Why has WikiLeakS.org not published any Stratfor email headers ?

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The increasingly Julian Assange centered WikiLeakS.org project recieved a media hype and publicity boost before Christmas 2011, when they appear to have been handed some or all of the hacked emails from the pretentious "private intelligence agency" company Stratfor.

Some of the "Anonymous" / "LulzSec" gang of hackers, who were under the influence and perhaps the control of an FBI coerced informant and agent provocateur (Hector Xavier Monsegur supposedly the LulzSec twit "Sabu") have been arrested and charged with this computer crime. They even stored the alleged millions of emails from Stratfor on a server under the control of the FBI.

See The Register: Stratfor email hackers were tricked into using Feds' server

There has been no noticable support for any of them by Julian Assange, even though at least two of them (Ryan Ackroyd "Kayla", Jake Davis "Topiary") have been indicted in the USA and could be facing extradition from the United Kingdom, unlike Assange himself, who is fighting an unjust European Arrest Warrant extradition to Sweden on sexual offences charges.

See Public Intelligence (a website which, unlike WikiLeaks.org anymore, does actually allow comments from the public on the censored or restricted documents it publishes) Anonymous/LulzSec Sabu, Kayla, Topiary, Anarchaos, Palladium, Pwnsauce Indictment and Criminal Complaints

All the above is background information relevant to the question in the title of this blog post: Why has WikiLeakS.org not published any Stratfor email headers ?

WikiLeakS.org has been milking a very small selection of Strafor emails for "maximum publicity", but with almost zero political impact, since 27th February, when they launched a subection of their main website (not, this time, chossing to use a subdomain or a different domain name like they did for collateralmurder.com)

The Stratfor emails are being touted as The Global Intelligence Files, using similar hype to that which the notorious and obviously cyber security inept Texas based private think tank likes to puff itself up with.

Julian Assange / @wikileaks twitter feed has been claiming that the formerly private rumours and speculation by Stratfor employees such as Fred Burton, who used to be employed by the US Government, are somehow actually official US Government policy or the "truth", even when other Stratfor employees have, sensibly, tagged such rumours as "single source" or "unverified".

The claim by WikiLeakS.org is that they are publishing 5 million emails, but they have not actually done so.

They have published 935 extracts in just under a month. At that rate it will be about 96 years before they publish 5 million email extracts. Surely even the second (or third) division media partners listed by WikiLeakS.org, since Julian Assange has lost the trust of The Guardian, the New York Times, Der Spiegel etc. etc., will have moved on to other stories by then ?

Despite claiming to have somehow invented "scientific journalism", whereby the original document sources of information for a story are made available to the public for expert analysis, Julian Assange has not done this with the Strafor emails, since the extracts do not contain any actual email header information, listing email clients, mailservers and IP addresses etc.

Why not ?

  • What is Assange hiding ?

  • Did the FBI controlled "Sabu" make sure that WikiLeakS.org only got a censored version of the Stratfor emails ?

  • Since there is no WikiLeakS.org secure document submission system, or published PGP Public Encryption Key, how did the Anonymous / Lulzsec/ FBI contact Julian Assange / WikiLeakS.org ?

  • Did WikiLeakS.org / Julian Assange actively reach out to the pompous "Sabu" over IRC and or Twitter ?

  • Is the Stratfor email "leak" an attempt to drag Julian Assange and other WikiLeakS.org people into the credit card fraud and computer intrusion criminal cases which are currently in motion regarding Stratfor and other Anonymous/Lulzsec targets ?

About this blog

This blog here at WikiLeak.org (no "S") discusses the ethical and technical issues raised by the WikiLeakS.org project, which is trying to be a resource for whistleblower leaks, by providing "untraceable mass document leaking and analysis".

These are bold and controversial aims and claims, with both pros and cons, especially for something which crosses international boundaries and legal jurisdictions.

This blog is not part of the WikiLeakS.org project, and there really are no copies of leaked documents or files being mirrored here.

Email Contact

Please feel free to email us your views about this website or news about the issues it tries to comment on:

email: blog@WikiLeak[dot]org

Before you send an email to this address, remember that this blog is independent of the WikiLeakS.org project.

If you have confidential information that you want to share with us, please make use of our PGP public encryption key or an email account based overseas e.g. Hushmail

LeakDirectory.org

Now that the WikiLeakS.org project is defunct, so far as new whistleblower are concerned, what are the alternatives ?

The LeakDirectory.org wiki page lists links and anonymity analyses of some of the many post-wikileaks projects.

There are also links to better funded "official" whistlblowing crime or national security reporting tip off websites or mainstream media websites. These should, in theory, be even better at protecting the anonymity and security of their informants, than wikileaks, but that is not always so.

New whistleblower website operators or new potential whistleblowers should carefully evaluate the best techniques (or common mistakes) from around the world and make their personal risk assessments accordingly.

