikiLeaks.[82]

In late October, Sweden denied Assange's application for a Swedish residency and work permit. Subsequently, on 4 November, Assange said that he is considering a formal request for political asylum in Switzerland as "a real possibility".[82] He would also move the WikiLeaks servers to Switzerland in order to "operate in safety."[83] However, according to the Swiss Refugee Council (Schweizerische Flüchtlingshilfe), his chances of obtaining asylum there are small. Assange would first need to claim protection from his native Australia, and then make a credible argument that Australia could not protect him. This would be extremely difficult, according to the organisation.[84]

On 18 November, Stockholm District Court approved a request to detain Assange for questioning on suspicion of rape, sexual molestation, and unlawful coercion.[85] Director of Public Prosecutions Marianne Ny, who had reopened the investigation in September, said she had requested the warrant because, "so far, we have not been able to meet with him to accomplish the interrogation."[85][86] Assange's British legal counsel, Mark Stephens, disputed this, saying "we were willing to meet at the Swedish embassy or Scotland Yard or via video link" and that "all of these offers have been flatly refused by a prosecutor who is abusing her powers by insisting that he return to Sweden at his own expense to be subjected to another media circus that she will orchestrate."[87][88] On 20 November, Sweden's National Criminal Police force issued an international arrest warrant for Assange via Interpol; an EU arrest warrant was issued through the Schengen Information System. "We made sure that all the police forces in the world would see it", a spokesman for the National Criminal Police said.[89][90][91][92]

Stephens dismissed the charges,[87] issuing a statement in which he called the allegations "false and without basis" and said "even the substance of the allegations, as revealed to the press through unauthorized disclosures do not constitute what any advanced legal system considers to be rape".[91][93] Assange's Swedish lawyer, Björn Hurtig, claimed that the evidence against Assange was "very meager. It's not enough to get him convicted for crime."[94]

On 24 November 2010, Assange lost an appeal against his detention, and thus remains under arrest in absentia and under an arrest warrant. The Svea Court of Appeal rejected his appeal and upheld the decision to remand him by the Stockholm district court.[86][95] In late November, Assange escalated the process by appealing to the Supreme Court of Sweden.[95][96]

On 30 November, 2010, Interpol issued a red notice against Assange for sex crimes. The notice is not an international arrest warrant, but requests that the public to contact local police with any information about his whereabouts.[97]

Main article: United States diplomatic cables leak

On 28 November, WikiLeaks began releasing more than 251,000 American diplomatic cables, many of which labeled "classified" or "secret". The following day, the Attorney-General of Australia, Robert McClelland, told the press that Australia would inquire into Assange's activities and WikiLeaks.[98] He said that "from Australia's point of view, we think there are potentially a number of criminal laws that could have been breached by the release of this information. The Australian Federal Police are looking at that".[99] McClelland would not rule out the possibility that Australian authorities will cancel Assange's passport, and warned him that he might face charges should he return to Australia.[100] McClelland also vowed to fully support any U.S. legal action against Wikileaks and Assange.[101] The United States launched a criminal investigation related to the leak of US government information by Assange and WikiLeaks on 29 November.[102]

On the same day, Deputy Foreign Minister Kintto Lucas of Ecuador considered offering Assange residency with "no conditions ... so he can freely present the information he possesses and all the documentation, not just over the Internet but in a variety of public forums".[103] Lucas believed that Ecuador may benefit from initiating a dialogue with Assange.[104] However, Foreign Minister Ricardo Patino stated on 30 November that the residency application would "have to be studied from the legal and diplomatic perspective".[105] A few hours later, President Rafael Correa stated that WikiLeaks "has committed an error by breaking the laws of the United States and leaking this type of information ... no official offer was [ever] made."[106] Correa noted that Lucas was speaking "on his own behalf"; additionally, he will launch an investigation into possible ramifications Ecuador would suffer from the release of the cables.[106]

Assange advocates a "transparent" and "scientific" approach to journalism, saying that "you can't publish a paper on physics without the full experimental data and results; that should be the standard in journalism."[107][108] In 2006, CounterPunch called him "Australia's most infamous former computer hacker."[109] The Age has called him "one of the most intriguing people in the world" and "internet's freedom fighter."[21] Assange has called himself "extremely cynical".[21] The Personal Democracy Forum said that as a teenager he was "Australia's most famous ethical computer hacker."[23] He has been described as thriving on intellectual battle.[110] He has been described as being largely self-taught and widely read on science and mathematics.[12]

Pentagon Papers whistleblower Daniel Ellsberg said that Assange "is serving our [American] democracy and serving our rule of law precisely by challenging the secrecy regulations, which are not laws in most cases, in this country." On the issue of national security considerations for the U.S. regarding Assange's release of American diplomatic cables, Ellsberg added that "any serious risk to that national security is extremely low. There may be 260,000 diplomatic cables. It's very hard to think of any of that which could be plausibly described as a national security risk. Will it embarrass diplomatic relationships? Sure, very likely—all to the good of our democratic functioning."[111]

On the other hand, Daniel Yates, a former British military intelligence officer, believes Assange has jeopardized the lives of Afghan civilians: "The logs contain detailed personal information regarding Afghan civilians who have approached NATO soldiers with information. It is inevitable that the Taliban will now seek violent retribution on those who have co-operated with NATO. Their families and tribes will also be in danger."[112]

Responding to the criticism, Assange said in August 2010 that 15,000 documents are still being reviewed "line by line", and that the names of "innocent parties who are under reasonable threat" will be removed.[113] This was in response to a letter from a White House spokesman. Assange replied to the request through Eric Schmitt, a New York Times editor. This reply was Assange's offer to the White House to vet any harmful documents; Schmitt responded that "I certainly didn't consider this a serious and realistic offer to the White House to vet any of the documents before they were to be posted, and I think it's ridiculous that Assange is portraying it that way now."[114]

Glenn Greenwald and others have criticized the media's profiles of Assange. Greenwald calls one New York Times article (written by John Burns) on Assange a "sleazy hit piece".[115][116] Burns defended his article, saying it was an "absolutely standard journalistic endeavour"; Greenwald disputed this, saying "What Burns did to Julian Assange is most certainly not a "standard journalistic endeavor" for The New York Times ... please show me any article that paper has published which trashed the mental health, psyche and personality of a high-ranking American political or military official—a Senator or a General or a President or a cabinet secretary or even a prominent lobbyist—based on quotes from disgruntled associates of theirs. That is not done, and it never would be. This kind of character smear ... is reserved for ... people without power or standing in Washington and, especially, those whom American Government authorities scorn. ... the Pentagon hates Assange and wants him destroyed, and therefore the "reporters" who rely on, admire and identify with Pentagon officials immediately adopt that perspective—and that's why he was the target of this type of attack".[115][117]

