Wikileaks - It's time to open the archives

[elbows]

not starting a slanging match with Wikileaks but #anon 'found' and released this publically first.....

Stratfor was 'breached' in December btw....

Those files appear to be the list of subscribers to the publication, not the emails at all.

 

[xes]

apparently....some of the emails contain loads of credit card information......you know.....just saying......anyone fancy a take out?

 

[TheHoodedClaw]

Stratfor is a glorified cuttings agency apparently:

http://www.theatlantic.com/internat...s-wikileaks-for-taking-them-seriously/253681/

 

[xes]

Wonder how many of these "plants" came up with the idea to write that article

 

[elbows]

Well the emails released in yesterdays batch certainly did not suggest that this is a ridiculously powerful organisation with a large quantity of intelligence assets and other such resources.

Apart from wikileaks themselves hyping what Stratfor is, there are only a couple of participants in Stratfors email chats whose words attempt to convey Stratfor as being CIA-tastic. One is the head of the company, who goes so far as to expect the CIA would be asking for advice on how Stratfor manage to be so great, and some bloke who shrouds himself in the mystique of being an old hand at the dark arts and seedy underbelly of intelligence, including throwaway comments about how back in the good old days the likes of Chavez and Moralez would have been killed in helicopter 'accidents'.

None of this means these releases are totally without merit, but we should have learnt long ago not to take wikileaks hype at face value. I also shudder that wikileaks is doing a 'secure' alternative to Facebook, for activists, but I'll go on about that some other time.

 

[elbows]

Subsequent releases were even lamer than the first batch. Im losing interest rapidly.

 

[teqniq]

Wikileaks are in the process of releasing a load of files to do with Syria, how interesting they are likely to be, remains to be seen:

http://wikileaks.org/syria-files/releases.html

 

[elbows]

The detail in todays batch was not interesting, to the point that there is probably no need to read any of them like I did, the summary is enough:

"In the database there are emails demonstrating that Selex sold a technology called Tetra to the Syrian government. This technology allows police forces to communicate in a secure and reliable manner. The database demonstrates that selling assistance and training by Selex continued through to this year."

 

[teqniq]

It would appear that Wikileaks has been under Ddos attck for a number of days and and is consequently unavailable. It's backup http://cabledrum.net is also experiencing Ddos attacks and is also currently unavailable. If this article is to be believed it has a lot to do with the type of information that has been released; rather than video footage of U.S. forces gunning down unarmed civilians it would appear to revolve around the inner workings of the state itself:

....The proof is the cables about Spain, where we interfered with their courts and pressured them into accepting our bizarre, Mickey Mouse friendly interpretations of copyright law. These aren’t easily dismissed matters that only dirty fucking hippies care about like “No Blood for Oil” or “Save the Planet”. These are the levers by which the wealthy and powerful stay wealthy and powerful. And if it’s true that the next organization to have its secrets aired will be one of the large American banks that did so much to destroy the economy, Wikileaks will have struck the first significant blow against the modern corporate structure since neo-liberalism became all the rage in the 1990s....

 

[elbows]

Is that article doing some kind of funky time warp? Perhaps someone has republished a much older article? The stuff about Spains copyright laws came out in late 2010. Assange said something about releasing a banks internal documents a very long time ago now.

 

[teqniq]

Ah ok thanks for that elbows. Upon closer inspection Wikileaks appears to be up atm though cabledrum still appears to be down. Wtf are they doing recycling articles? I checked the date too.

 

[elbows]

What is that site anyway? Looking at other 'recent' articles there I see mention of the elections being over, the first snow of winter, tomorrow being Christmas, and being 6 months away from the July 2011 Obama Afghan war fade-out.

