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Shallow, uninformed, and lacking identity

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The arc of history bends toward the same old fuckery.

You are here: Home / Wikileaks Opens Its Sphincter

Wikileaks Opens Its Sphincter

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Last night, Wikileaks published the last of 133,000 cables that it’s made public in the last 10 days. The revelation came in part because the whole file of cables had been released on filesharing networks, and the password for the encrypted file was made public in a Guardian book about Wikileaks. Wikileaks’ side of the story is that the release is the Guardian’s fault.

The Guardian, quoting Daniel Domscheit-Berg, the former Wikileaks technical lead and founder of Openleaks, says that the release is Assange’s fault because he re-used passwords instead of creating a separate encrypted file for each news organization. No matter how the Guardian excuses itself, and even if Assange was sloppy with his password handling, publishing a password given them in confidence was a stunningly stupid move.

It’s been pretty clear for a while that Assange’s legal troubles have tied him up and made him ineffective, and that he was such a control freak that Wikileaks was a compromised operation without him. My working assumption was that organizations like Openleaks would take over, but it’s been at least 6 months since Openleaks was announced and it still hasn’t hosted any leaks. Domscheit-Berg is another strange duck who deleted bank memos after Assange fired him, so it’s unclear that he would be a better guardian of secrets than Assange.

In the meantime, a bunch of cables, some of which could possibly compromise sources, have been dumped on the Internet, and neither the Guardian nor Wikileaks is looking very trustworthy.

Reader Interactions

95Comments

  3. 3.

    Samara Morgan

    lol!

    mixie is pissy.
    did you vote mistermix? Assange is crowdsourcing the decision.
    i think….the release of the encrypted file already happened…it was distributed over mirror servers, the media outlets each had a copy, so that didn’t happen like you say…its the Guardian’s release of the password that is driving this.
    But i also think slow drip paranoia induction wasn’t working.
    It was immunizing the target.

    Maximize impact, right? That is Wikileaks prime directive.

    Assange is trying to wake up the populace. I have quoted his philosophy here before. An aware populace is an empowered populace.

  4. 4.

    Samara Morgan

    @Omnes Omnibus: did you vote Omnes?
    i kinda think the juicers are all horrified at Julian’s new tactic of unredacted release.
    we can call it ….shock-n-awe paranoia induction, as opposed to slow drip.
    :)

  8. 8.

    Omnes Omnibus

    @Samara Morgan:

    An aware populace is an empowered populace.

    Yeah, Assange invented that. No one ever came up with ideas like “Knowledge is power” ever before.

  10. 10.

    arguingwithsignposts

    @Omnes Omnibus: Did he also come up with “lolly, lolly, lolly, get your adverbs here”? Because that would be so cool.

    ETA: doing an internet poll =/= “crowdsourcing” anything.

  12. 12.

    Admiral_Komack

    “No matter how the Guardian excuses itself, and even if Assange was sloppy with his password handling, publishing a password given them in confidence was a stunningly stupid move.”

    Aye, but Assange is no white knight, either.
    I think what he is doing is wrong.
    If he is placed in jail, I won’t lose any sleep.

  14. 14.

    Samara Morgan

    @arguingwithsignposts: did you vote AWS?
    just send your opinion to #WLVoteYes or #WLVoteNo.
    complaining to me isnt going to do any good.
    use your voice.

    i want to see the gharani massacre video, but not yet i guess.
    :)

    soon, i bet….in 3 months.

  16. 16.

    t jasper parnell

    I would have thought that this might have been a bigger story than the various racing horses. And, as by the way, every time there is one of this document dumps the same tired somebody’s going to get killed because of this charge circulates and yet no one ever is. Odd that.

  17. 17.

    adolphus

    If the professional investigative journalists would step up and take their watchdog role seriously, we wouldn’t be saddled a group of Keystone Cops for whistle blowers.

  18. 18.

    Samara Morgan

    @Omnes Omnibus: how many times to i have to explain this?
    im not a racist unless christian and stupid are races now.
    and white is not a race….caucasian is a race, and it includes hispanics.
    :)

  19. 19.

    Samara Morgan

    @t jasper parnell:

    I would have thought that this might have been a bigger story than the various racing horses.

    it is…just not here.
    the diplo cables arent going to cause killings, just firings, and more erosion of American influence in global politics. Julian had removed names, the media had removed names in previous releases– the names are all there in the encrypted file.
    I think the important thing is should Julian release the encryption key?
    that is why he is crowdsourcing the decision.
    its kinda globally democratic.
    :)

  21. 21.