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77. ^ a b "Sex allegations against founder derail WikiLeaks' momentum", The Washington Post, 10 September 2010.
78. ^ Davies, Caroline (22 August 2010). "WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange denies rape allegations". The Guardian. www.guardian.co.uk...
79. ^ WikiLeaks: Interpol issues wanted notice for Julian AssangeThe Guardian, David Leigh, Luke Harding, Afua Hirsch and Ewen MacAskill, Tuesday 30 November 2010
80. ^ "WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange questioned by police". The Guardian. 31 August 2010. www.guardian.co.uk...
81. ^ "Sweden reopens investigation into rape claim against Julian Assange". The Guardian. 10 September 2010. www.guardian.co.uk...
82. ^ a b "Wikileaks founder may seek Swiss asylum: interview". The Sydney Morning Herald. 5 November 2010. news.smh.com.au... Retrieved 28 November 2010.
83. ^ "Al-ManarTV:: WikiLeaks Founder to Release Thousands of Documents on Lebanon 05/11/2010". Almanar.com.lb. www.almanar.com.lb... Retrieved 2010-11-29.
84. ^ "Wikileaks-Chef erhält kaum Asyl in der Schweiz" (in German). 20 Minuten. 5 November 2010. www.20min.ch... Retrieved 28 November 2010.
85. ^ a b "Sweden to issue int'l warrant for Assange". Breitbart.com. www.breitbart.com... Retrieved 2010-11-29.
86. ^ a b Wikileaks Assange's detention order upheld by Sweden. BBC
87. ^ a b "Europe - Warrant for WikiLeaks founder condemned". Ft.com. 2010-11-22. www.ft.com... Retrieved 2010-11-29.
88. ^ www.smh.com.au...
89. ^ Grundberg, Sven. "Swedish Police Files International Arrest Warrant For WikiLeaks Founder", Dow Jones Newswire, 19 November 2010.
90. ^ "Wikileaks' Assange faces international arrest warrant". BBC News. 20 November 2010. www.bbc.co.uk... Retrieved 25 November 2010.
91. ^ a b "Assange hits back at rape allegations". Australian Broadcasting Corporation. www.abc.net.au...
92. ^ Sweden issues international warrant for WikiLeaks founder. AFP
93. ^ "Swedish prosecutors seek Assange arrest". The Register. www.theregister.co.uk...
94. ^ Rising, Malin; Karl Ritter (18 November 2010). "Julian Assange Charges: Sweden Seeks To Detain WikiLeaks Founder In Rape Case". Huffington Post/AP. Archived from the original on 23 November 2010. www.webcitation.org... Retrieved 23 November 2010.
95. ^ a b "Court confirms arrest warrant for Assange". Sydney Morning Herald//AFP. 24 November 2010. Archived from the original on 24 November 2010. www.webcitation.org... Retrieved 24 November 2010.
96. ^ Washington Post report on Assange legal predicament
97. ^ "Wikileaks' Assange appeals over Sweden arrest warrant". BBC News. 1 December 2010. www.bbc.co.uk... Retrieved 2010-12-01.
98. ^ english.aljazeera.net...
99. ^ www.attorneygeneral.gov.au... entsbyWikiLeaks
100. ^ Australia warns Assange of possible charges if he returns to Australia
101. ^ Australia vows to back any US legal action against WikiLeaks founder
102. ^ Hillary Rodham Clinton comments in U.K. Daily Mail
103. ^ Ottawa Citizen online report of Ecuador offer of asylum to Assange
104. ^ WikiLeaks' Assange Offered Residency in Ecuador
105. ^ Ecuador alters refuge offer to WikiLeaks founder
106. ^ a b Ecuador backs off offer to WikiLeaks' Assange
107. ^ "'A real free press for the first time in history': WikiLeaks editor speaks out in London". Blogs.journalism.co.uk. 12 July 2010. blogs.journalism.co.uk... Retrieved 21 August 2010.
108. ^ "Julian Assange: the hacker who created WikiLeaks". Csmonitor.com. www.csmonitor.com... Retrieved 22 August 2010.
109. ^ Julian Assange: The Anti-Nuclear WANK Worm. The Curious Origins of Political Hacktivism CounterPunch, 25/26 November 2006
110. ^ Julian Assange, monk of the online age who thrives on intellectual battle 1 August 2010
111. ^ "Daniel Ellsberg: Wikileaks' Julian Assange "in Danger"". The Daily Beast. 11 June 2010. www.thedailybeast.com... Retrieved 5 July 2010.
112. ^ Yates, Daniel (30 July 2010). "Leaked Afghan files 'put civilians at risk'". Channel 4 News. www.channel4.com... Retrieved 1 August 2010.
113. ^ "Sweden Withdraws Arrest Warrant for Embattled WikiLeaks Founder". .voanews.com. 20 August 2009. www1.voanews.com... Retrieved 22 August 2010.
114. ^ "Informant says WikiLeaks suspect had civilian help". 1 August 2010. www.dawn.com... Retrieved 3 November 2010.
115. ^ a b "More on the media's Pentagon-subservient WikiLeaks coverage - Glenn Greenwald". Salon.com. 2010-10-27. www.salon.com... Retrieved 2010-11-29.
116. ^ Calderone, Michael. "NY Times reporter defends profile of WikiLeaks’ Assange | The Upshot Yahoo! News". News.yahoo.com. news.yahoo.com... Retrieved 2010-11-29.
117. ^ "The Nixonian henchmen of today: at the NYT - Glenn Greenwald". Salon.com. 2010-10-24. www.salon.com... Retrieved 2010-11-29.

# Archived versions of the home page on Julian Assange's web site iq.org (at the Internet Archive)
# Video profile on SBS Dateline
# WikiLeaks Founder Julian Assange: "Transparent Government Tends to Produce Just Government"
# "Video of US attack in Iraq 'genuine'". YouTube. 5 April 2010. www.youtube.com...
# Symington, Annabel (1 September 2009). "Exposed: Wikileaks' secrets". Wired. www.wired.co.uk...
# Meet the Aussie behind Wikileaks Fairfax New Zealand 8 July 2008
# "MSNBC Panel discusses WikiLeaks.org's "Collateral Murder" Video - Part 1". 5 April 2010. www.youtube.com...
# "Julian Assange Unedited Interview". Stephen Colbert (interviewer), Julian Assange (subject). The Colbert Report. Comedy Central. 12 April 2010. No. 6049.
# "WikiLeaks editor on Apache combat video: No excuse for US killing civilians". RussiaToday. April 2010. www.youtube.com...
# "WikiLeaks Release 1.0: Insight into vision, motivation and innovation". 26th Chaos Communication Congress. 30 December 2009. events.ccc.de...
# Goodman, Amy (6 April 2010). "Massacre Caught on Tape: US Military Confirms Authenticity of Their Own Chilling Video Showing Killing of Journalists". Democracy Now. www.democracynow.org...

WikiLeaks is an international non-profit media organization that publishes submissions of otherwise unavailable documents from anonymous sources and leaks. Its website, launched in 2006, is run by The Sunshine Press.[1] Within a year of its launch, the site claimed a database that had grown to more than 1.2 million documents.[3]

The organization has described itself as having been founded by Chinese dissidents, as well as journalists, mathematicians, and start-up company technologists from the U.S., Taiwan, Europe, Australia, and South Africa.[1] Newspaper articles and The New Yorker magazine (7 June 2010) describe Julian Assange, an Australian Internet activist, as its director.[4]

WikiLeaks has won a number of awards, including the 2008 Economist magazine New Media Award.[5] In June 2009, WikiLeaks and Julian Assange won Amnesty International's UK Media Award (in the category "New Media") for the 2008 publication of "Kenya: The Cry of Blood – Extra Judicial Killings and Disappearances",[6] a report by the Kenya National Commission on Human Rights about police killings in Kenya.[7] In May 2010, the New York Daily News listed WikiLeaks first in a ranking of "websites that could totally change the news".[8]

In April 2010, WikiLeaks posted video from a 2007 incident in which Iraqi civilians were killed by U.S. forces, on a website called Collateral Murder. In July of the same year, WikiLeaks released Afghan War Diary, a compilation of more than 76,900 documents about the War in Afghanistan not previously available for public review.[9] In October, the group released a package of almost 400,000 documents called the Iraq War Logs in coordination with major commercial media organisations.