 

[teqniq]

I dunno it was posted on twitter via @Wikileaks account

 

[elbows]

I dont see it, but I do see other goofery from them on twitter:

Speculation on DDoS attack against WikiLeaks timing: 1. Olympics cover 2. Upcomng release. 3. Ongoing Syria, Stratfor releases

 

[teqniq]

I dont see it, but I do see other goofery from them on twitter:

here:

wikileaks
WikiLeaks: The Red Menace of the 21st centuary http://tetheredswimming.com/2012/08/wikileaks-the-red-menace-of-the-21st-century/ https://wlfriends.org/

Not that it really matters; though it makes me wonder why they do stuff like this. I'd have a bit more sympathy if they didn't over-egg and recycle stuff. Somebody needs to have a word with themselves

 

[teqniq]

Hmm well it appears that maybe there is no smoke without fire, there seems to be a fair bit of tweeting about a surveillance system called Trapwire. If true this info seems to have been gleaned from the Stratfor hack which netted lots of emails some of which discuss this system. Emails can be found at the following links (when working):

WikiLeaks #Trapwire release mirror part 1) http://wl.wikileaks-press.org/gifiles/releasedate/2012-08-09-1.html 2) http://wl.wikileaks-press.org/gifiles/releasedate/2012-08-09-2.html 3) http://wl.wikileaks-press.org/gifiles/releasedate/2012-08-09-3.html https://wlfriends.org/

An article outlining Trapwire can be found at the link below:

http://www.businessinsider.com/trapwire-everything-you-need-to-know-2012-8

 

[elbows]

I think I learnt more from Trapwires own website! What I learnt from that batch of Stratfor emails was the same as what I learnt from the first batches, they are self-aggrandizing, under-resourced and prone to making stupid mistakes. In this case the amusing detail has more to do with bloated and irrelevant RSS feeds than tech that makes me shiver.

Clever automated aggregation and analysis of surveillance data has scary potential, but the actual value these systems can add at this point is still rather unlikely to match the company hype. We tend to learn more about the business aspects of this complex than its actual capabilities. This stuff will improve over time but I expect that the war on terror revealed to a new generation of procurement & operations people that for all of technologies progress in recent decades, improvements in analysis capability have not even begun to keep pace with improvements in gathering, transmission & storage capabilities. Especially of visual material, where I expect the algorithms for reliable detection of specific people from cctv footage in no way match the hype.

But it should not be news to people that systems which attempt this sort of thing exist, and a lot of cctv infrastructure is not covert anyway. I dont think people in the USA will be too surprised by the details here, its always been a visible part of the known response to 9/11. I suppose its possible that there could still be outrage about it since there are some slightly bizarre aspects to the way that nation comes to terms with this sort of thing. eg even when the 9/11 effect was strongest the 'Total Information Awareness' Poindexter stuff had to be reconfigured and obscured due to a backlash. But this stuff had not gone away and there was little reason for people to convince themselves that it had, and yet the outrage dissipated.

From what I've seen of the Stratfor leaks they tell a commercial embarrassment story rather than one that reveals interesting details about methods or capabilities.

 

[teqniq]

Thanks elbows, as usual you have taken the time to investigate this more thoroughly that I. I didn't realise the system had it's own site which does indeed furnish a fair bit of info. Now this brings me back to why all this over-egging? Is it to somehow inflate the importance of what Wikileaks and the whole hacktivist 'scene' is doing/have done?

 

[Treacle Toes]

#enemyofthestate going off today....

Pentagon Declares WikiLeaks Enemy of the State… Same as Al-Qaeda

Added by Denise on October 1, 2012.
Saved under News, Politics
Tags: life, Pentagon Papers, prison, united-states



Are entities and people that release government information as much of a threat to American security as those who carry out terrorist attacks? Apparently, the Obama administration believes so, since it has declared those who leak classified information as enemies of the state.
AllGov reports:

​

According to an unprecedented legal theory apparently adopted by the Obama administration, persons and entities who leak or publish classified information are “enemies” of the United States punishable by death or life imprisonment. If this theory had been applied to recent leaks, it would have meant death or life in prison for Pentagon Papers leaker Daniel Ellsberg and the editors of The New York Times and The Washington Post…​

This means that major news outlets will no longer be able to publish leaked government information without threat of imprisonment or death. This is a threat to free press when one considers that much of what the press learns about the the lies and contradictions of government come from leaked documents. Whistleblowers use leaked documents as a way to prove government misconduct and corruption, but what happens now that they’re threatened with life in prison for their actions?