    Samara Morgan

    @adolphus: i think its pretty cool how Julian has enslaved them.
    The WaPo tried to gatekeep on the first release and they never got another crumb.

  22. 22.

    Samara Morgan

    @arguingwithsignposts: how am i a racist?

    defn. racist – a person with a prejudiced belief that one race is superior to others

    what race do i believe is superior to others?
    caucasian is a race. white is not.

  25. 25.

    superluminar

    Fuck – this is like a greatest hits collection all on one thread. Just missing the link to the LoOGers…any minute naow…

  26. 26.

    fhtagn

    @Samara Morgan:

    As opposed to a cud-lip child who knows nothing about evolution, religion or hacking, but likes to sound like the worst sort of wingnut with pretensions?

  27. 27.

    Aaron Fown

    I am almost certain that Domscheit-Berg is an intelligence agent, probably a private one for BoA. His objective was to fracture the Wikileaks organization and delete the evidence that the banks are bankrupt. He accomplished his mission; Openleaks is just a beard for his real activities. Thus, the lack of concern for actually publishing anything shouldn’t be a real surprise. He’s probably too busy counting his piles of loot.

  29. 29.

    Samara Morgan

    @arguingwithsignposts: sure.
    but there are more of me than there are of you i think.

    we are anonymous
    we are legion
    we do not forget
    we do not forgive
    expect us

    besides, i think natural humanmonkey curiousity will vote for decryption.

    @mixie

    In the meantime, a bunch of cables, some of which could possibly compromise sources,

    oh they will–Assange has been holding back the SECRET NOFORN cables. there are 15000 of them.

    have been dumped on the Internet, and neither the Guardian nor Wikileaks is looking very trustworthy.

    this is where we differ mixie.
    i think our government is no longer trustworthy. And hasn’t been since Bush corrupted it for the evangelism of missionary democracy and the economic rule of the neo-corporatists.
    it might go back even further, but the ground the cables cover is 21st century ground.

  30. 30.

    fhtagn

    @Samara Morgan:

    You don’t forget or forgive?

    Just remember, everyone on this site laughs at you – and there ain’t nothing you can do about it.

    Just remember – don’t forget, don’t forgive.

    I am still laughing, tokie.

  31. 31.

    Samara Morgan

    @fhtagn: did you vote fthagen?
    @Aaron Fown: good analysis– the thing the wikileaks community is saying is that no advocate of open information and anti-sec would delete leaked data.
    it is pretty obvious that he deleted the BoA data.

  32. 32.

    arguingwithsignposts

    @Samara Morgan:

    but there are more of me than there are of you i think.

    Very empirical that.

    Do you own a Fawkes mask, too?

    I would imagine there are more of People Who Don’t Care than either of us. But who knows. I don’t.

  33. 33.

    arguingwithsignposts

    @Aaron Fown:

    His objective was to fracture the Wikileaks organization and delete the evidence that the banks are bankrupt.

    I think most everyone with a brain knows the banks are bankrupt. You don’t need encryption for that.

  35. 35.

    Samara Morgan

    @fhtagn: laugh away. but i think more ppl hate me than laugh. if what Cole says about his mail is true. :)
    i cant wait to see these.

    6 percent, or 15,652 cables, are classified as “secret.” Of those, 4,330 are so sensitive that they carry the additional label “NOFORN,” meaning that they should not be made accessible to non-US nationals.

    and i predict in 3 months Gharani.

  36. 36.

    fhtagn

    @Samara Morgan:

    And just how many of your predictions have come true? None whatsoever.

    You need a new gig, because the Nostradamus of Trolling racket that you’ve got going now looks distinctly threadbare.

    Don’t forgive, don’t forget.

    I am still laughing at you, Tokie.

  38. 38.

    Samara Morgan

    @fhtagn: its not a poll. its a forum, where you give reasons either to release the key or not.
    the encrypted file is loose on the internet.
    there are many, many copies by now.
    surely all foreign governments have copies of the NOFORNs….they just cant read them yet.
    i assume the media outlets have decrypted copies, and are not in possession of the key. but i doubt they will release their files, because they would lose their franchise of releasing the cables to the public.

  41. 41.

    Samara Morgan

    @Admiral_Komack: i’ve been reading the twitter streams since Guardian Gate started.
    its all true.
    i tried unsuccessfully to draw the juicers attention to it yesterday but they were waaaaaay too involved in schedulegate.