WikiLeaks was launched as a user-editable site, but has progressively moved towards a more traditional publication model, and no longer accepts either user comments or edits. Wikipedia cofounder Jimmy Wales says it is not a wiki.[10]

The WikiLeaks website first appeared on the Internet in January 2007.[11] The site claims to have been "founded by Chinese dissidents, journalists, mathematicians and start-up company technologists, from the US, Taiwan, Europe, Australia and South Africa".[1] The creators of WikiLeaks have not been formally identified.[12] It has been represented in public since January 2007 by Julian Assange and others. Assange describes himself as a member of WikiLeaks' advisory board.[13] News reports in The Australian have called Assange the "founder of Wikileaks".[14] According to Wired magazine, a volunteer said that Assange described himself in a private conversation as "the heart and soul of this organization, its founder, philosopher, spokesperson, original coder, organizer, financier, and all the rest".[15] As of June 2009

Important Topic Updates
, the site had over 1,200 registered volunteers[1] and listed an advisory board comprising Assange, Phillip Adams, Wang Dan, C. J. Hinke, Ben Laurie, Tashi Namgyal Khamsitsang, Xiao Qiang, Chico Whitaker and Wang Youcai.[16] Despite appearing on the list, when contacted by Mother Jones magazine in 2010, Khamsitsang said that while he received an e-mail from WikiLeaks, he had never agreed to be an advisor.[17]

WikiLeaks states that its "primary interest is in exposing oppressive regimes in Asia, the former Soviet bloc, Sub-Saharan Africa and the Middle East, but we also expect to be of assistance to people of all regions who wish to reveal unethical behavior in their governments and corporations."[1][18]

In January 2007, the website stated that it had over 1.2 million leaked documents that it was preparing to publish.[19] An article in The New Yorker said

One of the WikiLeaks activists owned a server that was being used as a node for the Tor network. Millions of secret transmissions passed through it. The activist noticed that hackers from China were using the network to gather foreign governments’ information, and began to record this traffic. Only a small fraction has ever been posted on WikiLeaks, but the initial tranche served as the site’s foundation, and Assange was able to say, "[w]e have received over one million documents from thirteen countries."[20][21]

Assange responded to the suggestion that eavesdropping on Chinese hackers played a crucial part in the early days of WikiLeaks by saying "the imputation is incorrect. The facts concern a 2006 investigation into Chinese espionage one of our contacts were involved in. Somewhere between none and handful of those documents were ever released on WikiLeaks. Non-government targets of the Chinese espionage, such as Tibetan associations were informed (by us)".[22] The group has subsequently released a number of other significant documents which have become front-page news items, ranging from documentation of equipment expenditures and holdings in the Afghanistan war to corruption in Kenya.[23]

The organization's stated goal is to ensure that whistle-blowers and journalists are not jailed for emailing sensitive or classified documents, as happened to Chinese journalist Shi Tao, who was sentenced to 10 years in 2005 after publicising an email from Chinese officials about the anniversary of the Tiananmen Square massacre.[24]

The project has drawn comparisons to Daniel Ellsberg's leaking of the Pentagon Papers in 1971.[25] In the United States, the leaking of some documents may be legally protected. The U.S. Supreme Court has ruled that the Constitution guarantees anonymity, at least in the area of political discourse.[26] Author and journalist Whitley Strieber has spoken about the benefits of the WikiLeaks project, noting that "Leaking a government document can mean jail, but jail sentences for this can be fairly short. However, there are many places where it means long incarceration or even death, such as China and parts of Africa and the Middle East."[27]

On 24 December 2009, WikiLeaks announced that it was experiencing a shortage of funds[28] and suspended all access to its website except for a form to submit new material.[29] Material that was previously published was no longer available, although some could still be accessed on unofficial mirrors.[30][31] WikiLeaks stated on its website that it would resume full operation once the operational costs were covered.[32][33] WikiLeaks saw this as a kind of strike "to ensure that everyone who is involved stops normal work and actually spends time raising revenue".[34] While it was initially hoped that funds could be secured by 6 January 2010,[35] it was only on 3 February 2010 that WikiLeaks announced that its minimum fundraising goal had been achieved.[36]

On 22 January 2010, PayPal suspended WikiLeaks' donation account and froze its assets. WikiLeaks said that this had happened before, and was done for "no obvious reason".[37] The account was restored on 25 January 2010.[38]

On 18 May 2010, WikiLeaks announced that its website and archive were back up.[39]

As of June 2010, WikiLeaks was a finalist for a grant of more than half a million dollars from the John S. and James L. Knight Foundation,[40] but did not make the cut.[41] WikiLeaks commented, "Wikileaks was highest rated project in the Knight challenge, strongly recommended to the board but gets no funding. Go figure”. WikiLeaks said that the Knight foundation announced the award to "'12 Grantees who will impact future of news' – but not WikiLeaks" and questioned whether Knight foundation was "really looking for impact".[41] A spokesman of the Knight Foundation disputed parts of WikiLeaks' statement, saying "WikiLeaks was not recommended by Knight staff to the board."[42] However, he declined to say whether WikiLeaks was the project rated highest by the Knight advisory panel, which consists of non-staffers, among them journalist Jennifer 8. Lee, who has done PR work for WikiLeaks with the press and on social networking sites.[42]

On 17 July Jacob Appelbaum spoke on behalf of WikiLeaks at the 2010 Hackers on Planet Earth conference in New York City, replacing Assange because of the presence of federal agents at the conference.[43][44] He announced that the WikiLeaks submission system was again up and running, after it had been temporarily suspended.[43][45] Assange was a surprise speaker at a TED conference on 19 July 2010 in Oxford, and confirmed that WikiLeaks was now accepting submissions again.[46][47]

Upon returning to the U.S. from the Netherlands, on 29 July, Appelbaum was detained for three hours at the airport by U.S. agents, according to anonymous sources.[48] The sources told Cnet that Appelbaum's bag was searched, receipts from his bag were photocopied, his laptop was inspected, although in what manner was unclear.[48] Appelbaum reportedly refused to answer questions without a lawyer present, and was not allowed to make a phone call. His three mobile phones were reportedly taken and not returned.[48] On 31 July, he spoke at a Defcon conference and mentioned his phone being "seized". After speaking, he was approached by two FBI agents and questioned.[48]

