WHISTLEBLOWING WEBSITE WikiLeaks has published the entirety of its cache of US diplomatic cables, uploading over 251,000 files in an unredacted format.
The full cache was posted online yesterday after it emerged that the entire cache had been leaked elsewhere online, appearing on peer-to-peer torrenting networks in their original unredacted form.
The final decision to publish the memos came after the WikiLeaks Twitter account asked people to use the hashtags #WLVoteYes and #WLVoteNo to vote in a straw poll on their publication.
WikiLeaks claimed that the leaked version of the documents – contained in an encrypted file, to which the password had not been acknowledged – had become publicly legible after two Guardian writers ‘negligently’ published its password in a book published earlier this year.
The two Guardian writers, David Leigh and Luke Harding, acknowledge that the password was published but deny that the database leaked online was the same one the Guardian had been supplied with.
They claim they were told that the password supplied by WikiLeaks’ Julian Assange had a limited ‘shelf life’, and that it would have been safe for them to publish it once the password had been changed – a claim WikiLeaks’ founder and editor Julian Assange denies.
In a statement, WikiLeaks said it had been aware of the leaked database for some months, but had been unable to comment on it, saying that to do so would draw further attention to its existence.
It said it could only now discuss the leak because knowledge of the database, and its connection to the password published in the Guardian’s book, had since become public.
“WikiLeaks has commenced pre-litigation action against the Guardian and an individual in Germany who was distributing the Guardian passwords for personal gain,” it said.
It also said that media partners around the world had been working with WikiLeaks to redact some names and data from cables so as not to put those people at risk, but that its “careful work has been compromised as a result of the recklessness of the Guardian”.
The organisation has now called for a boycott of the Guardian, claiming that it began a smear campaign against Assange when WikiLeaks dropped it as a media partner last year. The subsequent publications of cables in the UK had been carried out in partnership with the Daily Telegraph.
The Guardian, in a joint editorial with the other four titles which had originally engaged with WikiLeaks, condemned the publication.
“It now appears that last December another WikiLeaks employee was responsible for a further leak when he placed the unredacted cables on a peer-to-peer site with an old password – motivated, it seems, by the arrest of Assange on allegations concerning his private life,” the Guardian said.
It is not clear that even Assange – distracted by his legal actions over the Swedish sex allegations – knew of this act…We don’t count ourselves in that tiny fringe of people who would regard themselves as information absolutists – people who believe it is right in all circumstances to make all information free to all.
The public interest in all acts of disclosure has to be weighed against the potential harm that can result.
Australia’s attorney general Robert McClelland said the publication of the unredacted cables was “extremely concerning” and asked media outlets there not to identify individuals whose lives could then be put at risk.
To embed this post, copy the code below on your site
have your say