  42. 42.

    fhtagn

    @Samara Morgan:

    And how do you know the forum is authentic, or that Assange really cares either way?

    You don’t, do you?

    In any case, if you are voting, yes, it is a poll, not just a forum where people write in.

    Don’t forget or forgive, Tokie, because you are really bad at this online trolling shtick.

  44. 44.

    Samara Morgan

    /shrug
    fhtagen can bury his head in the sand, or up his butt, but the world is changing.
    america can lead, follow, get out of the way, or crumble into obscurity and irrelevence. fhtagen wants to go back, exactly like the teabaggers.
    but timetravel to the past is impossible, because of closed form timecurves.
    :)
    social media and the internet have changed the world. and no one can put that djinni back in the bottle.

  46. 46.

    Sam Houston

    Yep. Krebs, Schneier, et al saw this coming. Takeaways:

    *Journalists need basic crypto training.
    *Assange is still a megalomaniac or showboat, take yer pick.
    *DB is just as tainted.
    *People are going to be hurt by this. Good and bad.
    *Massive embarrassment for the State dept.
    *Remember all this started because Sate kept their files in plain text.
    *Millions of curious citizens are getting an eye-opening education on how governments work.

    And last but not least:

    *Assange’s still-encrypted “insurance” file looms large in many players minds. Grandstanding or Real Dirt? You decide.

  47. 47.

    Gravenstone

    18/46 posts (.391) emanating from the brain damaged wildchild. That’s a pretty impressive batting average, even at the majors. I mean fuck, that’s damn near Ted Williams territory.

  50. 50.

    Samara Morgan

    @Sam Houston:

    *Assange’s still-encrypted “insurance” file looms large in many players minds. Grandstanding or Real Dirt? You decide.

    i think its real. and the Gharani massacre video is part of it.

    *Assange is still a megalomaniac or showboat, take yer pick.

    He might be both of those, but he is also a genius and a fanatic. He is also the leader of a New Movement, Hacktivism.
    Hacktivism is a New Event, and has a mission statement, a philosophy, and a community of transnational followers.

  53. 53.

    Samara Morgan

    @arguingwithsignposts: try me. im open to a good argument. there are some good arguments against on the #WLVoteNo forum. i just havent heard any here.

    @mistermix
    let me fix your title….

    Wikileaks Opens Its Sphincter

    should be

    Wikileaks Opens America’s Sphincter

    haha fixt!

  55. 55.

    Samara Morgan

    @fhtagn: They’re heeeere!

    and you have no freedoms.
    you are are just another tool of the authoritarian neo-corporatist oligarchy.
    go chew your “freed” market cud.

    and…..IWASRIGHTIWASRIGHTIWASRIGHT!
    hahahahaha!

  56. 56.

    Samara Morgan

    here is al-jazeera, another PSA for you slow-witted “patriots.”

    The website said it took the action after claiming the Guardian had leaked the passwords to the full cache of cables, a charge the British newspaper denies.
    __
    The Guardian broke off its co-operation with WikiLeaks in December over concerns about the security of sources.
    __
    The Guardian, the New York Times, Der Spiegel of Germany and Spain’s El Pais as well as French newspaper Le Monde were WikiLeaks’ original media partners and published selected cables, although with names of sources redacted.
    __
    In a joint statement, the news organisations said: “We deplore the decision of WikiLeaks to publish the unredacted state department cables, which may put sources at risk.
    __
    “Our previous dealings with WikiLeaks were on the clear basis that we would only publish cables which had been subjected to a thorough editing and clearance process.

    awww….poor gatekeepers lost their exclusive.

    boo-fucking-hoo

  59. 59.

    Samara Morgan

    @Peter: i predicted Julian would release the crypto key. did you miss that?
    but then…i was actually reading the arguments at #WLVote.
    :)

  60. 60.

    fhtagn

    @Samara Morgan:

    And when did you predict so utterly inconsequential a matter,dear child?

    Oh wait – you didn’t predict it. You just mooched the idea from someone else. As usual.

  63. 63.

    soonergrunt

    it’s unclear that he would be a better guardian of secrets…

    You’re fucking kidding, right?

  64. 64.

    Samara Morgan

    @Judas Escargot: the guardian is saying that, not the WL community…. the passwords werent “old”..i think he gave the media outlets the same password for the diplo cable files. fair access.
    perhaps THAT was a mistake..
    :)

    notice…al-jazeera is not bitching about the lack of redaction and classification testing.
    :)

  66. 66.

    Judas Escargot

    @Samara Morgan:

    notice…al-jazeera is not bitching about the lack of redaction and classification testing.

