Information published by WikiLeaks
Encyclopedia
Since 2006, the document archive website Wikileaks
, used by whistleblower
s, has published anonymous submissions of documents that are generally unavailable to the general public. This article documents the leaks which have attracted media coverage.
has reported that
(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.
was taken offline after the Swiss Bank Julius Baer sued WikiLeaks and the wikileaks.org domain registrar, Dynadot
, in a court in California, United States, and obtained a permanent injunction
ordering the shutdown. WikiLeaks had hosted allegations of illegal activities at the bank's Cayman Islands
branch. 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.
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 News 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
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:
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
. WikiLeaks was thus able to bring its site online
again. The bank dropped the case on 5 March 2008. The judge also denied the bank's request for an order prohibiting the website's publication.
The Executive Director of the Reporters Committee for Freedom of the Press
, Lucy Dalglish, commented:
–the protocol of the U.S. Army
at the Guantanamo Bay detention camp–dated March 2003 was released on the WikiLeaks website on 7 November 2007. The document, named "gitmo-sop.pdf", is also mirrored at The Guardian. 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.
On 3 December 2007, WikiLeaks released a copy of the 2004 edition of the manual, together with a detailed analysis of the changes.
,". On 7 April 2008, they reported receiving a letter (dated 27 March) from the Religious Technology Center
claiming ownership of the several 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 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", and did so.
, the contents of a Yahoo! account belonging to Sarah Palin
(the running mate of Republican presidential nominee John McCain
) were posted on WikiLeaks after being hacked into by members of Anonymous
. It has been alleged by Wired that contents of the mailbox indicate that she used the private Yahoo! account to send work-related messages, in violation of public record laws. The hacking of the account was widely reported in mainstream news outlets. Although WikiLeaks was able to conceal the hacker's identity, the source of the Palin emails was eventually publicly identified as David Kernell, a 20-year-old economics student at the University of Tennessee and the son of Democratic Tennessee State Representative Mike Kernell
from Memphis, whose email address (as listed on various social networking sites) was linked to the hacker's identity on Anonymous. Kernell attempted to conceal his identity by using the anonymous proxy service ctunnel.com, but, because of the illegal nature of the access, ctunnel website administrator Gabriel Ramuglia assisted the FBI in tracking down the source of the hack.
investigators involved, Oscar Kamau Kingara
and John Paul Oulu
, who made major contributions to a Kenya National Commission on Human Rights
(KNCHR) report that was redistributed by WikiLeaks, The Cry of Blood — Report on Extra-Judicial Killings and Disappearances, were assassinated several months later, on 5 March 2009. WikiLeaks called for information on the assassination. In 2009, Amnesty International
UK gave WikiLeaks and Julian Assange an award for the distribution of the KNCHR's The Cry of Blood report.
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. 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. On 20 October 2009, a list of BNP members from April 2009 was leaked. This list contained 11,811 members.
reports.
senatorial campaign.
'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 120 MB archive was WikiLeaks, although the information was not originally leaked to them.
. In an editorial on the issue, The Guardian pointed out that, due to the mismatch of resources, tax collectors (HMRC) now have to rely on websites such as Wikileaks to obtain such documents.
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
. 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
, the list leaked on WikiLeaks contains a number of sites unrelated to sex crimes involving minors. 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. 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.
Wikileaks published a list of web sites blacklisted by Denmark.
. It includes the group's history and meeting reports from the years 1955, 1956, 1957, 1958, 1960, 1962, 1963 and 1980.
. The release of the tapes featured on the front pages of five Peruvian newspapers.
had abruptly resigned for unknown reasons after twelve years in office. Shortly afterwards WikiLeaks released a report disclosing a "serious nuclear accident" at the Iranian Natanz nuclear facility in 2009. 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.
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.
commissioned an internal report about a toxic dumping incident in the Ivory Coast, 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 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" 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 and The Chemical Engineer magazine. On 14 September 2009, WikiLeaks posted the report.
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
". The suppressed details rapidly circulated via the internet and Twitter 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. The injunction was lifted on 16 October.
from just prior to the collapse of Iceland's banking sector, which led to the 2008–2011 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. 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.
, a 2,400-page restricted document written in 2001 by the British Ministry of Defence
was leaked. It containing instructions for the security services on how to avoid leaks of information by hackers
, journalists, and foreign spies
.
officials and New York City Police Department
.
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.
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. According to some media reports, the Reuters news staff were in the company of armed men and the pilots may have thought Chmagh and Noor-Eldeen were carrying weapons (which was actually camera equipment).
The military conducted an investigation into the incident and found there were two rocket propelled grenade
launchers and one AK-47
among the dead.
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.
(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 Baghdad airstrike video, in addition to a video of the Granai airstrike
and around 260,000 diplomatic cables, to WikiLeaks. WikiLeaks said "allegations in Wired that we have been sent 260,000 classified US embassy cables are, as far as we can tell, incorrect." 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." 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.
Manning reportedly wrote, "Everywhere there’s a U.S. post, there’s a diplomatic scandal that will be revealed." 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."
, 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. 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, whose decryption details would be released if WikiLeaks or Assange were harmed.
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."
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. 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".
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)." 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."
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." 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.
of Fox News described the leaking as "WikiLeaks' Crusade Against the U.S. Military." 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.
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. A Taliban spokesman said that the Taliban had formed a nine-member "commission" to review the documents "to find about people who are spying." 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."
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. 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. 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.
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 wikileaks.org 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
.
to UK newspapers, which requests advance notice from the newspapers regarding the expected publication. 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." 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.
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. 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."
On 28 November, WikiLeaks announced it was undergoing a massive Distributed Denial-of-service attack, 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. 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. 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. Despite the steps taken by United States Government forbidding all unauthorized federal government employees and contractors from accessing classified documents publicly available on WikiLeaks, in the week following the release (28 November – 5 December 2010), "Wikileaks" remained the top search term in United States
as measured by Google Insights
.
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." John Perry Barlow
, co-founder of the Electronic Frontier Foundation
, wrote a tweet saying: "The first serious infowar is now engaged. The field of battle is WikiLeaks. You are the troops."
Wikileaks
WikiLeaks is an international self-described not-for-profit organisation that publishes submissions of private, secret, and classified media from anonymous news sources, news leaks, and whistleblowers. Its website, launched in 2006 under The Sunshine Press organisation, claimed a database of more...