According to a January 2010 interview, the WikiLeaks team then consisted of five people working full-time and about 800 people who worked occasionally, none of whom were compensated.[34] WikiLeaks has no official headquarters. The expenses per year are about €200,000, mainly for servers and bureaucracy, but would reach €600,000 if work currently done by volunteers were paid for.[34] WikiLeaks does not pay for lawyers, as hundreds of thousands of dollars in legal support have been donated by media organisations such as the Associated Press, The Los Angeles Times, and the National Newspaper Publishers Association.[34] Its only revenue stream is donations, but WikiLeaks is planning to add an auction model to sell early access to documents.[34] According to the Wau Holland Foundation, WikiLeaks receives no money for personnel costs, only for hardware, travelling and bandwidth.[49] An article in TechEYE.net wrote

As a charity accountable under German law, donations for Wikileaks can be made to the foundation. Funds are held in escrow and are given to Wikileaks after the whistleblower website files an application containing a statement with proof of payment. The foundation does not pay any sort of salary nor give any renumeration [sic] to Wikileaks' personnel, corroborating the statement of the site's German representative Daniel Schmitt (real name Daniel Domscheit-Berg)[50] on national television that all personnel works voluntarily, even its speakers.[49]

There has been public disagreement between Julian Assange and Daniel Domscheit-Berg, who was suspended by Assange and on 28 September announced he would leave the company.[51][52][53] In October 2010, it was reported that Moneybookers, which collected donations for WikiLeaks, had ended its relationship with the site. Moneybookers stated that its decision had been made "to comply with money laundering or other investigations conducted by government authorities, agencies or commissions."[54]

WikiLeaks describes itself as “an uncensorable system for untraceable mass document leaking”. WikiLeaks is hosted by PRQ, a Sweden-based company providing “highly secure, no-questions-asked hosting services.” PRQ is said to have “almost no information about its clientele and maintains few if any of its own logs.” The servers are spread around the world with the central server located in Sweden.[55] Julian Assange has said that the servers are located in Sweden (and the other countries) "specifically because those nations offer legal protection to the disclosures made on the site". He talks about the Swedish constitution, which gives the information providers total legal protection.[55] It is forbidden according to Swedish law for any administrative authority to make inquiries about the sources of any type of newspaper.[56] These laws, and the hosting by PRQ, make it difficult to take WikiLeaks offline. Furthermore, "Wikileaks maintains its own servers at undisclosed locations, keeps no logs and uses military-grade encryption to protect sources and other confidential information." Such arrangements have been called "bulletproof hosting."[57][58]

On 17 August 2010, it was announced that the Swedish Pirate Party will be hosting and managing many of WikiLeaks' new servers. The party donates servers and bandwidth to WikiLeaks without charge. Technicians of the party will make sure that the servers are maintained and working.[59][60] Some servers are hosted in the converted former NATO nuclear bunker CyberBunker[61]

WikiLeaks is based on several software packages, including MediaWiki, Freenet, Tor, and PGP.[62] WikiLeaks strongly encouraged postings via Tor because of the strong privacy needs of its users.[63]

The "about" page originally read: "To the user, Wikileaks will look very much like Wikipedia. Anybody can post to it, anybody can edit it. No technical knowledge is required. Leakers can post documents anonymously and untraceably. Users can publicly discuss documents and analyze their credibility and veracity. Users can discuss interpretations and context and collaboratively formulate collective publications. Users can read and write explanatory articles on leaks along with background material and context. The political relevance of documents and their verisimilitude will be revealed by a cast of thousands."[64]

However, WikiLeaks established an editorial policy that accepted only documents that were "of political, diplomatic, historical or ethical interest" (and excluded "material that is already publicly available").[65] This coincided with early criticism that having no editorial policy would drive out good material with spam and promote "automated or indiscriminate publication of confidential records."[66] It is no longer possible for anybody to post to it or edit it, as the original FAQ promised. Instead, submissions are regulated by an internal review process and some are published, while documents not fitting the editorial criteria are rejected by anonymous WikiLeaks reviewers. By 2008, the revised FAQ stated that "Anybody can post comments to it. [...] Users can publicly discuss documents and analyze their credibility and veracity."[67] After the 2010 relaunch, posting new comments to leaks was no longer possible.[68]

WikiLeaks states that it has never released a misattributed document. Documents are assessed before release. In response to concerns about the possibility of misleading or fraudulent leaks, WikiLeaks has stated that misleading leaks "are already well-placed in the mainstream media. [Wikileaks] is of no additional assistance."[69] The FAQ states that: "The simplest and most effective countermeasure is a worldwide community of informed users and editors who can scrutinize and discuss leaked documents."[70]

According to statements by Assange in 2010, submitted documents are vetted by a group of five reviewers, with expertise in different fields such as language or programming, who also investigate the background of the leaker if his or her identity is known.[71] In that group, Assange has the final decision about the assessment of a document.[71]

The home of Theodor Reppe, registrant of the German WikiLeaks domain name, wikileaks.de, was raided on 24 March 2009 after WikiLeaks released the Australian Communications and Media Authority (ACMA) censorship blacklist.[72] The site was not affected.[73][74][75]

The Chinese (PRC) government uses its Golden Shield Project to attempt to censor every web site with "wikileaks" in the URL, including the primary .org site and the regional variations .cn and .uk. However, the site is still accessible from behind the Chinese firewall through one of the many alternative names used by the project, such as "secure.sunshinepress.org". The alternate sites change frequently, and WikiLeaks encourages users to search "wikileaks cover names" outside mainland China for the latest alternative names. Mainland search engines, including Baidu and Yahoo!, also censor references to "wikileaks".[76]

On 16 March 2009, the Australian Communications and Media Authority added WikiLeaks to their proposed blacklist of sites that will be blocked for all Australians if the mandatory internet filtering censorship scheme is implemented as planned.[77][78]

The black listing was removed 30th November 2010 [79]

The Centre for the Resolution of the Emergency Situation (CRES) is currently censoring the website WikiLeaks in Thailand[80] and more than 40,000 other webpages[81] because of the emergency decree in Thailand imposed as a result of political instabilities (Emergency decree declared beginning of April 2010[82]). When trying to access the WikiLeaks website, internet users are redirected to this webpage.

According to The Times, WikiLeaks and its members have complained about continuing harassment and surveillance by law enforcement and intelligence organizations, including extended detention, seizure of computers, veiled threats, “covert following and hidden photography.”[83]

After the release of the 2007 airstrikes video and as they prepared to release film of the Granai airstrike, Julian Assange has said that his group of volunteers came under intense surveillance. In an interview and Twitter posts he said that a restaurant in Reykjavik where his group of volunteers met came under surveillance in March; there was "covert following and hidden photography" by police and foreign intelligence services; that an apparent British intelligence agent made thinly veiled threats in a Luxembourg car park; and that one of the volunteers was detained by police for 21 hours. Another volunteer posted that computers were seized, saying "If anything happens to us, you know why ... and you know who is responsible."[84] According to the Columbia Journalism Review, "the Icelandic press took a look at Assange’s charges of being surveilled in Iceland [...] and, at best, have found nothing to substantiate them."[85]

WikiLeaks has claimed that Facebook deleted their fan page, which had 30,000 fans.[86][87][88][89]

