Anonymous, Wikileaks, The Government, and You

Last week, I went to pay some bills online. I found I couldn't because a group called "Anonymous" was busy reaming Visa and Mastercard.

Netwar is afoot. Wikileaks has caused quite the commotion. Amazon pulled their hosting, and the only two major payment processing companies quit accepting payments for them.

This, in turn, upset Anonymous--who like me, know that information wishes to be free.

But who is "Anonymous"? Who is Wikileaks? And are they really enemies of the US Government?

Anonymous, while proclaimed to be a group of "hackers" by your average media, is more or less anarchy put to good use.

There are no centralized authorities, but various places on the web Anonymous may congregate around. If there is one starting point, it would obviously be 4Chan. 4Chan is an image board, an idea imported from Japan. Part forum and part chat log, users all over the web visit daily to trade photos and keep up with each other.

The site is divided into several categories of images--but the "random" board, called /b/, is the most frequently visited.

How random is it? Well, it's randomly full of lewd, dark comedy. And information. Not to mention "templates," for various internet memes.

When a user posts to the site they are met with an easy-to-use submission form. While some decide to have a name, the majority of users don't bother. Therefore, most of the site is the product of someone named Anonymous.

So every time Anonymous does something crazy, think of the LOLcats, the Rickrolling, and Pedobear. Without which, YouTube would only have 1/10th of it's material left.

While many of these people possess strong technological skills, to call the whole of this rag-tag band of people "hackers" is misleading.

Hailing from all corners of the globe, living in different economic realities, Anonymous is a vocal collective. To be honest, if someone told me 10 years ago that an image board would cause all of "this" to percolate--I'd have laughed.

Certainly the internet has changed our world. We've gone from zip codes to domains, and this isn't going to change. For better, or for worse it's now flat. Some people already have jobs working for a company that may not have a strong, if any, physical presence in the employee's native country.

So, with this in mind, it's easier to see how Anonymous could be so successful. Especially with millions of viewers who grew up on this here info super highway. They're adept at not only getting a bunch of people to take down Mastercard, they'll also single handedly create new industries. Here's looking at you, Cheezeburger.

Where governments and corporations have allegiance to their allies, and rivalries among enemies, Anonymous is fluid, free forming, and powered by any one of you.

The danger is, of course, any mass of Anonymous can do widespread damage, when they put their minds to it. I think it speaks volumes that they've only gone so far.

And, as the video above shows, Anonymous is no longer simply looking to shutter websites in retaliation. They truly wish to see all of Wikileaks forever and endlessly free, away from hands that wish to keep such stuff secret.

But what are Wikileaks goals?

Wikileaks has been growing in popularity over the past several years, and originally went online way back in 2006. They were once much "like" Wikipedia wherein anyone could edit, comment, review, etc. This could all be done "safely and securely," through the combination use of PGP, TOR, and other open source efforts. Actually, don't quote me on PGP. It's not a sure thing, as this isn't quite publicized, but it's a pretty good bet.

Right now, they aren't accepting submissions due to an effort to improve their security back end and efficiency of their servers.

While a whole detailed history is beyond the scope of this article, it was once backed by a round table of investors that hail from a wide range of demographics. Mathematics, technology, journalists, and dissidents. They cover the globe, too--early players came from the US, Taiwan, China, Europe, South Africa, and Australia.

Proclaiming to be the world's foremost "whistle blower outlet," it bills it's self as an infrastructure to discreetly reveal previously publicly unknown documents. It's director, Julian Assange, proclaims it to be the world's first "stateless news organization." This refers to how the system is now hosted. Their main provider, PRQ (from Sweden), keeps very little record of site activity. They also do not ask questions about the contents being hosted.

This is a double edged sword, as anything of this nature will be. But it does make for an effective lack of history and digital trail.

If you haven't heard, to spite the US, Wikileaks was briefly hosted through Amazon's EC2 infrastructure. This was later discovered and removed, citing a breach of "terms of service." Now, while I'll spare you the finer points, keep in mind Amazon hosted "controversial-themed erotica" sold through their site and Kindle e-store. Oh, and let's not forget the once availability of a love making guide that Pedobear would gush over.

Amazon defended this at the time as free speech.

But they pulled Wikileaks. Just saying.

the United States government isn't making matters for this organization any easier. Because of "Cablegate," where Wikileaks released several documents from the White House. The former left with a lot of egg on their face.

There are of course concerns that with information Wikileaks releases that someone may use it to intentionally harm a person, and Julian Assange has stated that he is aware this organization may one day be responsible for blood on it's hands.

Except, if someone did use this material, it wouldn't be the information that did the victim in--it would be the perp nailed for the crime. (See: Guns don't kill, person wielding said gun does.)

Early on, there was and still is some backlash by the United States of America's citizens. Terrified over the reaction of their government, they were deceived by the overblown statements made by several members of the White House and Press. If that wasn't enough, launching of a legitimate investigatory probe against Wikileaks didn't help persuade many that the US had been harmed and shamed.

Digging deeper into the situation, one would find that Wikileaks has released material time and time again dealing with other nations, whose names were not redacted. Overall, the majority of those who criticize Wikileaks don't have a problem with what they do, but rather, how it's released. Wikileaks continues to modify it's editorial policies.