, used by whistleblower
Whistleblower
A whistleblower is a person who tells the public or someone in authority about alleged dishonest or illegal activities occurring in a government department, a public or private organization, or a company...
s, has published anonymous submissions of documents that are generally unavailable to the general public. This article documents the leaks which have attracted media coverage.
Apparent Somali assassination order
WikiLeaks posted its first document in December 2006, a decision to assassinate government officials signed by Sheikh Ahmed Khan Hamza Hassan Dahir Aweys. The New YorkerThe New Yorker
The New Yorker is an American magazine of reportage, commentary, criticism, essays, fiction, satire, cartoons and poetry published by Condé Nast...
has reported that
Daniel arap Moi family corruption
On 31 August 2007, The GuardianThe Guardian
The Guardian, formerly known as The Manchester Guardian , is a British national daily newspaper in the Berliner format...
(Britain) featured on its front page a story about corruption by the family of the former Kenyan leader Daniel arap Moi
Daniel arap Moi
Daniel Toroitich arap Moi was the President of Kenya from 1978 until 2002.Daniel arap Moi is popularly known to Kenyans as 'Nyayo', a Swahili word for 'footsteps'...
. The newspaper stated that the source of the information was WikiLeaks.
Bank Julius Baer lawsuit
In February 2008, the wikileaks.org domain nameDomain name
A domain name is an identification string that defines a realm of administrative autonomy, authority, or control in the Internet. Domain names are formed by the rules and procedures of the Domain Name System ....
was taken offline after the Swiss Bank Julius Baer sued WikiLeaks and the wikileaks.org domain registrar, Dynadot
Dynadot
-Expired auctions:Bid on domains about to expire or place a backorder for a domain pending deletion.-SSL:Both RapidSSL and AlphaSSL certificates are available for purchase.-Bank Julius Baer lawsuit:...
, in a court in California, United States, and obtained a permanent injunction
Injunction
An injunction is an equitable remedy in the form of a court order that requires a party to do or refrain from doing certain acts. A party that fails to comply with an injunction faces criminal or civil penalties and may have to pay damages or accept sanctions...
ordering the shutdown. WikiLeaks had hosted allegations of illegal activities at the bank's Cayman Islands
Cayman Islands
The Cayman Islands is a British Overseas Territory and overseas territory of the European Union located in the western Caribbean Sea. The territory comprises the three islands of Grand Cayman, Cayman Brac, and Little Cayman, located south of Cuba and northwest of Jamaica...
branch. 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.
The American Civil Liberties Union
American Civil Liberties Union
The American Civil Liberties Union is a U.S. non-profit organization whose stated mission is "to defend and preserve the individual rights and liberties guaranteed to every person in this country by the Constitution and laws of the United States." It works through litigation, legislation, and...
and the Electronic Frontier Foundation
Electronic Frontier Foundation
The Electronic Frontier Foundation is an international non-profit digital rights advocacy and legal organization based in the United States...
filed a motion protesting the censorship of WikiLeaks. The Reporters Committee for Freedom of the Press
Reporters Committee for Freedom of the Press
The Reporters Committee for Freedom of the Press is an American nonprofit organization, founded in 1970, that provides free legal assistance to and on behalf of journalists. A number of prominent journalists presently sit on the organization's steering committee, including Dan Rather, and Judy...
assembled a coalition of media and press that filed an amicus curiae
Amicus curiae
An amicus curiae is someone, not a party to a case, who volunteers to offer information to assist a court in deciding a matter before it...
brief on WikiLeaks' behalf. The coalition included major U.S. newspaper publishers and press organisations, such as the American Society of News Editors
American Society of News Editors
The American Society of News Editors is a membership organization for editors, producers or directors in charge of journalistic organizations or departments, deans or faculty at university journalism schools, and leaders and faculty of media-related foundations and training organizations...
, the Associated Press
Associated Press
The Associated Press is an American news agency. The AP is a cooperative owned by its contributing newspapers, radio and television stations in the United States, which both contribute stories to the AP and use material written by its staff journalists...
, the Citizen Media Law Project, the E. W. Scripps Company
E. W. Scripps Company
The E. W. Scripps Company is an American media conglomerate founded by Edward W. Scripps on November 2, 1878. The company is headquartered inside the Scripps Center in Cincinnati, Ohio. Its corporate motto is "Give light and the people will find their own way."On October 16, 2007, the company...
, the Gannett Company
Gannett Company
Gannett Company, Inc. is a publicly-traded media holding company headquartered in Tysons Corner, Virginia, United States, near McLean. It is the largest U.S. newspaper publisher as measured by total daily circulation. Its assets include the national newspaper USA Today and the weekly USA Weekend...
, the Hearst Corporation
Hearst Corporation
The Hearst Corporation is an American media conglomerate based in the Hearst Tower, Manhattan in New York City, New York, United States. Founded by William Randolph Hearst as an owner of newspapers, the company's holdings now include a wide variety of media...
, the Los Angeles Times
Los Angeles Times
The Los Angeles Times is a daily newspaper published in Los Angeles, California, since 1881. It was the second-largest metropolitan newspaper in circulation in the United States in 2008 and the fourth most widely distributed newspaper in the country....
, the National Newspaper Publishers Association, the Newspaper Association of America
Newspaper Association of America
The Newspaper Association of America is a trade association representing approximately 2000 newspapers in the United States and Canada. Member newspapers represented by the NAA include large daily papers, non-daily and small-market publications, as well as digital and multiplatform...
and the Society of Professional Journalists
Society of Professional Journalists
The Society of Professional Journalists , formerly known as Sigma Delta Chi, is one of the oldest organizations representing journalists in the United States. It was established in April 1909 at DePauw University, and its charter was designed by William Meharry Glenn. The ten founding members of...
. 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:
"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."
The same judge, Judge Jeffrey White, who issued the injunction vacated it on 29 February 2008, citing First Amendment
First Amendment to the United States Constitution
The First Amendment to the United States Constitution is part of the Bill of Rights. The amendment prohibits the making of any law respecting an establishment of religion, impeding the free exercise of religion, abridging the freedom of speech, infringing on the freedom of the press, interfering...
concerns and questions about legal jurisdiction
Jurisdiction
Jurisdiction is the practical authority granted to a formally constituted legal body or to a political leader to deal with and make pronouncements on legal matters and, by implication, to administer justice within a defined area of responsibility...
. WikiLeaks was thus able to bring its site online
ONLINE
ONLINE is a magazine for information systems first published in 1977. The publisher Online, Inc. was founded the year before. In May 2002, Information Today, Inc. acquired the assets of Online Inc....
again. The bank dropped the case on 5 March 2008. The judge also denied the bank's request for an order prohibiting the website's publication.