On 25 November 2010, the UK Defence, Press and Broadcasting Advisory Committee sent DA-Notices to UK newspapers regarding an expected major publication by WikiLeaks of a "huge cache" of U.S. diplomatic cables.[90][91] According to Index on Censorship, "DA-notices point to a set of guidelines, agreed by the government departments and the media", and compliance is voluntary.[90] According to the information technology journal Thinq, DA-Notices "are generally adhered to."[91]

In July 2010 Veterans for Peace president Mike Ferner editorialized on the group's website "neither Wikileaks nor the soldier or soldiers who divulged the documents should be prosecuted for revealing this information. We should give them a medal.[92]

Documentary filmmaker John Pilger wrote an August 2010 editorial in the Australian publication "Green Left" titled "Wikileaks Must Be Defended." In it, Pilger said WikiLeaks represented the interests of "public accountability" and a new form of journalism at odds with "the dominant section ... devoted merely to taking down what cynical and malign power tells it."[93]

Daniel Ellsberg has been a frequent defender of WikiLeaks. Following the November 2010 release of U.S. diplomatic cables, Ellsberg rejected criticism that the site was endangering the lives of U.S. military personnel and intelligence assets stating "not one single soldier or informant has been in danger from any of the WikiLeaks releases. That risk has been largely overblown."[94] Ellsberg went on to note that government claims to the contrary were "a script that they roll out every time there's a leak of any sort."[95]

In 2008 Index on Censorship presented Wikileaks with their inaugural Economist New Media Award. In 2009 Amnesty International awarded WikiLeaks their Media Award for exposing "extra judicial killings and disappearances" in Kenya. [96]

In late November 2010 the government of Ecuador made what was, apparently, an unsolicited public offer to Julian Assange to establish residency in Ecuador. Deputy Foreign Minister Kinto Lucas stated "we are going to invite him to come to Ecuador so he can freely present the information he possesses and all the documentation, not just on the Internet, but in various public forums." [97] Lucas went on to state his praise for WikiLeaks and Assange calling them "[people] who are constantly investigating and trying to get light out of the dark corners of [state] information."[98]

WikiLeaks has attracted criticism from a variety of sources[99].

In 2007 John Young, operator of cryptome, left his position on the WikiLeaks Board of Directors accusing the group of being a "CIA conduit." Young subsequently retreated from his assertion but has continued to be critical of the site.[100] In a 2010 interview with CNET.com Young accused the group of a lack of transparency regarding their fundraising and financial management. He went on to state his belief that WikiLeaks could not guarantee whistleblowers the anonymity or confidentiality they claimed and that he "would not trust them with information if it had any value, or if it put me at risk or anyone that I cared about at risk."[101]

Citing the leaking of the sorority rituals of Alpha Sigma Tau, Steven Aftergood has opined that WikiLeaks "does not respect the rule of law nor does it honor the rights of individuals." Aftergood went on to state that WikiLeaks engages in unrestrained disclosure of non-governmental secrets without compelling public policy reasons and that many anti-corruption activists were opposed to the site's activities.[102]

In 2010 Amnesty International joined several other human rights groups criticizing WikiLeaks for not adequately redacting the names of Afghan civilians working as U.S. military informants from files they had released. Julian Assange responded by offering Amnesty International staff the opportunity to assist in the document vetting process. When Amnesty International appeared to express reservations in accepting the offer Assange disclaimed the group as "people who prefer to do nothing but cover their asses." Other groups that joined Amnesty International in criticizing WikiLeaks subsequently noted that, despite their displeasure over the issue of civilian name redaction, they generally appreciated WikiLeaks work. [103]

In an August 2010 open letter, the non-governmental organization Reporters Without Borders praised WikiLeaks past usefulness in exposing "serious violations of human rights and civil liberties" but criticized the group over a perceived absence of editorial control, stating "indiscriminately publishing 92,000 classified reports reflects a real problem of methodology and, therefore, of credibility. Journalistic work involves the selection of information. The argument with which you defend yourself, namely that Wikileaks is not made up of journalists, is not convincing."[104] The group subsequently clarified their statement as a criticism of WikiLeaks release procedure and not the organization itself, stating "we reaffirm our support for Wikileaks, its work and its founding principles."[105]

Many of the governments and organizations whose files have been leaked by WikiLeaks have been critical of the organization. Following the November 2010 release of United States diplomatic cables, U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton denounced the group saying, "this disclosure is not just an attack on America's foreign policy interests, it is an attack on the international community."[106] In an editorial published in The News, an English-language Pakistani newspaper, U.S. ambassador Cameron Munter said the United States "condemned" WikiLeaks release of diplomatic cables.[107] Peter King, chairman of the Homeland Security Committee of the United States House of Representatives has stated his support for listing Wikileaks as a "foreign terrorist organization" explaining that "WikiLeaks presents a clear and present danger to the national security of the United States."[108]

In August 2009, Kaupthing, a large bank, succeeded in obtaining a court order gagging Iceland’s national broadcaster, RUV, from broadcasting a risk analysis report showing the bank's substantial exposure to debt default risk. This information had been leaked by a whistleblower to WikiLeaks and remained available on the WikiLeaks site; faced with an injunction minutes before broadcast the channel ran with a screen grab of the WikiLeaks site instead of the scheduled piece on the bank. Citizens of Iceland felt outraged that RUV was prevented from broadcasting news of relevance.[109] Therefore, WikiLeaks has been credited with inspiring the Icelandic Modern Media Initiative, a bill meant to reclaim Iceland's 2007 Reporters Sans Frontieres ranking as first in the world for free speech. It aims to enact a range of protections for sources, journalists, and publishers.[110][111] Birgitta Jónsdóttir, a former volunteer for WikiLeaks and member the Icelandic parliament, is the chief sponsor of the proposal.

On 4 November 2010, Julian Assange told Swiss public television TSR that he is seriously considering seeking political asylum in neutral Switzerland and setting up a WikiLeaks foundation in the country to move the operation there.[112][113] According to Assange, Switzerland and Iceland are the only countries where WikiLeaks would feel safe to operate.[114][115]

WikiLeaks posted its first document in December 2006, a decision to assassinate government officials signed by Sheikh Hassan Dahir Aweys.[20] The New Yorker has reported that

[Julian] Assange and the others were uncertain of its authenticity, but they thought that readers, using Wikipedia-like features of the site, would help analyze it. They published the decision with a lengthy commentary, which asked, “Is it a bold manifesto by a flamboyant Islamic militant with links to Bin Laden? Or is it a clever smear by US intelligence, designed to discredit the Union, fracture Somali alliances and manipulate China?” ... The document’s authenticity was never determined, and news about WikiLeaks quickly superseded the leak itself.[20]

On 31 August 2007, The Guardian (Britain) featured on its front page a story about corruption by the family of the former Kenyan leader Daniel arap Moi. The newspaper stated that the source of the information was WikiLeaks.[116]

Main article: Bank Julius Baer vs. Wikileaks lawsuit

In February 2008, the __._ domain name was taken offline after the Swiss Bank Julius Baer sued WikiLeaks and the __._ domain registrar, Dynadot, in a court in California, United States, and obtained a permanent injunction ordering the shutdown.[117][118] WikiLeaks had hosted allegations of illegal activities at the bank's Cayman Island branch.[117] WikiLeaks' U.S. Registrar, Dynadot, complied with the order by removing its DNS entries. However, the website remained accessible via its numeric IP address, and online activists immediately mirrored WikiLeaks at dozens of alternative websites worldwide.[119]

