Wikileaks' Julian Assange - An Update

In my post on 6/20/10 I discussed two possible ways that journalists involved in divulging sensitive information could be intercepted and detained by foreign governments interested in their apprehension.

It turns out that one of these methods is actually panning out for the notorious founder of WikiLeaks, Julian Assange.



















First, I speculated that Assange would try to seek asylum in Iceland due to their proposal to harbor asylum seeking journalists involved in high profile whistle-blowing stories.

Second, I gave two scenarios that could play out and lead to the detainment of Assange or any other asylum seeking journalist:

1) Iceland joins the EU and the EU pressures Iceland to extradite journalists that powerhouse countries in the EU want extradited.

2) Journalists that are implicated in international crimes could be taken into custody by Interpol.

It turns out that instead of seeking asylum in Iceland, Assange tried to seek asylum in Sweden but was denied a residency permit by the Swedish government.

The plot thickened even further with pending rape and molestation charges against Assange.

Sure enough, Swedish police have issued an international arrest warrant for Assange in relation to the charges:














Interpol hunts for Wikileaks founder Julian Assange


....the story doesn't stop there, however.
























In spite of catching heat from Interpol, Assange has vowed to another leak seven times greater than WikiLeaks' most recent leak.

This almost guarantees that Western intelligence services will step up pursuit and surveillance efforts while making apprehension operations for Assange entirely possible.


That's not it though...

Along with Interpol and Western intelligence services, Assange is also likely to have caught the attention of Russian intelligence services with his proposal to leak classified Russian documents.

















Perhaps Assange will evade all three parties and continue his operations while on-the-run.

Perhaps Interpol will detain Assange and extradite him to Sweden for the pending rape and molestation charges (where he will be a sitting duck for all interested parties).

Perhaps Western intelligence services or Russian intelligence services will issue a kill order for Assange should the leaks be severe enough and the threat Assange poses to either party increases.

If Assange is assassinated, it could turn out to be a "frame up" operation with Russian intelligence making it look like a CIA job or vice-versa.

A bewildering game of real-life Clue could be in the works this very moment.
























As always..."time will tell"

Another Web 2.0 Video

My first post on this blog was a video that showed exactly what web 2.0 is all about.

Here is a video I recently came across that suggests we are in the midst of a "social media revolution" :



Other than consisting of a large user-base, this so-called "social media revolution" might entail other dynamics that are likely to go unnoticed.

If this "social media revolution" is truly a revolution then one has to ask just who benefits from the changing times.

A video from the New America Foundation yields some clues:



Now while this video is pretty long winded, the title sums up what the author argues in his book.

It seems to me that the emerging liberal nouveau riche have benefited the most from the continued growth in social media.

Additionally, I suspect that a majority of those engaged in the "social media revolution" are liberal leaning "techie types" on the same page as the liberal nouveau riche.

It is highly possible that this will change political dynamics in the United States and abroad. But as I always say: "only time will tell."

Update on last post

I mentioned Wikileaks in my last post as an example of a website with sensitive info. Since January of this year there have been some developments with that site.

4/5/10 :

A 2007 video of a U.S. air assault attack in Iraq was submitted to wikileaks.


This is a photo of the U.S. Intelligence Analyst that leaked the video. His name is Bradley Manning...a 22 year old from Potomac, Maryland. He was eventually detained after a former hacker provided the information he learned from Manning to the proper authorities.

Here is a link to the whole story:

http://www.wired.com/threatlevel/2010/06/leak/

Here are the instant messages between Manning and the informant that turned him in:

"I can't believe what I'm confessing to you"






















Manning "couldn't believe" he was spilling the beans to former hacker Adrian Lamo.

I'm not sure what will happen to Manning. He is under investigation and this case will most likely require a thorough investigation and probing of how Manning exploited the electronic systems and how much information he released. Not to mention patching up and making security tight.

6/10/2010

Julian Assange, Australian journalist and founder of WikiLeaks, is being sought by the Pentagon for questioning on his alleged role in the Manning leak.