The Executive Director of the Reporters Committee for Freedom of the Press
Reporters Committee for Freedom of the Press
The Reporters Committee for Freedom of the Press is an American nonprofit organization, founded in 1970, that provides free legal assistance to and on behalf of journalists. A number of prominent journalists presently sit on the organization's steering committee, including Dan Rather, and Judy...
, 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."
Guantanamo Bay procedures
A copy of Standard Operating Procedures for Camp DeltaCamp Delta Standard Operating Procedures
The Camp Delta Standard Operating Procedures is a document that was written under the authority of Geoffrey D. Miller when he was the officer in charge of Joint Task Force Guantanamo....
–the protocol of the U.S. Army
United States Army
The United States Army is the main branch of the United States Armed Forces responsible for land-based military operations. It is the largest and oldest established branch of the U.S. military, and is one of seven U.S. uniformed services...
at the Guantanamo Bay detention camp–dated March 2003 was released on the WikiLeaks website on 7 November 2007. The document, named "gitmo-sop.pdf", is also mirrored at The Guardian. 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
International Committee of the Red Cross
The International Committee of the Red Cross is a private humanitarian institution based in Geneva, Switzerland. States parties to the four Geneva Conventions of 1949 and their Additional Protocols of 1977 and 2005, have given the ICRC a mandate to protect the victims of international and...
, something that the U.S. military had in the past repeatedly denied.
On 3 December 2007, WikiLeaks released a copy of the 2004 edition of the manual, together with a detailed analysis of the changes.
Tibetan Dissent in China
On 24 March 2008, WikiLeaks made 35 censored videos of civil unrest in Tibet available for viewing, to get around official Chinese censorship during the worst of the unrest.Scientology
On 24 March 2008, WikiLeaks published what they referred to as "the collected secret 'bibles' of ScientologyScientology
Scientology is a body of beliefs and related practices created by science fiction and fantasy author L. Ron Hubbard , starting in 1952, as a successor to his earlier self-help system, Dianetics...
,". On 7 April 2008, they reported receiving a letter (dated 27 March) from the Religious Technology Center
Religious Technology Center
The Religious Technology Center is a Californian non-profit corporation. RTC was founded in 1982 by the Church of Scientology in order to control and oversee the use of all of the trademarks, symbols and texts of Scientology and Dianetics, including the copyrighted works of Scientology founder and...
claiming ownership of the several documents pertaining to OT Levels
Operating Thetan
In Scientology, the state of Operating Thetan is a spiritual state above Clear. L. Ron Hubbard, the founder of Scientology, defined it as "knowing and willing cause over life, thought, matter, energy, space and time ". According to religious scholar J...
within the Church of Scientology
Church of Scientology
The Church of Scientology is an organization devoted to the practice and the promotion of the Scientology belief system. The Church of Scientology International is the Church of Scientology's parent organization, and is responsible for the overall ecclesiastical management, dissemination and...
. These same documents were at the center of a 1994 scandal. The email stated:
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
Wikinews
Wikinews is a free-content news source wiki and a project of the Wikimedia Foundation. The site works through collaborative journalism. Wikipedia co-founder Jimmy Wales has distinguished Wikinews from Wikipedia by saying "on Wikinews, each story is to be written as a news story as opposed to an...
stating: "in response to the attempted suppression, WikiLeaks will release several thousand additional pages of Scientology material next week", and did so.
Sarah Palin's Yahoo! email account contents
In September 2008, during the 2008 United States presidential election campaignsUnited States presidential election, 2008
The United States presidential election of 2008 was the 56th quadrennial presidential election. It was held on November 4, 2008. Democrat Barack Obama, then the junior United States Senator from Illinois, defeated Republican John McCain, the senior U.S. Senator from Arizona. Obama received 365...
, the contents of a Yahoo! account belonging to Sarah Palin
Sarah Palin
Sarah Louise Palin is an American politician, commentator and author. As the Republican Party nominee for Vice President in the 2008 presidential election, she was the first Alaskan on the national ticket of a major party and first Republican woman nominated for the vice-presidency.She was...
(the running mate of Republican presidential nominee John McCain
John McCain
John Sidney McCain III is the senior United States Senator from Arizona. He was the Republican nominee for president in the 2008 United States election....
) were posted on WikiLeaks after being hacked into by members of Anonymous
Anonymous (group)
Anonymous is an international hacking group, spread through the Internet, initiating active civil disobedience, while attempting to maintain anonymity. Originating in 2003 on the imageboard 4chan, the term refers to the concept of many online community users simultaneously existing as an anarchic,...
. It has been alleged by Wired that contents of the mailbox indicate that she used the private Yahoo! account to send work-related messages, in violation of public record laws. The hacking of the account was widely reported in mainstream news outlets. Although WikiLeaks was able to conceal the hacker's identity, the source of the Palin emails was eventually publicly identified as David Kernell, a 20-year-old economics student at the University of Tennessee and the son of Democratic Tennessee State Representative Mike Kernell
Mike Kernell
Mike Kernell is a member of the Tennessee House of Representatives. Kernell is married with two children....
from Memphis, whose email address (as listed on various social networking sites) was linked to the hacker's identity on Anonymous. Kernell attempted to conceal his identity by using the anonymous proxy service ctunnel.com, but, because of the illegal nature of the access, ctunnel website administrator Gabriel Ramuglia assisted the FBI in tracking down the source of the hack.
Killings by the Kenyan police
WikiLeaks publicised reports on extrajudicial executions by Kenyan police for one week starting 1 November 2008 on its home page. Two of the human rightsHuman rights
Human rights are "commonly understood as inalienable fundamental rights to which a person is inherently entitled simply because she or he is a human being." Human rights are thus conceived as universal and egalitarian . These rights may exist as natural rights or as legal rights, in both national...
investigators involved, Oscar Kamau Kingara
Oscar Kamau Kingara
Oscar Kamau Kingara was a Kenyan lawyer and human rights activist. Kingara was the founder and director of the Oscar Foundation Free Legal Aid Clinic, a human rights organization based in Nairobi...
and John Paul Oulu
John Paul Oulu
John Paul Oulu was a Kenyan human rights activist and former Students Union official at the University of Nairobi. His 2009 assassination is widely attributed to his work in documenting police killings.-Human rights work:...
, who made major contributions to a Kenya National Commission on Human Rights
Kenya National Commission on Human Rights
The Kenya National Commission on Human Rights is an autonomous national human rights institution established by a Kenyan Act of Parliament in 2002. KNCHR became operational in July 2003...