    At least not until the list of their shadowy funding sources gets published. But they have nothing to worry about: Assange only seems interested in undermining Western institutions.

    Wonder why that would be?

  67. 67.

    Samara Morgan

    @Judas Escargot: wallah, its not that hard. because Julian got gifted with America’s secrets, not KSA’s or China’s.

    you are pretty much thinking like the rest of the juicers.
    Americans aren’t the good guys….we arent even the better guys.
    We are the stupid guys.

    Hacktivism is putting a stake in the heart of the myth of American exceptionalism. the only way America is different from KSA or China is that we PRETEND we are.
    America is an authoritarian neo-corporatist conspiracy like every security state on the planet.

  68. 68.

    Interrobang

    Assange only seems interested in undermining Western institutions. Wonder why that would be?

    Gee, ’cause he’s obsessively fascinated with power, and that’s where the power is? Crumple up your tinfoil hat already and give it to the cat to play with, jeez.

    Hacktivism isn’t new by internet standards; I was tracking the first wave of hacktivists (like, say, Emmanuel Goldstein) back in the 1990s, for pity’s sake. The particular snowball that started the avalanche formed a long time ago. Assange just has better tools.

  70. 70.

    Judas Escargot

    @Interrobang:

    Hacktivism isn’t new by internet standards; I was tracking the first wave of hacktivists (like, say, Emmanuel Goldstein) back in the 1990s, for pity’s sake.

    Oh, the 90s: I bet you were quite the 1337 haxx0r, with your own geocities page and everything. (I’m sure Eric would appreciate the name-drop, too).

    Access is expensive. Secrecy is even more expensive. Script-kids like Assange don’t work for free: it’s just that they’re normally more interested in selling credit cards and routing numbers than State department cables.

    You’re naive if you don’t think there’s a funding source.

  71. 71.

    Judas Escargot

    @Samara Morgan:

    the only way America is different from KSA or China is that we PRETEND we are.

    In the KSA or China, we wouldn’t be having this conversation: Their rocket scientists aren’t allowed to have political opinions, so my ass would be in prison or a mass grave. And you, my eccentric young friend, would be in an institution or re-education camp.

    I may do nothing here but bitch about this country (or, more accurately, its political culture), but don’t tell me “there’s no difference!”. That’s a very facile, shallow framing, and not of much use to anyone.

  72. 72.

    Temporarily Max McGee (soon enough to be Andy K again)

    @Samara Morgan:

    LOL! Julian is not out to “guard” secrets….His design is get secrets MAXIMUM IMPACT.
    right sooner?

    Jebus…Any excuse, right? And you’re the one who claims to have read Assange’s blueprint?

    The release of secrets is of secondary concern in Assange’s model. For it- breaking the systems of secrecy- to work, he needs to get multiple leaks going in a given system, not just one big leak, especially not one big leak of material that was relatively lightly secured. Get it? No? Try this: Assange doesn’t want one Bradley Manning leaking 260K documents at once, he needs 260K Bradley Mannings leaking one document each, and leaking better quality material- on average- than this. One “Collateral Murder” video>260K “meh” docs.

    For the secondary concern- publicizing the content of the leaks- to make an impact, the idea is to make big reveals slowly, to let each big reveal breathe, not suffocate under the weight of a huge dump. You’re a fool to think differently.

  78. 78.

    Samara Morgan

    @Judas Escargot:

    You’re naive if you don’t think there’s a funding source.

    the people fund wikileaks thru donation….but in America the land of the “free” and home of the “brave”, you can make a mastercard donation to the KKK, but not to WL. Have you ever heard of bitcoins?

    @fhtagn: refute what?

  83. 83.

    eemom

    what, a Wikileaks post devolves into yet another episode of Baby Girl Playing With Her Genitals? Ya gotta be shittin me.

  84. 84.

    Samara Morgan

    @fhtagn: srsly– what am i supposed to refute?
    you are a freemarket fucktard– i can pull up plenty of quotes on that.
    i repeat, go wander in the Free Market Fantasy Forest and chew your free market cud.
    good steer.
    /pat pat

  86. 86.

    Samara Morgan

    @eemom: go away crone.
    you have never gotten over being SPECTACULARILY WRONG on the Afghan doc dump.
    your butthurt is showing.

  87. 87.

    Temporarily Max McGee (soon enough to be Andy K again)

    @Samara Morgan:

    i speculate this it was because the slow drip paranoia induction wasnt working.

