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German Police Raid Homes of Wikileaks.de Domain Owner
BountyX writes "First and foremost, wikileaks.org is back up after downtime due to server load; however, the German government wants to keep the site down. According to their twitter page, police have raided the home of Wikileaks.de domain owner Theodor Reppe (PDF) over internet censorship lists that were leaked two weeks ago. What the Australian government's secret ACMA internet censorship blacklist has to do with Germany is a mystery. This case is a prime example of multiple governments collaborating in support of censorship." Reader iter8 provides a link to coverage on Wikileaks itself, which says that police searched Reppe's homes in both Dresden and Jena, and adds:
"According to police, the reason for the search was 'distribution of pornographic material' and 'discovery of evidence.' Wikileaks has published censorship lists for Australia, Thailand, Denmark and other countries. Included on the lists are references to sites alleged to contain pornography, including child pornography. Wikileaks has not published any images from the sites."
His house was raided by the cops because he was listed as the registrant for the domain wikileaks.de? Is that what passes for probable cause in the Fatherland?
WTF?
To us, it looks like a game of whack-a-mole. To the authorities, however, it may look like a hydra, and I worry that they might start acting like it. If they haven't already.
Athy, athier, athiest.
Smart move, raiding the home of a person involved in a website devoted to leaking crappy behavior by companies and governments. Even smarter citing wishy-washy reasons for doing so. Real smart.
Silly rabbit
I didn't realise German secret services were involved in that sort of thing.
That and this article certainly shines a whole new light on German politics for me. It seems hypocritical that they're not willing to perform combat operations in Afghanistan because of fears this will make people link it to it's Nazi past in being seen as an oppressive force yet meanwhile, back home, their security services are, well, acting as an oppressive force?
It sounds like Germany's political elite are suffering an identity crisis - do they accept they've moved on (which they have) and that they can stop worrying about how people will view them and actually do something useful in Afghanistan or do they keep living under that cloud of fear of what people think of them and their past, in which case, they need to stop doing shit like this because this sort of thing links them to their past much more strongly than actually doing their fair share in Afghanistan would.
They can't have it both ways, either do something useful in Afghanistan and stop caring what others think or stop doing this kind of shit to oppress your citizens back home.
"First they ignore you, then they laugh at you, then they fight you, then you win."
Keep up the good work, wikileaks. Somebody's got to.
No, they were not. The immense majority of currently living Germans were not even planned at the time of the Nazis. Guilt is not inherited, you know...
More seriously, what the fuck did the police think they're doing? They are persecuting people for exposing censorship.
Well, you're a German citizen, right? Germany has, last I checked, a constitutional federal, parliamentary representational democratic republican form of government, correct? Does the Grundgesetz für die Bundesrepublik Deutschland not guarantee your basic rights?
Well, then stand up for them and write your representatives in parliament. Tell them you, as a German citizen, won't stand for the rights of citizens being violated! Tell them that Germany is no longer a gestapo state. The Geheime Staatspolizei is no more! And you won't stand for having it recreated!
My blog
If this looks like the first case of international collaboration over a wikileaks takedown, it could be a sign of things to come.
Wikileaks relies on the fact that, although they piss countries off, they never piss of a lot of countries at once. As such a takedown in one country means little because of its distribution.
However what would happen if something really major got posted on Wikileaks, something that a government would need to go all out to remove. Say someone posted a list identifying all CIA agents. Would the US government make its allies act to take down wiki leaks presence in each of their country? Would they get ICANN involved and order them to wipe all of its urls off the web? Even block all wikileak IPs at a root server level?
The second a website like Wikileaks which tries to evade potential countermeasures becomes a nuisence to enough people, there'll be plans (if they don't already exist, it's hard to see intelligence agencies not having thought about it) drawn up about how you'd go about wiping a site from the internet. If this does happen, it'll have dire consequences about the future of the net.
They posted it to ISPs.
And how many governments leak information? ALL OF THEM.
So the AUS government is guilty of distribution of KP links too.
German police to raid Australia in 3, 2, 1...
There would seem to be a concerted effort across the globe to tighten control of information that gets out to the public. Jay Rockefeller trying to take down the existing(free) version of the internet is another example. One of the many sources of information out there that the "establishment" is concerned about is the Alex Jones Show (or infowars.com) Inform yourself, we are coming to an important time in history where those in power(our so-called leaders) are moving to a global government that has been planned for many years(i am not against global government per-say but i AM against one lead by the current corrupt pricks in power). Also something of interest: The Movie - The Obama Deception One other thing: I Want You to get MAD!!
~ awaiting spiritual enlightenment ~
Organizations like the CIA tend to do whatever the US government wants them to do
Yes that is a duh statement. They are employees of the US gov't and do what the US gov't wants. Just like the KGB did what the Communist Russian gov't wanted. Just like the Mossad does what the Israeli gov't wants. Makes sense.
This may include trying to save lives (but, most probably that would be in actuality, lives of citizens of the US and, to some extent, its allies), but it most likely also includes things like toppling foreign governments which the US dislikes, irrespective if this would likely make Americans safer.
Yes the CIA tries to topple gov'ts and while there can be abuse your statement of "irrespective" makes it sound like that is their primary goal. I would argue their primary goal is to make the US safer. You would have to prove otherwise.
It is really not clear, and actually rather unlikely, that the CIA is able to accurately predict the consequences of its present-day actions on the future safety of US
Nobody can accurately predict the future - but when you stop a terrorist cell you are pretty sure you did something to help save lives - or do you think terrorist cells are going to support the Infidels?
The reality, if you would take off your glasses, is that as long as everything the CIA really does is kept secret from you, you have no idea whatsoever if what they do is actually what you believe they do. After living for a while in an Internet-enabled world, I, for one, become less and less willing to blindly believe whatever the US government tells me "the CIA is doing for me".
The reality is I do not wear glasses, nor contacts. My vision is 100% fine - so is my perception of reality. While I do not know everything the CIA does I realize I do not need to know everything. If everyone knew every inch of the CIA there is no way they would be effective. It would be in the news "CIA investigates Joe"...well first, Joe may get harassed by people as many may already assume Joe is a criminal (hey if you are being investigated you did something wrong)...second if Joe was a criminal may stop or shift his activities foiling CIA plans to figure this out.
I am not asking you or anyone to blindly believe the US gov't is 100% kosher - make sure you vote and get the right people into office...or better yet, get yourself into office and on the right comittees. Join the CIA/FBI and do the right thing - but realize secrets are needed because our enemies have no qualms about using secrets or using our knowledge against us.
I do not support "The Man". I also do not support your irrational stupidity
Guilt is not inherited, you know...
Tell that to American blacks.
Free Martian Whores!
I'd suggest you watch it on the TV when and if it ever happens.
The revolution will not be televised.
Squirrel!