(KNCHR) report that was redistributed by WikiLeaks, The Cry of Blood — Report on Extra-Judicial Killings and Disappearances, were assassinated several months later, on 5 March 2009. WikiLeaks called for information on the assassination. In 2009, Amnesty International
Amnesty International
Amnesty International is an international non-governmental organisation whose stated mission is "to conduct research and generate action to prevent and end grave abuses of human rights, and to demand justice for those whose rights have been violated."Following a publication of Peter Benenson's...
UK gave WikiLeaks and Julian Assange an award for the distribution of the KNCHR's The Cry of Blood report.
BNP membership list
After briefly appearing on a blog, the membership list of the far-right British National PartyBritish National Party
The British National Party is a British far-right political party formed as a splinter group from the National Front by John Tyndall in 1982...
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. The BNP was known for going to considerable lengths to conceal the identities of members. On 19 November, BNP leader Nick Griffin
Nick Griffin
Nicholas John "Nick" Griffin is a British politician, chairman of the British National Party and Member of the European Parliament for North West England....
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. On 20 October 2009, a list of BNP members from April 2009 was leaked. This list contained 11,811 members.
Congressional Research Service reports
On 7 February 2009, WikiLeaks released 6,780 Congressional Research ServiceCongressional Research Service
The Congressional Research Service , known as "Congress's think tank", is the public policy research arm of the United States Congress. As a legislative branch agency within the Library of Congress, CRS works exclusively and directly for Members of Congress, their Committees and staff on a...
reports.
Contributors to Coleman campaign
In March 2009, WikiLeaks published a list of contributors to the Norm ColemanNorm Coleman
Norman Bertram Coleman, Jr. is an American attorney and politician. He was a United States senator from Minnesota from 2003 to 2009. Coleman was elected in 2002 and served in the 108th, 109th, and 110th Congresses. Before becoming a senator, he was mayor of Saint Paul, Minnesota, from 1994 to 2002...
senatorial campaign.
Climategate emails
In November 2009, controversial documents, including e-mail correspondence between climate scientists, were released (allegedly after being illegally obtained) from the University of East AngliaUniversity of East Anglia
The University of East Anglia is a public research university based in Norwich, United Kingdom. It was established in 1963, and is a founder-member of the 1994 Group of research-intensive universities.-History:...
's (UEA) Climatic Research Unit
Climatic Research Unit
The Climatic Research Unit is a component of the University of East Anglia and is one of the leading institutions concerned with the study of natural and anthropogenic climate change....
(CRU). According to the university, the emails and documents were obtained through a server hacking
Hacker (computer security)
In computer security and everyday language, a hacker is someone who breaks into computers and computer networks. Hackers may be motivated by a multitude of reasons, including profit, protest, or because of the challenge...
; one prominent host of the full 120 MB archive was WikiLeaks, although the information was not originally leaked to them.
Barclays Bank tax avoidance
In March 2009 documents concerning complex arrangements made by Barclays Bank to avoid tax appeared on Wikileaks. The documents had been ordered to be removed from the website of The GuardianThe Guardian
The Guardian, formerly known as The Manchester Guardian , is a British national daily newspaper in the Berliner format...
. In an editorial on the issue, The Guardian pointed out that, due to the mismatch of resources, tax collectors (HMRC) now have to rely on websites such as Wikileaks to obtain such documents.
Internet censorship lists
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
Australian Communications and Media Authority
The Australian Communications and Media Authority is an Australian government statutory authority within the Department of Broadband, Communications and the Digital Economy portfolio...
's blacklist of sites to be banned under Australia's proposed laws on Internet censorship
Internet censorship in Australia
Internet censorship in Australia currently consists of a regulatory regime under which the Australian Communications and Media Authority has the power to enforce content restrictions on Internet content hosted within Australia, and maintain a "black-list" of overseas websites which is then...
. 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
Australian Labor Party
The Australian Labor Party is an Australian political party. It has been the governing party of the Commonwealth of Australia since the 2007 federal election. Julia Gillard is the party's federal parliamentary leader and Prime Minister of Australia...
in 2008 was proposed with the stated intention of preventing access to child pornography
Child pornography
Child pornography refers to images or films and, in some cases, writings depicting sexually explicit activities involving a child...
and sites related to terrorism
Terrorism
Terrorism is the systematic use of terror, especially as a means of coercion. In the international community, however, terrorism has no universally agreed, legally binding, criminal law definition...
, the list leaked on WikiLeaks contains a number of sites unrelated to sex crimes involving minors. When questioned about the leak, Stephen Conroy
Stephen Conroy
Stephen Michael Conroy is an Australian politician and the current Minister for Broadband, Communications and the Digital Economy in the Gillard Ministry...
, 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. 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.
Wikileaks published a list of web sites blacklisted by Denmark.
Bilderberg Group meeting reports
Since May 2009, WikiLeaks has made available reports of several meetings of the Bilderberg GroupBilderberg Group
The Bilderberg Group, Bilderberg conference, or Bilderberg Club is an annual, unofficial, invitation-only conference of approximately 120 to 140 guests from North America and Western Europe, most of whom are people of influence. About one-third are from government and politics, and two-thirds from...
. It includes the group's history and meeting reports from the years 1955, 1956, 1957, 1958, 1960, 1962, 1963 and 1980.
2008 Peru oil scandal
On 28 January 2009, WikiLeaks released 86 telephone intercept recordings of Peruvian politicians and businessmen involved in the "Petrogate" oil scandal2008 Peru oil scandal
The 2008 Peru oil scandal started after a Peruvian TV station broadcast an audio tape of an alleged conversation between a government official and a lobbyist agreeing to help a firm win contracts...
. The release of the tapes featured on the front pages of five Peruvian newspapers.
Nuclear accident in Iran
On 16 July 2009, Iranian news agencies reported that the head of Iran's atomic energy organization Gholam Reza AghazadehGholam Reza Aghazadeh
Gholam Reza Aghazadeh is an Iranian Politician. Aghazadeh served as the Vice President for Atomic Energy of the Islamic Republic of Iran and the president of the Atomic Energy Organization of Iran up until July 2009....
had abruptly resigned for unknown reasons after twelve years in office. Shortly afterwards WikiLeaks released a report disclosing a "serious nuclear accident" at the Iranian Natanz nuclear facility in 2009. The Federation of American Scientists
Federation of American Scientists
The Federation of American Scientists is a nonpartisan, 501 organization intent on using science and scientific analysis to attempt make the world more secure. FAS was founded in 1945 by scientists who worked on the Manhattan Project to develop the first atomic bombs...