The American Civil Liberties Union and the Electronic Frontier Foundation filed a motion protesting the censorship of WikiLeaks. The Reporters Committee for Freedom of the Press assembled a coalition of media and press that filed an amicus curiae brief on WikiLeaks' behalf. The coalition included major U.S. newspaper publishers and press organisations, such as the American Society of Newspaper Editors, The Associated Press, the Citizen Media Law Project, The E.W. Scripps Company, the Gannett Company, The Hearst Corporation, the Los Angeles Times, the National Newspaper Publishers Association, the Newspaper Association of America, The Radio-Television News Directors Association, and The Society of Professional Journalists. The coalition requested to be heard as a friend of the court to call attention to relevant points of law that it believed the court had overlooked (on the grounds that WikiLeaks had not appeared in court to defend itself, and that no First Amendment issues had yet been raised before the court). Amongst other things, the coalition argued that:[119]

"Wikileaks provides a forum for dissidents and whistleblowers across the globe to post documents, but the Dynadot injunction imposes a prior restraint that drastically curtails access to Wikileaks from the Internet based on a limited number of postings challenged by Plaintiffs. The Dynadot injunction therefore violates the bedrock principle that an injunction cannot enjoin all communication by a publisher or other speaker."[119]

The same judge, Judge Jeffrey White, who issued the injunction vacated it on 29 February 2008, citing First Amendment concerns and questions about legal jurisdiction.[120] WikiLeaks was thus able to bring its site online again. The bank dropped the case on 5 March 2008.[121] The judge also denied the bank's request for an order prohibiting the website's publication.[119]

The Executive Director of the Reporters Committee for Freedom of the Press, Lucy Dalglish, commented:

"It's not very often a federal judge does a 180 degree turn in a case and dissolves an order. But we're very pleased the judge recognized the constitutional implications in this prior restraint."[119]

A copy of Standard Operating Procedures for Camp Delta–the protocol of the U.S. Army at the Guantánamo Bay detention camp–dated March 2003 was released on the WikiLeaks website on 7 November 2007.[122] The document, named "gitmo-sop.pdf", is also mirrored at The Guardian.[123] Its release revealed some of the restrictions placed over detainees at the camp, including the designation of some prisoners as off-limits to the International Committee of the Red Cross, something that the U.S. military had in the past repeatedly denied.[124]

On 3 December 2007, WikiLeaks released a copy of the 2004 edition of the manual,[125] together with a detailed analysis of the changes.[126]

On 7 April 2008, WikiLeaks reported receiving a letter (dated 27 March) from the Religious Technology Centre claiming ownership of several recently leaked documents pertaining to OT Levels within the Church of Scientology. These same documents were at the center of a 1994 scandal. The email stated:
“ The Advanced Technology materials are unpublished, copyrighted works. Please be advised that your customer's action in this regard violates United States copyright law. Accordingly, we ask for your help in removing these works immediately from your service.

– Moxon and Kobrin[127]
”

The letter continued on to request the release of the logs of the uploader, which would remove their anonymity. WikiLeaks responded with a statement released on Wikinews stating: "in response to the attempted suppression, Wikileaks will release several thousand additional pages of Scientology material next week",[128] and did so.

After briefly appearing on a blog, the membership list of the far-right British National Party was posted to WikiLeaks on 18 November 2008. The name, address, age and occupation of many of the 13,500 members were given, including several police officers, two solicitors, four ministers of religion, at least one doctor, and a number of primary and secondary school teachers. In Britain, police officers are banned from joining or promoting the BNP, and at least one officer was dismissed for being a member.[137] The BNP was known for going to considerable lengths to conceal the identities of members. On 19 November, BNP leader Nick Griffin stated that he knew the identity of the person who initially leaked the list on 17 November, describing him as a "hardliner" senior employee who left the party in 2007.[138][139][140] On 20 October 2009, a list of BNP members from April 2009 was leaked. This list contained 11,811 members.[141]

In January 2009, over 600 internal United Nations reports (60 of them marked "strictly confidential") were leaked.[142]

On 7 February 2009, WikiLeaks released 6,780 Congressional Research Service reports.[143]

In March 2009, WikiLeaks published a list of contributors to the Norm Coleman senatorial campaign[144] and a set of documents belonging to Barclays Bank that had been ordered removed from the website of The Guardian.[145]

Main article: Climatic Research Unit email controversy

In November 2009, controversial documents, including e-mail correspondence between climate scientists, were released (allegedly after being illegally obtained)[146] from the University of East Anglia's (UEA) Climatic Research Unit (CRU). According to the university, the emails and documents were obtained through a server hacking; one prominent host of the full 120MB archive was WikiLeaks.[147][148]

WikiLeaks has published the lists of forbidden or illegal web addresses for several countries.

On 19 March 2009, WikiLeaks published what was alleged to be the Australian Communications and Media Authority's blacklist of sites to be banned under Australia's proposed laws on Internet censorship.[149] Reactions to the publication of the list by the Australian media and politicians were varied. Particular note was made by journalistic outlets of the type of websites on the list; while the Internet censorship scheme submitted by the Australian Labor Party in 2008 was proposed with the stated intention of preventing access to child pornography and sites related to terrorism,[150] the list leaked on WikiLeaks contains a number of sites unrelated to sex crimes involving minors.[151][152] When questioned about the leak, Stephen Conroy, the Minister for Broadband, Communications and the Digital Economy in Australia's Rudd Labor Government, responded by claiming that the list was not the actual list, yet threatening to prosecute anyone involved in distributing it.[153] On 20 March 2009, WikiLeaks published an updated list, dated 18 March 2009; it more closely matches the claimed size of the ACMA blacklist, and contains two pages which have been independently confirmed to be blacklisted by ACMA.

WikiLeaks also contains details of Internet censorship in Thailand, including lists of censored sites dating back to May 2006.[154]

Since May 2009, WikiLeaks has made available reports of several meetings of the Bilderberg Group.[155] It includes the group's history[156] and meeting reports from the years 1955, 1956, 1957, 1958, 1960, 1962, 1963 and 1980.

On 28 January 2009, WikiLeaks released 86 telephone intercept recordings of Peruvian politicians and businessmen involved in the "Petrogate" oil scandal. The release of the tapes led the front pages of five Peruvian newspapers.[157]

On 16 July 2009, Iranian news agencies reported that the head of Iran's atomic energy organization Gholam Reza Aghazadeh had abruptly resigned for unknown reasons after twelve years in office.[158] Shortly afterwards WikiLeaks released a report disclosing a "serious nuclear accident" at the Iranian Natanz nuclear facility in 2009.[159] The Federation of American Scientists (FAS) released statistics according to which the number of enriched centrifuges operational in Iran mysteriously declined from about 4,700 to about 3,900 beginning around the time the nuclear incident WikiLeaks mentioned would have occurred.[160][161]

According to media reports the accident may have been the direct result of a cyberattack at Iran's nuclear program, carried out with the Stuxnet computer worm.[162][163]

In September 2006, commodities giant Trafigura commissioned an internal report about a toxic dumping incident in the Ivory Coast,[164] which (according to the United Nations) affected 108,000 people. The document, called the Minton Report, names various harmful chemicals "likely to be present" in the waste — sodium hydroxide, cobalt phthalocyanine sulfonate, coker naphtha, thiols, sodium alkanethiolate, sodium hydrosulfide, sodium sulfide, dialkyl disulfides, hydrogen sulfide — and notes that some of them "may cause harm at some distance". The report states that potential health effects include "burns to the skin, eyes and lungs, vomiting, diarrhea, loss of consciousness and death", and suggests that the high number of reported casualties is "consistent with there having been a significant release of hydrogen sulphide gas".