Hints and Tips for Whistleblowers and Political Dissidents

The WikiLeakS.org Submissions web page provides some methods for sending them leaked documents, with varying degrees of anonymity and security. Anybody planning to do this for real, should also read some of the other guides and advice to political activists and dissidents:

Please take the appropriate precautions if you are planning to blow the whistle on shadowy and powerful people in Government or commerce, and their dubious policies. The mainstream media and bloggers also need to take simple precautions to help preserve the anonymity of their sources e.g. see Spy Blog's Hints and Tips for Whistleblowers - or use this easier to remember link: http://ht4w.co.uk

BlogSafer - wiki with multilingual guides to anonymous blogging

Digital Security & Privacy for Human Rights Defenders manual, by Irish NGO Frontline Defenders.

Everyone’s Guide to By-Passing Internet Censorship for Citizens Worldwide (.pdf - 31 pages), by the Citizenlab at the University of Toronto.

Handbook for Bloggers and Cyber-Dissidents - March 2008 version - (2.2 Mb - 80 pages .pdf) by Reporters Without Borders

Reporters Guide to Covering the Beijing Olympics by Human Rights Watch.

A Practical Security Handbook for Activists and Campaigns (v 2.6) (.doc - 62 pages), by experienced UK direct action political activists

Anonymous Blogging with Wordpress & Tor - useful step by step guide with software configuration screenshots by Ethan Zuckerman at Global Voices Advocacy. (updated March 10th 2009 with the latest Tor / Vidalia bundle details)

WikiLeakS Links

The WikiLeakS.org Frequently Asked Questions (FAQ) page.

WikiLeakS Twitter feeds

The WikiLeakS.org website does not stay online all of the time, especially when there is a surge of traffic caused by mainstream media coverage of a particularly newsworthy leak.

Recently, they have been using their new Twitter feeds, to selectively publicise leaked documents to the media, and also to report on the status of routing or traffic congestion problems affecting the main website in Stockholm, Sweden.

N.B.the words "security" or "anonymity" and "Twitter" are mutually exclusive:

WikiLeakS.org Twitter feed via SSL encrypted session: https://twitter.com/wikileaks

WikiLeakS.org unencrypted Twitter feed http://twitter.com/wikileaks

Internet Censorship

OpenNet Initiative - researches and measures the extent of actual state level censorship of the internet. Features a blocked web URL checker and censorship map.

Temporary Autonomous Zone

Temporary Autonomous Zones (TAZ) by Hakim Bey (Peter Lambourn Wilson)

Cyberpunk author William Gibson

Campaign Button Links

Watching Them, Watching Us, UK Public CCTV Surveillance Regulation Campaign
UK Public CCTV Surveillance Regulation Campaign

NO2ID Campaign - cross party opposition to the NuLabour Compulsory Biometric ID Card
NO2ID Campaign - cross party opposition to the NuLabour Compulsory Biometric ID Card and National Identity Register centralised database.

Gary McKinnon is facing extradition to the USA under the controversial Extradition Act 2003, without any prima facie evidence or charges brought against him in a UK court. Try him here in the UK, under UK law.
Gary McKinnon is facing extradition to the USA under the controversial Extradition Act 2003, without any prima facie evidence or charges brought against him in a UK court. Try him here in the UK, under UK law.

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FreeFarid.com - Kafkaesque extradition of Farid Hilali under the European Arrest Warrant to Spain

Peaceful resistance to the curtailment of our rights to Free Assembly and Free Speech in the SOCPA Designated Area around Parliament Square and beyond

Parliament Protest blog - resistance to the Designated Area restricting peaceful demonstrations or lobbying in the vicinity of Parliament.

Petition to the European Commission and European Parliament against their vague Data Retention plans
Data Retention is No Solution Petition to the European Commission and European Parliament against their vague Data Retention plans.

Save Parliament: Legislative and Regulatory Reform Bill (and other issues)
Save Parliament - Legislative and Regulatory Reform Bill (and other issues)

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Open Rights Group

The Big Opt Out Campaign - opt out of having your NHS Care Record medical records and personal details stored insecurely on a massive national centralised database.

Tor - the onion routing network
Tor - the onion routing network - "Tor aims to defend against traffic analysis, a form of network surveillance that threatens personal anonymity and privacy, confidential business activities and relationships, and state security. Communications are bounced around a distributed network of servers called onion routers, protecting you from websites that build profiles of your interests, local eavesdroppers that read your data or learn what sites you visit, and even the onion routers themselves."

Tor - the onion routing network
Anonymous Blogging with Wordpress and Tor - useful Guide published by Global Voices Advocacy with step by step software configuration screenshots (updated March 10th 2009).

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Amnesty International's irrepressible.info campaign

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BlogSafer - wiki with multilingual guides to anonymous blogging

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NGO in a box - Security Edition privacy and security software tools

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Home Office Watch blog, "a single repository of all the shambolic errors and mistakes made by the British Home Office compiled from Parliamentary Questions, news reports, and tip-offs by the Liberal Democrat Home Affairs team."

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Reporters Without Borders - Reporters Sans Frontières - campaign for journalists 'and bloggers' freedom in repressive countries and war zones.

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Committee to Protect Bloggers - "devoted to the protection of bloggers worldwide with a focus on highlighting the plight of bloggers threatened and imprisoned by their government."

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Wikileaks.org - the controversial "uncensorable, anonymous whistleblowing" website based currently in Sweden.

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