(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.
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
Stuxnet
Stuxnet is a computer worm discovered in June 2010. It initially spreads via Microsoft Windows, and targets Siemens industrial software and equipment...
computer worm.
Toxic dumping in Africa: The Minton report
In September 2006, commodities giant TrafiguraTrafigura
Trafigura is an Amsterdam-based multinational company founded in 1993 trading in base metals and energy, including oil. the company had equity of more than $2 billion and a turnover of $73 billion that generated $440 million of profit....
commissioned an internal report about a toxic dumping incident in the Ivory Coast, 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 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
Carter-Ruck
Carter-Ruck is a British law firm founded by Peter Carter-Ruck.According to their website they specialise in libel, privacy, international law and commercial litigation....
, obtained a secret "super-injunction" 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 and The Chemical Engineer magazine. On 14 September 2009, WikiLeaks posted the report.
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
Freedom of speech
Freedom of speech is the freedom to speak freely without censorship. The term freedom of expression is sometimes used synonymously, but includes any act of seeking, receiving and imparting information or ideas, regardless of the medium used...
established under the 1689 Bill of Rights
Bill of Rights 1689
The Bill of Rights or the Bill of Rights 1688 is an Act of the Parliament of England.The Bill of Rights was passed by Parliament on 16 December 1689. It was a re-statement in statutory form of the Declaration of Right presented by the Convention Parliament to William and Mary in March 1689 ,...
". The suppressed details rapidly circulated via the internet and Twitter 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. The injunction was lifted on 16 October.
Kaupthing Bank
WikiLeaks made available an internal document from Kaupthing BankKaupthing Bank
Kaupthing Bank was an international Icelandic bank, headquartered in Reykjavík, Iceland. It was formed by the merger of Kaupthing and Búnaðarbanki Íslands in 2003 and was the largest bank in Iceland....
from just prior to the collapse of Iceland's banking sector, which led to the 2008–2011 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. 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.
Joint Services Protocol 440
In October 2009, Joint Services Protocol 440Joint Services Protocol 440
Joint Services Publication 440 is the name of a British 2001 Ministry of Defence 2,400-page restricted document describing requirements to assure the confidentiality, integrity, and availability of military computer systems...
, a 2,400-page restricted document written in 2001 by the British Ministry of Defence
Ministry of Defence (United Kingdom)
The Ministry of Defence is the United Kingdom government department responsible for implementation of government defence policy and is the headquarters of the British Armed Forces....
was leaked. It containing instructions for the security services on how to avoid leaks of information by hackers
Hacker (computer security)
In computer security and everyday language, a hacker is someone who breaks into computers and computer networks. Hackers may be motivated by a multitude of reasons, including profit, protest, or because of the challenge...
, journalists, and foreign spies
SPY
SPY is a three-letter acronym that may refer to:* SPY , ticker symbol for Standard & Poor's Depositary Receipts* SPY , a satirical monthly, trademarked all-caps* SPY , airport code for San Pédro, Côte d'Ivoire...
.
9/11 pager messages
On 25 November 2009, WikiLeaks released 570,000 intercepts of pager messages sent on the day of the September 11 attacks. Bradley Manning (see below) commented that those were from an NSA database. Among the released messages are communications between PentagonThe Pentagon
The Pentagon is the headquarters of the United States Department of Defense, located in Arlington County, Virginia. As a symbol of the U.S. military, "the Pentagon" is often used metonymically to refer to the Department of Defense rather than the building itself.Designed by the American architect...
officials and New York City Police Department
New York City Police Department
The New York City Police Department , established in 1845, is currently the largest municipal police force in the United States, with primary responsibilities in law enforcement and investigation within the five boroughs of New York City...
.
U.S. Intelligence report on WikiLeaks
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, and also that the concerns of the U.S. Army raised by the report were hypothetical.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.
Baghdad airstrike video
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 12-18 people, including two ReutersReuters
Reuters is a news agency headquartered in New York City. Until 2008 the Reuters news agency formed part of a British independent company, Reuters Group plc, which was also a provider of financial market data...
news staff, Saeed Chmagh
Saeed Chmagh
Saeed Chmagh was an Iraqi employed by Reuters news agency as a driver and camera assistant. He was killed, along with his colleague Namir Noor-Eldeen by American military forces in the New Baghdad district of Baghdad, Iraq, during an airstrike on July 12, 2007.-Life and career:Chmagh was born...
and Namir Noor-Eldeen
Namir Noor-Eldeen
Namir Noor-Eldeen was an Iraqi freelance photojournalist. He was killed, along with his assistant Saeed Chmagh and a number of others, by American military forces in the New Baghdad district of Baghdad, Iraq, during an airstrike on July 12, 2007.- Early life and career :Noor-Eldeen was born on...
, 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. According to some media reports, the Reuters news staff were in the company of armed men and the pilots may have thought Chmagh and Noor-Eldeen were carrying weapons (which was actually camera equipment).
The military conducted an investigation into the incident and found there were two rocket propelled grenade
Rocket propelled grenade
A rocket-propelled grenade is a shoulder-fired, anti-tank weapon system which fires rockets equipped with an explosive warhead. These warheads are affixed to a rocket motor and stabilized in flight with fins. Some types of RPG are reloadable while others are single-use. RPGs, with the exception of...
launchers and one AK-47
AK-47
The AK-47 is a selective-fire, gas-operated 7.62×39mm assault rifle, first developed in the Soviet Union by Mikhail Kalashnikov. It is officially known as Avtomat Kalashnikova . It is also known as a Kalashnikov, an "AK", or in Russian slang, Kalash.Design work on the AK-47 began in the last year...
among the dead.
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
Google
Google Inc. is an American multinational public corporation invested in Internet search, cloud computing, and advertising technologies. Google hosts and develops a number of Internet-based services and products, and generates profit primarily from advertising through its AdWords program...
Insights.
Bradley Manning
A 22-year-old US Army intelligence analyst, PFCPrivate First Class
Private First Class is a military rank held by junior enlisted persons.- Singapore :The rank of Private First Class in the Singapore Armed Forces lies between the ranks of Private and Lance-Corporal . It is usually held by conscript soldiers midway through their national service term...
(formerly SPC
Specialist (rank)
Specialist is one of the four junior enlisted ranks in the U.S. Army, just above Private First Class and equivalent in pay grade to Corporal. Unlike Corporals, Specialists are not considered junior non-commissioned officers...
