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How Did Wikileaks Do It?

grassy_knoll writes "Related to the Wikileaks video recently released and discussed here, the NY Times reports: 'Somehow — it will not say how — WikiLeaks found the necessary computer time to decrypt a graphic video, released Monday, of a United States Army assault in Baghdad in 2007 that left 12 people dead, including two employees of the news agency Reuters. The video has been viewed more than two million times on YouTube, and has been replayed hundreds of times in television news reports.' The article is light on details; what encryption algorithm was used? Was this a brute force attack? Did someone pass the decryption keys to Wikileaks along with the video? Something else?"

17 of 973 comments (clear)

  1. They did it for the money. by Leptok · · Score: -1, Flamebait

    They have been good in the past, but they seem to be playing this up for donations. They must really need the money.

  2. Wikileaks = Enemy by ThreeE · · Score: -1, Flamebait

    "WikiLeaks has released a classified US military video..."

    I hope they find out who leaked this and put them in a locked cell. Releasing classified material puts all of our American soldiers in danger -- not to mention our country.

    1. Re:Wikileaks = Enemy by ThreeE · · Score: -1, Flamebait

      It's a fucking war idiot. They had weapons -- including an RPG. Even Wikileaks admits that. A US unit was engaged a block away. It wasn't covered up, it was investigated by the Pentagon.

      You need to grow the fuck up fast. Those guys over their in the helicopter perform a more courageous act by just getting up in the morning than the sum total of courage you display your entire life.

  3. Re:Not true by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1, Flamebait

    The whole "Collateral Murder" website they setup is biased, from the name of the site, to the phrasing they use.

    Reality has a well known liberal bias.

  4. Anonymous Coward by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1, Flamebait

    The entire Wikileaks site is a far left plot against the military and the US. It's headed up by Obama the muslim.

  5. Re:Not true by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1, Flamebait

    Unfortunately, it seems that the angle most of the media has been playing up is "Wikileaks pwns DoD", not "US military massacres unarmed civilians and reporters".

    I guess that's a good thing, then, since even the main mouthpiece at Wikileaks acknowledges that the video shows guys with AK's and RPGs walking around, and that the average people who would be on the street weren't there - because they knew that armed insurgents were on the scene. They also know that armed insurgents in the immediate area had been shooting RPGs at military personnel throughout the day, and that there was an ongoing string of fights right in the area. Which is why the gunship was there in the first place, and why they presumed (understandibly) that the guys on the ground with RPGs and machine guns were likely just the guys there were looking for.

    And of course it didn't help that the two reporters involved hadn't bothered to mention they were in the area, and weren't wearing vests or any other gear to help identify themselves as journalists... even while they were standing in the street with armed insurgents.

    So, yeah, the story is that Wikileaks go their hands on video. And the details of that are interesting. The story you'd seem to prefer hearing would be lacking rather a lot of context, and would thus be highly misleading. Which is just what you seem to oppose. Right?

  6. Re:It was leaked. by icebraining · · Score: 0, Flamebait

    How is this insightful? How is it patriotic to provide the video, and unpatriotic to provide the keys to let them view it? It doesn't make sense.

  7. Are They Pissed They Got Scooped? by SplicerNYC · · Score: 0, Flamebait

    Or is it something else? The NY Times,regardless of the hype of it being a "liberal" (you can stop LOLing now) paper, has always ever been tied to the ruling class whether in the U.S. or abroad. I'm sure of my opinion that if this had gone to them first, the Times would have contacted the Pentagon first and been only too glad to bury the story at their behest. Thank goodness for organizations like Wikileaks.

  8. I don't get it by Frigo · · Score: -1, Flamebait

    How is that a bad thing to shoot Reuters reporters on sight?

  9. Re:maybe by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1, Flamebait

    What is the big deal about the video? Two people were killed after they were dumb enough to hang out in a war zone with people carrying weapons. This story is about as sensational and news worthy as Clay Aiken announcing he is gay. In both cases, who cares?

  10. Re:Overpaid geeks: GIVE WIKILEAKS MONEY! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1, Flamebait

    N,o don't give them money. There is a distinctly anti- American tilt to the comments on the video.

    It was *good* to release the video. I was *bad* and possibly *evil* to make it a propaganda piece - the military did nothing wrong on the video but are being made out as villains nonetheless.

  11. Re:Not true by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1, Flamebait

    THERE WHERE NO RPGs just a camera crew

  12. Re:Not true by negRo_slim · · Score: 0, Flamebait

    Way to try and justify the existence of a professional group of mass murderers. Seems to me we need to practice what we preach if we are ever to obtain lasting peace in this world.

    --
    On the Oregon Cost born and raised, On the beach is where I spent most of my days
  13. Re:Not true by spun · · Score: 0, Flamebait

    These guys are going to be tomorrow's homeless vets

    The 'homeless vets' thing has been blown way out of proportion. Most of the 'vets' you see on the street are bums with an angle. The only thing they know about the service is what they've seen on the movies.

    These guys - and tens of thousands of others - are going to be just what their peers were after coming back from Kuwait, Vietnam, Bosnia, Korea and the Pacific. Business leaders, professors, bus drivers, technicians. Quiet men who don't talk a lot about what they did but know their own value and get things done.

    Keep telling yourself that if it helps you sleep better at night.

    --
    - None can love freedom heartily, but good men; the rest love not freedom, but license. -- John Milton
  14. Re:Not true by jdpars · · Score: 0, Flamebait

    The legitimacy has been decided by the fact that no one cares anymore. We want it over. If you think he committed some kind of crime, go to the courts, not the forums.

  15. Re:Not true by anagama · · Score: 0, Flamebait

    Lt Watada is a true hero. You are not alone in your thinking, even if only army-junk has mod points right now.

    --
    What changed under Obama? Nothing Good
  16. Re:maybe by TheTurtlesMoves · · Score: 1, Flamebait

    And being unarmed, as the pilot said they were, does make them a non-combatant. But hay we are team America, we kill who ever the fuck we like.

    --
    The Grey Goo disaster happened 3 billion years ago. This rock is covered in self replicating machines!