Those condemning Wikileaks are usually doing so out of a national pride that has been hurt. To date, virtually every country who has been the subject of a Wikileaks release has responded negatively.

That's just natural. (But it doesn't make the behavior the correct one.)

While I would not want to see anyone damaged by the release of classified information, the majority of secrecy comes from a culture that can be just as corruptible and ill-mannered as the rest of us.

The Federal Government is by design separated by powers, so that no one branch can rule over the other. How this is achieved has changed overtime, and continues to be eroded in many areas.

A classic case of change would be that prior to whoever the Electoral College voted in as President, their next highest tallied candidate would then become Vice President.

This was later removed as politics became more defined and dual-sided, because a Democrat for a President with a Republican for a potential replacement should they be killed just doesn't mesh well in the modern day political arena.

So does the U.S. Government actually have a case against Wikileaks? Historically, no, they don't. The test bed tossed around would be the Pentagon Papers released by Daniel Ellsberg in 1971.

Because the report was more damaging to past administrations, and not the current one, President Nixon at the time did not react strongly. Henry Kissinger, though, pointed out that if nothing was done it would set a dangerous precedent.

Thus, the government began the process of throwing the Espionage Act of 1917 at him. The first occurrence of the courts testing this law occurred in 1919. In Shenck v. United States, an anti-war socialist was busy printing anti-draft pamphlets, passing them around to soldiers in objection to the war. The United States Supreme Court ruled that Shenck was guilty, however Justice Oliver Wendell Holmes further elaborated on the court's ruling and with a statement that introduced the idea that there needs to be a "clear and present danger" to National Security for this Act to be considered.

Fast forward to Ellsberg's legal woes and you'll find that once the government demanded for coverage of the leaked documents to be immediately halted by The New York Times, the paper responded with an editorial explaining that the documents being discussed did not represent a national security threat.

Another paper, The Washington Post, similarly began publishing a series about the leak, with portions of the ever popular documents being handed off by Daniel Ellsberg.

After refusing to cease publication, too, Attorney General William Rehnquist unsuccessfully sought a court ordered injunction. The Supreme Court began officially weighing in on the issue, and voted 6-3 that the United States government simply didn't have enough proof to seek an injunction against the papers.

As for Daniel himself....he ended up being indicted, of course. However, a mistrial was ultimately declared. The Federal government's case here was similarly shoddy and with Watergate having them "losing" illegally gathered evidence through the use of wiretapping, a lot of credibility for the government at the time overall was left to be desired. 

one cannot reasonably see how the United States could effectively win a trial against Wikileaks or Julian Assange. But even the host country to it's servers, Sweden, has been seeking Julian for questioning relating to sexual encounters. Two female Swedes ages 26 and 31, cried rape.

While the case for arrest was withdrawn or dismissed by Sweden officials, ultimately they did send out a red flag interpol alert.

It would be unwise for me to attempt to summarize the whole of the situation any further, (check it out here) because it's yet to be heard in court, and I'm not buying it. As of now, I personally consider this a fictional side story created to damage a person's reputation, much like Mr. Assange argues. So, if you want the skinny on it, please seek a more balanced perspective elsewhere.

Overall, Mr. Assange through out his adult life has consistently appeared to relish freedom of the press, to fear censorship, and shows an active desire to shape investigative journalism.

A cracker of computer systems in his teens, he once stated ethics shared by a mass of hackers world wide:

• Do no damage to the systems you crack
• Do not change information on these systems (except for logs showing your presence)
• Share the information you find

While the process of entering computer systems without prior consent is illegal in many nations worldwide, many governments and large corporations routinely use these methods and many others to gain information and spy on each other. They just aren't exposed.

Ultimately, Wikileaks is at the heart of a central debate on whether or not these actions should be brought to public light. And I don't know about you, but I certainly never liked being left out of the loop.

In the near term, expect cases against Julian by Sweden and most likely the United States of America. Barring any significant release of information against Mr. Assange or Wikileaks, expect these trials to fail. (But I'm not versed on Swedish law, so don't quote me there.)

In the long term, the current administration may seek powers to protect themselves from such releases in the future. This obviously isn't in the best interest of it's citizens, but for it's public image.

The beauty, though, is that even in a representational democracy, you still get a voice by proxy via your local elected official. I encourage you to use that voice, then, and discuss this situation at length with them and amongst you.

Many of you will have opposing view points here--and yes, there are arguments for and against Wikileaks, Julian Assange, and journalism. However, in a free society, the greatest threat is the systematic abolishment of rights under the guise of "security."

Wikileaks has a 1.5TB file of previously unreleased information that they're using as an insurance policy. Sadly, US Citizens don't have that going for them. But if history is any judge, you won't need it.

Remember: When the White House is tight lipped, the Senate and Congressional floors filled with foolery, and the Justice system only weighing in when absolutely necessary, the Media becomes an unspoken system for fact-checking politicians.

But you, Average Jane and Joe Citizen, are the employers of all five of these outlets.

Don't forget that, and for the sake of the truth--don't let them, either.