) Bradley Manning, was arrested after alleged chat logs were turned in to the authorities by former hacker Adrian Lamo
Adrian Lamo
Adrian Lamo is a threat analyst and "grey hat" hacker. He first gained media attention for breaking into several high-profile computer networks, including those of The New York Times, Yahoo!, and Microsoft, culminating in his 2003 arrest...
, in whom he had confided. Manning reportedly told Lamo he had leaked the Baghdad airstrike video, in addition to a video of the Granai airstrike
Granai airstrike
The Granai airstrike, sometimes called the Granai massacre, refers to the killing of a large number of Afghan civilians, mostly children, and including women, by American aircraft on May 4, 2009, in the village of Granai in Farah Province, south of Herat, Afghanistan...
and around 260,000 diplomatic cables, to WikiLeaks. WikiLeaks said "allegations in Wired that we have been sent 260,000 classified US embassy cables are, as far as we can tell, incorrect." 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." 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.
Manning reportedly wrote, "Everywhere there’s a U.S. post, there’s a diplomatic scandal that will be revealed." 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."
Afghan War Diary
On 25 July 2010, WikiLeaks released to The GuardianThe Guardian
The Guardian, formerly known as The Manchester Guardian , is a British national daily newspaper in the Berliner format...
, The New York Times
The New York Times
The New York Times is an American daily newspaper founded and continuously published in New York City since 1851. The New York Times has won 106 Pulitzer Prizes, the most of any news organization...
, and Der Spiegel
Der Spiegel
Der Spiegel is a German weekly news magazine published in Hamburg. It is one of Europe's largest publications of its kind, with a weekly circulation of more than one million.-Overview:...
over 92,000 documents related to the war in Afghanistan
War in Afghanistan (2001–present)
The War in Afghanistan began on October 7, 2001, as the armed forces of the United States of America, the United Kingdom, Australia, and the Afghan United Front launched Operation Enduring Freedom...
between 2004 and the end of 2009. The documents detail individual incidents including friendly fire
Friendly fire
Friendly fire is inadvertent firing towards one's own or otherwise friendly forces while attempting to engage enemy forces, particularly where this results in injury or death. A death resulting from a negligent discharge is not considered friendly fire...
and civilian casualties. The scale of leak was described by Julian Assange as comparable to that of the Pentagon Papers
Pentagon Papers
The Pentagon Papers, officially titled United States – Vietnam Relations, 1945–1967: A Study Prepared by the Department of Defense, is a United States Department of Defense history of the United States' political-military involvement in Vietnam from 1945 to 1967...
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, whose decryption details would be released if WikiLeaks or Assange were harmed.
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."
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. 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".
The Australia Defence Association (ADA) stated that WikiLeaks' Julian Assange
Julian Assange
Julian Paul Assange is an Australian publisher, journalist, writer, computer programmer and Internet activist. He is the editor in chief of WikiLeaks, a whistleblower website and conduit for worldwide news leaks with the stated purpose of creating open governments.WikiLeaks has published material...
"could have committed a serious criminal offence in helping an enemy of the Australian Defence Force
Australian Defence Force
The Australian Defence Force is the military organisation responsible for the defence of Australia. It consists of the Royal Australian Navy , Australian Army, Royal Australian Air Force and a number of 'tri-service' units...
(ADF)." 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."
WikiLeaks' recent leaking of classified U.S. intelligence has been described by commentator of The Wall Street Journal
The Wall Street Journal
The Wall Street Journal is an American English-language international daily newspaper. It is published in New York City by Dow Jones & Company, a division of News Corporation, along with the Asian and European editions of the 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." 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.
Greg Gutfeld
Greg Gutfeld is an American television personality, political satirist, humorist, magazine editor and blogger. Gutfeld is the host of Red Eye w/ Greg Gutfeld on the Fox News Channel. He is also one of five co-hosts/panelists on Fox News political talk-show The Five, which debuted on July 11, 2011....
of Fox News described the leaking as "WikiLeaks' Crusade Against the U.S. Military." John Pilger
John Pilger
John Richard Pilger is an Australian journalist and documentary maker, based in London. He has twice won Britain's Journalist of the Year Award, and his documentaries have received academy awards in Britain and the US....
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.
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. A Taliban spokesman said that the Taliban had formed a nine-member "commission" to review the documents "to find about people who are spying." 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."
Love Parade documents
Following the Love Parade stampedeLove Parade stampede
On 24 July 2010, a stampede at the 2010 Love Parade electronic dance music festival in Duisburg, North Rhine-Westphalia, Germany, caused the death of 21 people. At least 510 more were injured....
in Duisburg
Duisburg
- History :A legend recorded by Johannes Aventinus holds that Duisburg, was built by the eponymous Tuisto, mythical progenitor of Germans, ca. 2395 BC...
, 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. 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. 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.
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. 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." The Guardian reported on 21 October 2010 that it had received almost 400,000 Iraq war documents from WikiLeaks. On 22 October 2010, Al JazeeraAl Jazeera
Al Jazeera is an independent broadcaster owned by the state of Qatar through the Qatar Media Corporation and headquartered in Doha, Qatar...
was the first to release analyses of the leak, dubbed The War Logs. WikiLeaks posted a tweet
Twitter
Twitter is an online social networking and microblogging service that enables its users to send and read text-based posts of up to 140 characters, informally known as "tweets".Twitter was created in March 2006 by Jack Dorsey and launched that July...
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 wikileaks.org website, which had been offering no content since 30 September 2010.
The BBC quoted The Pentagon
The Pentagon
The Pentagon is the headquarters of the United States Department of Defense, located in Arlington County, Virginia. As a symbol of the U.S. military, "the Pentagon" is often used metonymically to refer to the Department of Defense rather than the building itself.Designed by the American architect...
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
Torture
Torture is the act of inflicting severe pain as a means of punishment, revenge, forcing information or a confession, or simply as an act of cruelty. Throughout history, torture has often been used as a method of political re-education, interrogation, punishment, and coercion...
by the Iraqi authorities during the period after the 2003 war
2003 invasion of Iraq
The 2003 invasion of Iraq , was the start of the conflict known as the Iraq War, or Operation Iraqi Freedom, in which a combined force of troops from the United States, the United Kingdom, Australia and Poland invaded Iraq and toppled the regime of Saddam Hussein in 21 days of major combat operations...
.