The government’s new policy was revealed as the result of declassified Air Force documents released under the Freedom of Information Act. The documents revealed that government officials were investigating a computer systems analyst working for the Air Force for sympathy with WikiLeaks and preparing to charge her with “communicating with the enemy,” a military crime that carries a maximum sentence of death.

http://www.kulturekritic.com/2012/1...wikileaks-enemy-of-the-state-same-as-al-qaeda

 

[xes]

Missed this link from the other week. The condom which is central to the rape case, doesn't contain any of Julians DNA.
http://rt.com/news/assange-condom-no-dna-277/

 

[elbows]

I have tried to avoid getting into details of the case that can impact on possible victims, although Im sure I have failed on a few occasions. I shall certainly fail again now.

It is unfair to take only the headline 'no DNA in ripped condom' and suggest it has destroyed the whole case. Its something, its a relevant part of the case, but there are two women involved, and a headline could just as easily be made of 'DNA of Assange apparently found in one condom'.

Due to a number of leaks and motivated attempts to clear or blacken Assanges name, a large quantity of specific details about this case is in the public domain. This includes names of potential victims, and quite a lot of focus on one of them in particular, their motives, politics, all manner of other stuff. Thankfully a lot of these murky depths have not been explored in insensitive depth on u75, probably because anyone who reads all the leaked reports will find it a depressing tale where its probably quite hard to discuss some of the themes without putting your foot in it.

In any case what some fail to grasp is that for those interested in sexual attitudes, justice and accountability, the quality & quantity of evidence is not the issue. Its that the justice process be allowed to take its course so that those institutions which are charged with investigating and prosecuting such matters can get on with it. The court of public opinion is a different jurisdiction, I've got my own opinions which are unfavourable towards Assange for numerous reasons, but I consider this to be entirely separate from both the Sweden sex case justice processes, and any possible legal issues regarding the USA & wikileaks activities. If he goes to Sweden and is found innocent or not even taken to court, then I wont have a problem with it, what I have a problem is with attempts for one man to use aspects of his political & business life to avoid a process of justice.

 

[elbows]

Im also somewhat scratching my head about the DNA news from a few weeks back, because Im pretty sure this detail had already been out there for some time. At least I thought I already knew this, but I've no idea where I got it from originally.

 

[butchersapron]

Missed this link from the other week. The condom which is central to the rape case, doesn't contain any of Julians DNA.
http://rt.com/news/assange-condom-no-dna-277/

Apart from the one which was found to have his DNA on it in the same report.

 

[butchersapron]

Missed this link from the other week. The condom which is central to the rape case, doesn't contain any of Julians DNA.
http://rt.com/news/assange-condom-no-dna-277/

Miss this one from the other acceptable state broadcaster xes:

Exclusive: Assange-Mossad ties unveiled

Today’s story will involve Julian Assange, Wikileaks, Israel, and the Mossad. Along with Netanyahu, Assange has tried to insert his way into the American election on the side of a losing candidate whose platform is simply war with Iran. Some explanation is needed.

 

[cesare]

That article reads like something Jazzz might have written. JA suppressing 9/11 investigation etc.

 

[teqniq]

Why they have waited till now is a mystery but a tranche of emails from Stratfor regarding Egypt has just been released:

http://search.wikileaks.org/gifiles...e=&nofrom=&noto=&count=50&sort=0&file=&docid=

 

[elbows]

Stratfor sucks. I cant spend more than an hour wading through that lot since many of them are no better informed than we were, relying on press reports and stupid sinister wisecrack hyped up spooky bravado from their security knob Burton.

Based on what I did read in an hour, there are probably a few vaguely interesting things in there. But it doesnt seem worth the effort just to learn what we already know about son of Mubarak not being terribly popular with the military, or what Googles briefings to staff about security are like.

 

[teqniq]

One of the people involved in the Stratfor hack has just been sentenced to ten years.

Jeremy Hammond, the Anonymous hacktivist who released millions of emails relating to the private intelligence firm Stratfor, has denounced his prosecution and lengthy prison sentence as a “vengeful, spiteful act” designed to put a chill on politically-motivated hacking....