    Occam’s Razor: It was because Assange is an idiot who didn’t use unique passwords for different files. As long as he had these files on hand he could, if nothing else, keep the spotlight on himself. Now he needs someone to come up with something big, pronto, or lose the light.

    And with that, I leave for the salt mine.

  88. 88.

    fhtagn

    @Samara Morgan:

    I find it touching that you try so hard and yet never get beyond the intellectual level of a superstitious peasant, staring in wonder at the big bright light in the sky, while kissing your medallion of George Bush’s ass.

  89. 89.

    Judas Escargot

    @Samara Morgan:

    $800,000 worth of anonymous wire transfers and PayPal donations is a lot of concerned citizens. Especially when the donation rate’s gone down to 2000 euros/month (and apparently peaked at $6000/month).

    You’re free to wire WL money, use PayPal, or mail them a check or money order, you know. If you don’t understand why a credit card company would be wary of doing business with a self-proclaimed “hacker collective”, email me your credit card number (or, even better, post it here).

  90. 90.

    Samara Morgan

    @fhtagn: im not the superstitious peasant that prays to the free market gods.
    go on steer, bulk up for your neo-corporatist masters.

    /moo moo

  91. 91.

    Samara Morgan

    @Judas Escargot: Mastercard is good for Mossad assassins too.
    :)
    hahaha…gawker had to delete the numbers but the Pali sites still have them and the wikimirrors.

    S E C R E T ABU DHABI 000103
    __
    NOFORN
    SIPDIS
    FOR NEA/ARP
    __
    E.O. 12958: DECL: 2020/02/24
    TAGS: PREL PINS CJAN AE
    SUBJECT: UAE REQUEST FOR USG ASSISTANCE IN INVESTIGATION OF KILLING
    OF MAHMOUD AL-MABHOUH
    __
    CLASSIFIED BY: Doug Greene, DCM; REASON: 1.4(D)
    __
    ¶1. (C/NF) On the margins of a meeting with visiting
    Secretary Chu, on Feb 24 MFA Minister of State Gargash made a
    formal request to the Ambassador for assistance in providing
    cardholder details and related information for credit cards
    reportedly issued by a U.S. bank to several suspects in last
    month’s killing of Hamas leader Mahmoud Al-Mabhouh in Dubai.
    According to a letter Gargash gave the Ambassador (which
    transmitted details of the request from Dubai Security authorities
    to the UAE Central Bank), the credit cards were issued by
    MetaBank, in Iowa. Embassy LEGATT is transmitting the request and
    associated details to FBI HQ. Gargash asked that Embassy pass any
    reply to the director of the General Directorate of State Security
    (GDSS) in Dubai.

  92. 92.

    Samara Morgan

    Once information is free on the interwebz, its free forever.
    it can never be scrubbed clean.

  94. 94.

    Samara Morgan

    @fhtagn: or your grovelling adoration of the freemarketeer neo-corportatists and Erik “Beyond Unions” Kain.

    I’ve cooled on the idea of unions lately, at least in their current form, and have had a number of really good conversations in the past couple of days after writing this post, about unions and particularly teachers unions.
    __
    Certainly teachers unions represent a major obstacle to reform of our education system.

    Do you understand how tit-for-tat works? trying to adhom me or de-credential me is a cheat move. I just want to to discuss the thread topic, Wikileaks.
    But the player that makes the first cheat move can never win, because the other player can always respond with a cheat move.
    Here is a very simple explanation.

    One guy decided to run a computer tournament; people were permitted to create algorithms in a synthetic language which would have the ability to keep track of previous exchanges and make a decision on each new exchange whether to be honest or to cheat. He challenged them to see who could come up with the one which did the best in a long series of matches against various opponents. It turned out that the best anyone could find, and the best anyone has ever found, was known as “Tit-for-tat”.
    __
    On the first round, it plays fair. On each successive round, it does to the other guy what he did the last time.
    __
    When Tit-for-tat plays against itself, it plays fair for the entire game and maximizes output. When it plays against anyone who tosses in some cheating, it punishes it by cheating back and reduces the other guys unfair winnings.
    __
    No-one has ever found a way of defeating it.

    Now i’d prefer to talk to about what effect the diplo cables will have, if crowdsourcing can work, and if this means Julians NLS security state destroyer is out of fuel.
    But i can play tit-for-tat if that is all you are up for.
    i luff games theory.

    so go bulk up for your authoritarian neo-corporatist overlords, fhtagen. but know they are just fattening your sorry cudlip ass for slaughter.

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