Diplomatic cables release
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." U.S. authorities and the media have speculated that they may contain diplomatic cables. Prior to the expected leak, the government of the United Kingdom (UK) sent a DA-NoticeDA-Notice
A DA-Notice or Defence Advisory Notice is an official request to news editors not to publish or broadcast items on specified subjects for reasons of national security...
to UK newspapers, which requests advance notice from the newspapers regarding the expected publication. According to Index on Censorship
Index on Censorship
Index on Censorship is a campaigning publishing organisation for freedom of expression, which produces an award-winning quarterly magazine of the same name from London. The present chief executive of Index on Censorship, since 2008, is the author, broadcaster and commentator John Kampfner, former...
, "there is no obligation on media to comply". "Newspaper editors would speak to [the] Defence, Press and Broadcasting Advisory Committee
Defence, Press and Broadcasting Advisory Committee
The Defence, Press and Broadcasting Advisory Committee is the British advisory body which issues DA-Notices. The secretary is a former two-star military officer employed from a Ministry of Defence budget and is housed by them and the committee is made up of senior civil servants and...
prior to publication." The Pakistani newspaper Dawn
Dawn (newspaper)
Dawn is Pakistan's oldest and most widely read English-language newspaper. One of the country's two largest English-language dailies, it is the flagship of the Dawn Group of Newspapers, published by Pakistan Herald Publications, which also owns the Herald, a magazine, the evening paper The Star and...
stated that the U.S. newspapers The New York Times
The New York Times
The New York Times is an American daily newspaper founded and continuously published in New York City since 1851. The New York Times has won 106 Pulitzer Prizes, the most of any news organization...
and The Washington Post
The Washington Post
The Washington Post is Washington, D.C.'s largest newspaper and its oldest still-existing paper, founded in 1877. Located in the capital of the United States, The Post has a particular emphasis on national politics. D.C., Maryland, and Virginia editions are printed for daily circulation...
were expected to publish parts of the diplomatic cables on Sunday 28 November, including 94 Pakistan-related documents.
On 26 November, via his lawyer Jennifer Robinson, Assange sent a letter to the US Department of State
United States Department of State
The United States Department of State , is the United States federal executive department responsible for international relations of the United States, equivalent to the foreign ministries of other countries...
, asking for information regarding people who could be placed at "significant risk of harm" by the diplomatic cables release. Harold Koh
Harold Hongju Koh
Harold Hongju Koh is an Korean American lawyer and legal scholar. He currently serves as the Legal Adviser of the Department of State. He was nominated to his current position by President Barack Obama on March 23, 2009, and confirmed by the Senate on June 25, 2009.In public service, Koh...
, Legal Adviser of the Department of State
Legal Adviser of the Department of State
The Legal Adviser of the Department of State is a position within the United States Department of State. It was created by an Act of Congress on February 23, 1931 and given a rank equivalent to that of an Assistant Secretary...
, 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."
On 28 November, WikiLeaks announced it was undergoing a massive Distributed Denial-of-service attack, but vowed to still leak the cables and documents via prominent media outlets including El País, Le Monde
Le Monde
Le Monde is a French daily evening newspaper owned by La Vie-Le Monde Group and edited in Paris. It is one of two French newspapers of record, and has generally been well respected since its first edition under founder Hubert Beuve-Méry on 19 December 1944...
, Der Spiegel
Der Spiegel
Der Spiegel is a German weekly news magazine published in Hamburg. It is one of Europe's largest publications of its kind, with a weekly circulation of more than one million.-Overview:...
, The Guardian
The Guardian
The Guardian, formerly known as The Manchester Guardian , is a British national daily newspaper in the Berliner format...
, and The New York Times. 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. 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. Despite the steps taken by United States Government forbidding all unauthorized federal government employees and contractors from accessing classified documents publicly available on WikiLeaks, in the week following the release (28 November – 5 December 2010), "Wikileaks" remained the top search term in United States
United States
The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...
as measured by Google Insights
Google Insights for Search
Google Insights for Search is a service by Google similar to Google Trends, providing insights into the search terms people have been entering into the Google search engine. Unlike Google Trends, Google Insights for Search provides a visual representation of regional interest on a country's map. It...
.
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." John Perry Barlow
John Perry Barlow
John Perry Barlow is an American poet and essayist, a retired Wyoming cattle rancher, and a cyberlibertarian political activist who has been associated with both the Democratic and Republican parties. He is also a former lyricist for the Grateful Dead and a founding member of the Electronic...
, co-founder of the Electronic Frontier Foundation
Electronic Frontier Foundation
The Electronic Frontier Foundation is an international non-profit digital rights advocacy and legal organization based in the United States...
, wrote a tweet saying: "The first serious infowar is now engaged. The field of battle is WikiLeaks. You are the troops."
Guantanamo Bay files
On April 24, 2011 WikiLeaks began a month-long release of 779 US Department of Defense documents about detainees at the Guantanamo Bay detention camp.Unpublished material
- In October 2009 Computer WorldComputer WorldComputer World is the eighth studio album by the German electronic music band Kraftwerk, released in May 1981. The album deals with the themes of the rise of computers within society. Critics see this album as a peak in the career of Kraftwerk, along with Autobahn and Trans-Europe Express...
published an interview with Assange in which he claimed to be in possession of "5GB from Bank of America" that was from "one of the executive's hard drives". In November 2010 ForbesForbesForbes is an American publishing and media company. Its flagship publication, the Forbes magazine, is published biweekly. Its primary competitors in the national business magazine category are Fortune, which is also published biweekly, and Business Week...
magazine published another interview with Assange in which he said 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". Bank of AmericaBank of AmericaBank of America Corporation, an American multinational banking and financial services corporation, is the second largest bank holding company in the United States by assets, and the fourth largest bank in the U.S. by market capitalization. The bank is headquartered in Charlotte, North Carolina...
's stock price fell by three percent as a result of this announcement. Assange commented on the possible impact of the release that "it could take down a bank or two." However, WikiLeaks claims that the information is among the documents that former spokesperson Daniel Domscheit-BergDaniel Domscheit-Berg-External links:*, the whistleblower website started by Domscheit-Berg* collected news and commentary at Der Spiegel...
claimed to have destroyed in August 2011.
- In March 2010, Daniel Domscheit-BergDaniel Domscheit-Berg-External links:*, the whistleblower website started by Domscheit-Berg* collected news and commentary at Der Spiegel...
