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WikiLeaks Launches New Platform, Privacy Study

Posted by timothy on from the tools-for-racking-the-mud dept.

itwbennett writes "WikiLeaks has launched a new submissions platform, along with a study of the global trade in surveillance products. WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange told press conference attendees in London that all the iPhone, BlackBerry, and Gmail users in the crowd were 'screwed.' 'The reality is intelligence contractors are selling right now to countries across the world mass surveillance systems for all of those products,' Assange said."

8 of 96 comments (clear)

  1. Whatever Julian by darien.train · · Score: 3, Insightful

    No matter how many acts of journalism this guys commits I will never see him as a journalist. I have to like someone personally first and also make sure they have a flawless record using a standard that I set and reserve only for him. Until this impossible standard is met I will bash in any way I can regardless of logic and back calls for his extrajudicial murder.

    It's really the only sensible path Very Serious People can take.

    --
    I don't know how many years on this Earth I got left. I'm going to get real weird with it. - Frank Reynolds
    1. Re:Whatever Julian by ackthpt · · Score: 3, Insightful

      No matter how many acts of journalism this guys commits I will never see him as a journalist. I have to like someone personally first and also make sure they have a flawless record using a standard that I set and reserve only for him. Until this impossible standard is met I will bash in any way I can regardless of logic and back calls for his extrajudicial murder.

      It's really the only sensible path Very Serious People can take.

      He's a facilitator. He made vast amounts of information available. He doesn't claim to the the journo or editor - that's the audience he's feeding to - assuming they'll do their job proper. You're always free to sift through the documents yourself, to stimulate your own personal outrage or mistrust of various world leaders, govenment functionaries, paper shufflers, rubber-stampers and pencil-pushers. Don't condemn the man for his journalistic shortcomings.

      --

      A feeling of having made the same mistake before: Deja Foobar
    2. Re:Whatever Julian by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Insightful

      for profit journalism has been corrupted so badly by the money and trying to make really rich people even richer that I no longer see them as journalists.

    3. Re:Whatever Julian by poetmatt · · Score: 3, Insightful

      The reality of the 21st century is that *everyone* can be a journalist, whether you consider them one or not. You can define it any way you want, but anyone can be a part of the press: reporting, feedback, facilitating, etc. Good/factual/relevant journalist? That's up to one's own interpretation.

      So what you call it, isn't really relevant. The laws haven't been updated to respect this, but with technology it's held true for quite some time.

  2. Re:"all the iPhone, BlackBerry, and Gmail users" by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 2, Insightful

    This is kind of the problem with privacy.

    I think it's important and people need to be taking action now before it is too late to go back.. however I _personally_ don't feel the impact from invasions of my privacy.

    I don't have any medical issues I'd like to keep secret, I don't have any embarrassing purchases, I don't care if people know how much money I have or my current location (well, I wouldn't want my location public to anyone who wants it for personal safety reasons.. but government/law enforcement.. no problem), don't care if people know what I do for a living, etc...

    In other words: I'm boring and know it! All that said, I think that if I did have any of that, I have the right to keep it private and so does everyone else.

    It's hard to explain to someone why protecting our right to privacy is important, because most people fall in the same boat as I do when it comes to their personal privacy. People willingly post the most relevant info about themselves on social media sites already, so it's a hard sell.

  3. Re:EFF off by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Insightful

    The one thing Assange is accomplishing that the EFF (from my perspective anyway) has failed to do is get people talking about these issues. Not geeks on slashdot, but your every day guy. To seriously fight back against erroding privacy, you need a huge mass of people to take a stand, and the problem has always been that most people just don't care.

    He may be an attention seeking asshole, but I think we kinda need that.

  4. Re:"all the iPhone, BlackBerry, and Gmail users" by GameboyRMH · · Score: 4, Insightful

    From your first sentence I thought you were going to point out that the problem with privacy is that you have to be a computer security expert to achieve it.

    --
    "When information is power, privacy is freedom" - Jah-Wren Ryel
  5. Re:They have to have the capability by betterunixthanunix · · Score: 4, Insightful

    Funny how law enforcement officers were able to do their jobs before mass surveillance technologies became available. You know, back in the days where privacy was guaranteed by the technical limitations of law enforcement? Before wiretapping, before CALEA, before the crypto wars, back when privacy rights were actually respected in free societies, the police were still able to do their jobs.

    Law enforcement agencies are more powerful today than at any other point in human history. Why are we not talking about reducing that power?

    --
    Palm trees and 8