At close to 40 years of age Assange is probably still quite mobile.

I don't actually know if Assange has safehouses but if he gets out of this he probably will want to have several prospective safehouses.

Iceland was so inspired by this story that they are now seeking to become a "safe haven" for journalists seeking asylum. So with that, Assange just might be Iceland's first asylum seeking journalist.















I don't know if this would be a good or bad thing for Iceland. When you harbor journalists that important people want to talk to you might find yourself walking on eggshells instead of sunshine.

Here are two ways that journalists could be extradited from Iceland:

1) Iceland joins the EU and the EU pressures Iceland to extradite journalists that powerhouse countries in the EU want extradited. Since Iceland has debt issues, it will most likely obey and take orders. Of course this won't be much of an issue if Iceland takes several years (maybe decades) to pay off its debt before applying to the EU.

2) Journalists that are implicated in international crimes could be taken into custody by Interpol.

"Criminal Suspect" or "Suspected Terrorist" most likely weighs more than "journalist" in the Web 2.0 era where even I could call myself a "journalist."

So that's that. Maybe this will develop further and I'll have another update.

Until then, if you want to travel to those leak sites I mentioned here are two big ones I know of:

Wikileaks (as mentioned here)

Cryptome (worth a look)

"Intimacy 2.0" and Internet Anonimity

I always thought "online privacy" was an oxymoron. Some net users think anonymous posts or online aliases suffice as a form of online privacy.

For me, anonymous posts and fictitious internet identities cheapen the online experience.

Posting anonymously also suggests an individual isn't bold enough to stand by a statement.

Many say we live in a "small world" and I think the old phrase rings true.

However, internet anonymity makes a small world seem enormous with the infinite ambiguity present in the world wide web.

Some argue books like Orwell's "1984" and Huxley's "Brave New World" are works of fiction turning into present day reality.





I'll admit that seemingly unlimited dangers in the world make the mass surveillance of "1984" plausible.

I'll also admit that today's unlimited entertainment makes certain dynamics of "Brave New World" plausible too.

However, here is one modern, "dark horse" book that is likely to turn into some form of future reality along with the book's older, aforementioned predecessors:



In short, this book focuses on a type of "time viewing" technology that can go back and replay history's events.

Everybody worldwide can view the actions of politicians, loved ones, historical figures, etc and be presented with absolute truth in the form of video evidence.

While this could happen if the world sees another quantum physics genius along the lines of Albert Einstein, here is what I see happening:

Instead of "time viewing" technology there could be a mass movement for internet transparency. All IP addresses of online posts, blogs, videos, web 2.0 media, etc would be revealed (showing the user's real name and true identity).

Sites like this:



and other "leak sites" would have anonymity compromised.

Everyone would know who was behind cyber attacks, internet whistleblows, etc.

The result would be similar to what happens in "The Light of Other Days":

Widespread transparency causing a decrease in corruption and dishonesty...but this end won't be easy..

Those in defiance could form modern day Luddite societies and shun technological society.

Others will be at the technological forefront and frontlines:

Data miners
Signals intelligence operatives
Government database operators
Telecoms
Hackers

and all other forms of data, media, computer, and internet techies.

All persons of influence and interest would form factions..battling each other for what information goes public, gets released, gets removed, gets deleted, etc.

Gordon Gekko's dream comes true and information truly becomes a "commodity."




The innovation that could make it all possible?

Possibly the dawn of the first quantum computer.

Such a computer could access all the information, organize it, post it, and update said info at breakneck speed.

Not to mention the dynamics of quantum computing could make modern day encryption methods obsolete (theoretically a quantum computer could hack an NSA database in minutes).

Maybe the faction with the best quantum computer wins out.

Maybe the faction who wins out uses something absurdly low tech (happens more than one would think).

Only time will tell...

Here's a recent article..semi related:

"How online life distorts privacy rights for all"