On 11 September 2009, Trafigura's lawyers, Carter-Ruck, obtained a secret "super-injunction"[165] against The Guardian, banning that newspaper from publishing the contents of the document. Trafigura also threatened a number of other media organizations with legal action if they published the report's contents, including the Norwegian Broadcasting Corporation[164] and The Chemical Engineer magazine.[166] On 14 September 2009, WikiLeaks posted the report.[167]

On 12 October, Carter-Ruck warned The Guardian against mentioning the content of a parliamentary question that was due to be asked about the report. Instead, the paper published an article stating that they were unable to report on an unspecified question and claiming that the situation appeared to "call into question privileges guaranteeing free speech established under the 1689 Bill of Rights".[168] The suppressed details rapidly circulated via the internet and Twitter[169][170][171] and, amid uproar, Carter-Ruck agreed the next day to the modification of the injunction before it was challenged in court, permitting The Guardian to reveal the existence of the question and the injunction.[172] The injunction was lifted on 16 October.[173]

WikiLeaks has made available an internal .174] from Kaupthing Bank from just prior to the collapse of Iceland's banking sector, which led to the 2008–2009 Icelandic financial crisis. The document shows that suspiciously large sums of money were loaned to various owners of the bank, and large debts written off. Kaupthing's lawyers have threatened WikiLeaks with legal action, citing banking privacy laws. The leak has caused an uproar in Iceland.[175] Criminal charges relating to the multibillion euro loans to Exista and other major shareholders are being investigated. The bank is seeking to recover loans taken out by former bank employees before its collapse.[176]

Joint Services Protocol 440 ("JSP 440") is the name of a British 2001 Ministry of Defense 2,400-page restricted document for security containing instructions for avoiding leaks in the information flow caused by hackers, journalists, and foreign spies.[177][178] The protocol was posted on WikiLeaks on 3 October 2009.

On 25 November 2009, WikiLeaks released 570,000 intercepts of pager messages sent on the day of the September 11 attacks.[179][180][181] Bradley Manning (see below) commented that those were obvious NSA intercepts.[182] Among the released messages are communications between Pentagon officials and New York City Police Department.[183]

On 15 March 2010, WikiLeaks released a secret 32-page U.S. Department of Defense Counterintelligence Analysis Report from March 2008. The document described some prominent reports leaked on the website which related to U.S. security interests and described potential methods of marginalizing the organization. WikiLeaks editor Julian Assange said that some details in the Army report were inaccurate and its recommendations flawed,[184] and also that the concerns of the U.S. Army raised by the report were hypothetical.[185] The report discussed deterring potential whistleblowers via termination of employment and criminal prosecution of any existing or former insiders, leakers or whistleblowers. Reasons for the report include notable leaks such as U.S. equipment expenditure, human rights violations in Guantanamo Bay and the battle over the Iraqi town of Fallujah.[186]

Main article: July 12, 2007 Baghdad airstrike

On 5 April 2010, WikiLeaks released classified U.S. military footage from a series of attacks on 12 July 2007 in Baghdad by a U.S. helicopter that killed 12, including two Reuters news staff, Saeed Chmagh and Namir Noor-Eldeen, on a website called "Collateral Murder". The footage consisted of a 39-minute unedited version and an 18-minute version which had been edited and annotated. Analysis of the video indicates that the pilots thought the men were carrying weapons (which were actually camera equipment). When asked if they were sure that the men were carrying weapons, they answered in the affirmative.[187] The military conducted an "informal" investigation into the incident, but has yet to release the investigative materials (such as the sworn statements of the soldiers involved or the battle damage assessment) that were used, causing the report to be criticized as "sloppy."[188]

In the week following the release, "Wikileaks" was the search term with the most significant growth worldwide in the last seven days as measured by Google Insights.[189]

Main article: Bradley Manning

A 22-year-old US Army intelligence analyst, PFC (formerly SPC) Bradley Manning, was arrested after alleged chat logs were turned in to the authorities by former hacker Adrian Lamo, in whom he had confided. Manning reportedly told Lamo he had leaked the "Collateral Murder" video, in addition to a video of the Granai airstrike and around 260,000 diplomatic cables, to WikiLeaks.[190][191] WikiLeaks said "allegations in Wired that we have been sent 260,000 classified US embassy cables are, as far as we can tell, incorrect."[192] WikiLeaks have said that they are unable as yet to confirm whether or not Manning was actually the source of the video, stating "we never collect personal information on our sources", but that they have nonetheless "taken steps to arrange for his protection and legal defence."[191][193] On 21 June Julian Assange told The Guardian that WikiLeaks had hired three US criminal lawyers to defend Manning but that they had not been given access to him.[194]

Manning reportedly wrote, "Everywhere there’s a U.S. post, there’s a diplomatic scandal that will be revealed."[195] According to the Washington Post, he also described the cables as "explaining how the first world exploits the third, in detail, from an internal perspective."[196]

Main article: Afghan War documents leak

On 25 July 2010,[197] WikiLeaks released to The Guardian, The New York Times, and Der Spiegel over 92,000 documents related to the war in Afghanistan between 2004 and the end of 2009. The documents detail individual incidents including friendly fire and civilian casualties.[198] The scale of leak was described by Julian Assange as comparable to that of the Pentagon Papers in the 1970s. The documents were released to the public on 25 July 2010. On 29 July 2010 WikiLeaks added a 1.4 GB "Insurance File" to the Afghan War Diary page. The file is AES encrypted and has been speculated to serve as insurance in case the WikiLeaks website or its spokesman Julian Assange are incapacitated, upon which the passphrase could be published (q.v.).[199]

About 15,000 of the 92,000 documents have not yet been released on WikiLeaks, as the group is currently reviewing the documents to remove some of the sources of the information. Speaking to a group in London in August 2010, Assange said that the group will "absolutely" release the remaining documents. He stated that WikiLeaks has requested help from the Pentagon and human-rights groups to help redact the names, but has not received any assistance. He also stated that WikiLeaks is "not obligated to protect other people's sources...unless it is from unjust retribution."[200]

According to a report on the Daily Beast website, the Obama administration has asked Britain, Germany and Australia among others to consider bringing criminal charges against Assange for the Afghan war leaks and to help limit Assange's travels across international borders.[201] In the United States, a joint investigation by the Army and the Federal Bureau of Investigation may try to prosecute "Mr. Assange and others involved on grounds they encouraged the theft of government property".[202]

