Unlimited Wikileaks Shenanigans

[Triple Zero]

... not going to post the bit with the password btw (but it's easy to find if you click the links, plus it's in Google Books and Amazon Look-Inside since Februari or so) but these Guardian people aren't exactly tech-savvy

He typed in the lengthy password, and was gratified to be able to download a huge file from Assange's temporary website. Then he realized it was zipped up – compressed using a format called 7z which he had never heard of, and couldn't understand. He got back in his car and drove through the deserted London streets in the small hours, to Assange's headquarters in Southwick Mews. Assange smiled a little pityingly, and unzipped it for him.

... no wonder they figured a PGP password could be temporary (as the Guardian article claims they were given the idea) -- while in fact it probably takes about half an hour or so to re-encrypt several gigabytes with PGP on the average netbook. (still doesn't excuse Assange not doing it, since lives were at stake)

Additionally, what's kinda ironic (?), is that if Assange hadn't used a semi-obfuscated pithy oneliner for the password, but instead a series of random characters (as he should have), the book probably wouldn't have published the password verbatim but just said "he scribbled a line of random characters onto a scrap of paper".

[Triple Zero]

[Chairman Risus]

 

[Cain]

Right, found it.  Took all of 10 minutes.

And I'm not feeling well.

[Doktor Howl]

Right, found it.  Took all of 10 minutes.

And I'm not feeling well.

You didn't expect the big boys to meekly sit back and do nothing, did you?

[Cain]

Nope.

On the other hand, letting all the cables get out unredacted is fairly embarrassing for them.  No doubt they'll use it to make problems (Wikileaks responsible for 17,000 diplomats having very awkward moments around the world!) but it's not an optimal solution for everyone.  I'm not even sure it's a reasonable zero-sum outcome for the governments opposed to Wikileaks, in the long run.

[Doktor Howl]

Nope.

On the other hand, letting all the cables get out unredacted is fairly embarrassing for them.  No doubt they'll use it to make problems (Wikileaks responsible for 17,000 diplomats having very awkward moments around the world!) but it's not an optimal solution for everyone.  I'm not even sure it's a reasonable zero-sum outcome for the governments opposed to Wikileaks, in the long run.

Couple of things:

1.  It also makes leaks an odious thing in White Picket Fence America, if it wasn't already, and

2.  I'm pretty sure they don't care about the people that might get hurt or arrested.

ETA:

3.  Nobody says they're as smart as they think they are.

[Prince Glittersnatch III]

Anything interesting in the new documents?

[Prince Glittersnatch III]

Nevermind...

http://www.stumbleupon.com/su/2cCpR1/www.mcclatchydc.com/2011/08/31/122789/wikileaks-iraqi-children-in-us.html

[Adios]

Where the fuck is Assange, anyway?

[Doktor Howl]

Where the fuck is Assange, anyway?

In an "undisclosed location".   

[Adios]

Where the fuck is Assange, anyway?

In an "undisclosed location".   

Oh shit, so was Jimmy Hoffa...

[Triple Zero]

Check the Spiegel article, it has the most complete timeline of how this FUCKUP happened:

1. David Leigh gets the unredacted cables from Assange. In order to do this, Leigh has to install PGP software, Assange places the encrypted file somewhere in a hidden directory on the WikiLeaks server. Julian writes down part of the password on a piece of paper and tells him how to complete it.

1b. Once Leigh decrypts the file he finds a compressed .7z file, which he doesn't know what to do with and has to go back to Assange later the same night, who explains and decompresses it for him. This illustrates Leigh's cluelessness, and also how he could think that "it was a temporary password which would expire and be deleted in a matter of hours.", and how "if anyone at WikiLeaks had thought this compromised security they have had seven months to remove the files" (files that were released on bittorrent)

1c. After making the data in this hidden sub-folder available to Leigh, Assange apparently simply left it there. After all, it seemed unlikely that anyone would ever find it.

2. David Leigh writes a book, in which he publishes the full password, under the assumption it was temporary.

3. Immediately after the first diplomatic dispatches were made public, WikiLeaks became the target of several denial-of-service attacks. Mirror servers were set up to prevent WikiLeaks from disappearing completely from the Internet. WikiLeaks supporters also put online a compressed version of all data that had been published by WikiLeaks until that time via BitTorrent--including the hidden subfolder with the PGP encrypted .7z cable archive.


This seems a lot like an utterly moronic fuckup, doesn't really smell like malice to me.


BTW there's more background in the Spiegel article, highly recommended reading.

[Triple Zero]

http://www.readwriteweb.com/archives/wikileaks_takes_down_the_head_of_al_jazeera.php

[Triple Zero]

Wikileaks is running out of cash because of the financial blockade from Visa, Mastercard and Paypal:

http://techcrunch.com/2011/10/24/wikleaks-is-running-out-of-cash/

Of course they made arrangements to receive donations via different kinds of channels, but being blocked by Visa/Mastercard/Paypal raises the bar for the average person that would otherwise decide on a whim to donate a few bucks, effectively reducing their income to about 5% of what it otherwise would have been.

And they're still doing it!!

How come Visa/Mastercard/Paypal are still allowed to block donations to Wikileaks??