, at the time WikiLeaks' spokesperson, announced on a podcast that the organization had in its possession around 37,000 internal e-mails from far-right National Democratic Party of GermanyNational Democratic Party of GermanyThe National Democratic Party of Germany – The People's Union , is a far right German nationalist party. It was founded in 1964 a successor to the German Reich Party . Party statements self-identify as Germany's "only significant patriotic force"...
. He stated explicitly that he was not working on this project himself because it would make him legally vulnerable as a German citizen. According to him, Wikileaks was working on a crowd sourcing based tool to exploit such masses of data. WikiLeaks claimed that these e-mails (which it claimed numbered 60,000) were among the documents that Domscheit-Berg claimed to have destroyed in August 2011.
- In May 2010, WikiLeaks said it had video footage of an alleged massacre of Afghan civilians by the U.S. military, which it said it was preparing to release. However, this may have been among the videos that WikiLeaks reported that former spokesperson Domscheit-Berg destroyed in August 2011.
- In July 2010 during an interview with Chris Anderson, Assange showed a document WikiLeaks had on an Albanian oil well blowout, and said it also had material from inside BPBPBP p.l.c. is a global oil and gas company headquartered in London, United Kingdom. It is the third-largest energy company and fourth-largest company in the world measured by revenues and one of the six oil and gas "supermajors"...
, and that it was "getting [an] enormous quantity of whistle-blower disclosures of a very high caliber" but added that WikiLeaks has not been able to verify and release the material because it does not have enough volunteer journalists.
- In a September 2010 TwitterTwitterTwitter is an online social networking and microblogging service that enables its users to send and read text-based posts of up to 140 characters, informally known as "tweets".Twitter was created in March 2006 by Jack Dorsey and launched that July...
post, WikiLeaks stated that it had a first-edition copy of Operation Dark HeartOperation Dark HeartOperation Dark Heart is a 2010 memoir by U.S. Army intelligence officer Lt. Col Anthony Shaffer notable for the lengths the U.S. Defense Department went in an attempt to censor information revealed within, after the book had already been distributed free of redactions.The book details Shaffer's...
, a memoir by a U.S. Army intelligence officer. The uncensored first printing of around 9,500 copies was purchased and destroyed by the U.S. Department of Defense in its entirety.
- In October 2010, Assange told a leading Moscow newspaper that "[t]he Kremlin had better brace itself for a coming wave of WikiLeaks disclosures about Russia." In late November, Assange stated, "we have material on many businesses and governments, including in Russia. It's not right to say there's going to be a particular focus on Russia". On 23 December 2010, the RussiaRussiaRussia or , officially known as both Russia and the Russian Federation , is a country in northern Eurasia. It is a federal semi-presidential republic, comprising 83 federal subjects...
n newspaper Novaya GazetaNovaya GazetaNovaya Gazeta is a Russian newspaper well known in the country for its critical and investigative coverage of Russian political and social affairs....
announced that it had been granted access to a wide range of materials from the WikiLeaks database. The newspaper said that it will begin releasing these materials in January 2011, with an eye toward exposing corruption in the Russian government.
- In December 2010, Assange's lawyer, Mark Stephens, said on The Andrew Marr Show that WikiLeaks had information that it considers to be a "thermo-nuclear device" which it would release if the organisation needs to defend itself.
- In January 2011, Rudolf ElmerRudolf ElmerRudolf Elmer is a former employee of Swiss bank Julius Bär. He worked for the bank for close to two decades, the last position being overseeing the Caribbean operations of the bank for eight years until his dismissal in 2002...
hand delivered two CDsCompact DiscThe Compact Disc is an optical disc used to store digital data. It was originally developed to store and playback sound recordings exclusively, but later expanded to encompass data storage , write-once audio and data storage , rewritable media , Video Compact Discs , Super Video Compact Discs ,...
to Assange during a news conference in London. Elmer claimed the CDs contain the names of around 2,000 tax-evading clients of the Swiss bank Julius BaerJulius Baer GroupJulius Bär Group is a Swiss banking firm which is the parent company of Bank Julius Bär, a traditional private bank based in Zurich, Switzerland. The firm dates itself back to the year 1890, when an exchange office was founded by Ludwig Hirschhorn und Theodor Grob. Joseph Michael Uhl and Julius...
.
- In February 2011 in his memoir, Inside WikiLeaks: My Time with Julian Assange at the World's Most Dangerous Website, Daniel Domscheit-BergDaniel Domscheit-Berg-External links:*, the whistleblower website started by Domscheit-Berg* collected news and commentary at Der Spiegel...
acknowledged that he and another former WikiLeaks volunteer have material submitted to WikiLeaks in their possession (as well as the source codeSource codeIn computer science, source code is text written using the format and syntax of the programming language that it is being written in. Such a language is specially designed to facilitate the work of computer programmers, who specify the actions to be performed by a computer mostly by writing source...
to the site's submission system) and that they would only return to the organization once it repaired its security and online infrastructure. However, in August 2011 Domscheit-Berg announced that he destroyed all 3,500 documents in his possession. The German newspaper Der SpiegelDer SpiegelDer Spiegel is a German weekly news magazine published in Hamburg. It is one of Europe's largest publications of its kind, with a weekly circulation of more than one million.-Overview:...
reported that the documents included the U.S. government's No Fly ListNo Fly ListThe No Fly List is a list, created and maintained by the United States government's Terrorist Screening Center , of people who are not permitted to board a commercial aircraft for travel in or out of the United States. The list has also been used to divert away from U.S. airspace aircraft not...
. WikiLeaks also claimed that the data destroyed by Domscheit-Berg included the No Fly List. This is the first mention of WikiLeaks having had possession of the No Fly List. WikiLeaks also claimed that the data destroyed included information which it had previously announced to be in its possession, but which had not yet been released publicly. This information includes "five gigabytes from the Bank of America" (which was previously reported to be in WikiLeaks' possession in October 2009), "60,000 emails from the NPDNational Democratic Party of GermanyThe National Democratic Party of Germany – The People's Union , is a far right German nationalist party. It was founded in 1964 a successor to the German Reich Party . Party statements self-identify as Germany's "only significant patriotic force"...
" (which Domscheit-Berg divulged to be in Wikileaks' possession in March 2010, back when he still worked with the organization), and "videos of a major US atrocity in Afghanistan" (which perhaps include the one it claimed to have in May 2010) Additionally, WikiLeaks claimed that the documents destroyed included "the internals of around 20 neo-Nazi organizations" and "US intercept arrangements for over a hundred internet companies". Neither of these two leaks were reported to have been in WikiLeaks' possession before.