The Australia Defence Association (ADA) stated that WikiLeaks' Julian Assange "could have committed a serious criminal offence in helping an enemy of the Australian Defence Force (ADF)."[203] Neil James, the executive director of ADA, states: "Put bluntly, Wikileaks is not authorised in international or Australian law, nor equipped morally or operationally, to judge whether open publication of such material risks the safety, security, morale and legitimate objectives of Australian and allied troops fighting in a UN-endorsed military operation."[203]

WikiLeaks' recent leaking of classified U.S. intelligence has been described by commentator of The Wall Street Journal as having "endangered the lives of Afghan informants" and "the dozens of Afghan civilians named in the document dump as U.S. military informants. Their lives, as well as those of their entire families, are now at terrible risk of Taliban reprisal."[204] When interviewed, Assange stated that WikiLeaks has withheld some 15,000 documents that identify informants to avoid putting their lives at risk. Specifically, Voice of America reported in August 2010 that Assange, responding to such criticisms, stated that the 15,000 still held documents are being reviewed "line by line," and that the names of "innocent parties who are under reasonable threat" will be removed.[205] Greg Gutfeld of Fox News described the leaking as "WikiLeaks' Crusade Against the U.S. Military."[206] John Pilger has reported that prior to the release of the Afghan War Diaries in July, WikiLeaks contacted the White House in writing, asking that it identify names that might draw reprisals, but received no response.[207][208]

According to the New York Times, Amnesty International and Reporters Without Borders criticized WikiLeaks for what they saw as risking people’s lives by identifying Afghans acting as informers.[209] A Taliban spokesman said that the Taliban had formed a nine-member "commission" to review the documents "to find about people who are spying."[209] He said the Taliban had a "wanted" list of 1,800 Afghans and was comparing that with names WikiLeaks provided, stating "after the process is completed, our Taliban court will decide about such people."[209]

Sometime after the Love Parade stampede in Duisburg, Germany on 24 July 2010, the local news blog Xtranews published internal documents of the city administration regarding Love Parade planning and actions by the authorities. The city government reacted by acquiring a court order on 16 August forcing Xtranews to remove the documents from its blog.[210] Two days later, however, after the documents had surfaced on other websites as well, the government stated that it would not conduct any further legal actions against the publication of the documents.[211] On 20 August WikiLeaks released a publication titled Loveparade 2010 Duisburg planning documents, 2007-2010, which comprised 43 internal documents regarding the Love Parade 2010.[212][213]

Main article: Iraq War documents leak
Wikinews has related news: Wikileaks Releases Iraq War Logs

In October 2010, it was reported that WikiLeaks was planning to release up to 400,000 documents relating to the Iraq War.[214] Julian Assange initially denied the reports, stating: "WikiLeaks does not speak about upcoming releases dates, indeed, with very rare exceptions we do not communicate any specific information about upcoming releases, since that simply provides fodder for abusive organizations to get their spin machines ready."[215] The Guardian reported on 21 October 2010 that it had received almost 400,000 Iraq war documents from WikiLeaks.[216] On 22 October 2010, Al Jazeera was the first to release analyses of the leak, dubbed The War Logs. WikiLeaks posted a tweet that "Al Jazeera have broken our embargo by 30 minutes. We release everyone from their Iraq War Logs embargoes." This prompted other news organizations to release their articles based on the source material. The release of the documents coincided with a return of the main __._ website, which had been offering no content since 30 September 2010.

The BBC quoted the Pentagon referring to the Iraq War Logs as "the largest leak of classified documents in its history." Media coverage of the leaked documents focused on claims that the U.S. government had ignored reports of torture by the Iraqi authorities during the period after the 2003 war.[217]

Main article: United States diplomatic cables leak
Wikinews has news on this topic:

* Wikileaks to release thousands of secret documents; 'international embarrassment' likely, 27 November 2010
* Files will risk 'countless' lives, Obama administration warns Wikileaks, 28 November 2010
* Wikileaks website attacked; millions of files to be released tonight, 28 November 2010

On 22 November 2010 an announcement was made by the WikiLeaks twitter feed that the next release would be "7x the size of the Iraq War Logs."[218][219] U.S. authorities and the media have speculated that they may contain diplomatic cables.[220] Prior to the expected leak, the government of the United Kingdom (UK) sent a DA-Notice to UK newspapers, which requests advance notice from the newspapers regarding the expected publication.[90] According to Index on Censorship, "there is no obligation on media to comply". "Newspaper editors would speak to [the] Defence, Press and Broadcasting Advisory Committee prior to publication."[90] The Pakistani newspaper Dawn stated that the U.S. newspapers The New York Times and The Washington Post were expected to publish parts of the diplomatic cables on Sunday 28 November, including 94 Pakistan-related documents.[221]

On 26 November, via his lawyer Jennifer Robinson, Assange sent a letter to the US Department of State, asking for information regarding people who could be placed at "significant risk of harm" by the diplomatic cables release.[222][223] Harold Koh, Legal Adviser of the Department of State, refused the proposal, stating, "We will not engage in a negotiation regarding the further release or dissemination of illegally obtained U.S. Government classified materials."[223]

On 28 November, Wikileaks announced it was undergoing a massive Distributed Denial-of-service attack,[224] but vowed to still leak the cables and documents via prominent media outlets including El País, Le Monde, Der Spiegel, The Guardian, and The New York Times.[225] The announcement was shortly thereafter followed by the online publication, by The Guardian, of some of the purported diplomatic cables including one in which United States Secretary of State Hillary Clinton apparently orders diplomats to obtain credit card and frequent flier numbers of the French, British, Russian and Chinese delegations to the United Nations Security Council.[226] Other revelations reportedly include that several Arab nations urged the U.S. to launch a first strike on Iran, that the Chinese government was directly involved in computer hacking, and that the U.S. is pressuring Pakistan to turn over nuclear material to prevent it from falling into the wrong hands. The cables also include unflattering appraisals of world leaders.[227] U.S. congressman Peter T. King called for WikiLeaks to be designated as a terrorist organization in response to the leak of the cables.[228]

U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton responded to the leaks saying, "This disclosure is not just an attack on America's foreign policy; it is an attack on the international community, the alliances and partnerships, the conventions and negotiations that safeguard global security and advance economic prosperity." Julian Assange is quoted as saying, "Of course, abusive, Titanic organizations, when exposed, grasp at all sorts of ridiculous straws to try and distract the public from the true nature of the abuse."[229]

In May 2010, WikiLeaks said they had video footage of a massacre of civilians in Afghanistan by the U.S. military which they were preparing to release.[230][231]

In an interview with Chris Anderson on 19 July 2010, Assange showed a document WikiLeaks had on an Albanian oil well blowout, and said they also had material from inside BP,[232] and that they were "getting enormous quantity of whistle-blower disclosures of a very high caliber"[233] but added that they have not been able to verify and release the material because they do not have enough volunteer journalists.[234]

In October 2010, Assange told a leading Moscow newspaper that "The Kremlin had better brace itself for a coming wave of WikiLeaks disclosures about Russia."[235][236] Assange later clarified: "we have material on many business and governments, including in Russia. It’s not right to say there’s going to be a particular focus on Russia".[237]

In an interview with Forbes magazine, Assange announced that WikiLeaks was planning another "megaleak" for early in 2011, which this time would be from inside the private sector and involve "a big U.S. bank". That may lead to the failure of bank involved.[237]

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