Emma Best's New Transparency Project Targets Russian Leaks She Says Wikileaks Refuses To Touch

from the actual-transparency dept

Turnabout, as they say, is only fair play.

If you hadn't noticed, Wikileaks isn't quite the transparency operation it used to be. Staffers who routinely helped rein in Assange's less noble impulses long ago left the effort behind, leaving us with the often bizarre comedy that is Wikileaks in 2019. And while that doesn't justify the misguided DNC lawsuit or the potential threat to transparency posed by government efforts to prosecute leakers, that doesn't change one undeniable fact: modern Wikileaks is increasingly seen in infosec and policy circles as a poorly-written joke, long-since buried under the rubble of numerous scandals and Assange's bulbous ego.

That's not to say that Wikileaks didn't provide an invaluable service in its prime. Its early operations lit a much-needed fire under a press routinely terrified of speaking truth to power, especially in regards to the United States' often bipartisan, mindless unchecked international militarism. These days, however, Wikileaks is more about pandering to MAGA kids for bitcoin donations, selectively avoiding transparency, and levying silly legal threats against the press rather than actually adhering to its core mission of a decade ago.

Still, there's no doubt that Wikileaks of old contributed to a marginally braver press, even if it remains obvious that a lot of work on this front still needs to be done. And its influence continues to be mirrored by subsequent incarnations looking to improve on the formula, even as those efforts criticize Wikileaks' increasingly erratic behavior in the wake of a percussive parade of unflattering revelations.

Case in point: transparency activist and long-time infosec reporter Emma Best has unveiled the creation of Distributed Denial of Secrets. The organization is expected to make waves this week with the publication of hundreds of thousands of hacked emails and gigabytes of leaked documents, some of which come from previous hacks of Putin aides like Vladislav Surkov.

Unlike Wikileaks, DDoS will focus more on compiling and curating information, much of it coming from past hacks and breaches, building a sort of museum and library of now easily-accessible information. Especially information related to the Russian government and its bone-grafted relationship to Russian organized crime; stuff, project supporters claim, Wikileaks has steered clear of in recent years:

"A lot of what WikiLeaks will do is organize and re-publish information that’s appeared elsewhere,” said Nicholas Weaver, a researcher at the University of California at Berkeley’s International Computer Science Institute. “They’ve never done that with anything out of Russia."

DDoS differs from WikiLeaks in that it doesn’t solicit direct leaks of unpublished data—its focus is on compiling, organizing, and curating leaks that have already appeared somewhere in public. “Emma Best, I think, is someone who will actually do a good job,” said Weaver, citing Best’s aggressive use of the Freedom of Information Act to extract documents from recalcitrant U.S. agencies. “Things get so scattered that putting it all into one place is a huge benefit."

According to the group's FAQ, the biggest difference between itself and Wikileaks is it won't advocate for any particular ideology, putting the data itself back as the priority, a concept pretty clearly lost by Wikileaks in recent years:

"Distributed Denial of Secrets (“DDOS”) is a transparency collective, aimed at enabling the free transmission of data in the public interest. We aim to avoid any political, corporate or personal leanings, and to act as a simple beacon of available information. As a collective, we do not support any cause, idea or message beyond ensuring that information is available to those who need it most - the people."

Needless to say, Best and company are trying to manage the "creeping paranoia" that comes with playing information patty cake with Vlad and friends, having already mitigated what she calls "cyber shenanigans" the group believes was aimed at disrupting Friday's information dump. Also needless to say, this new operation, like operations before it, will likely be challenged by criticism when it comes to determining how far such transparency efforts should go (in fact it already has). But the fact remains that as long as the press refuses to fully embrace transparency, there's an evolving role for organizations just like this one.

In the interim, Best has been having fun with Wikileaks supporters who haven't been handling her criticism of the organization particularly well:

If you've been tuned in to Wikileaks and its newer supporters' aggressive disdain for even the most tempered criticism, things should definitely get interesting when the full data trove drops this week.

Filed Under: emma best, journalism, julian assange, leaks, russia
Companies: ddos, distributed denial of secrets, wikileaks

Irony Alert: Wikileaks Sends Reporters A List Of 140 Things Not To Say About Julian Assange; Tells Them Not To Publish

from the i-mean,-come-on dept

Either Julian Assange is the least self-aware person in the British Isles (currently), or Wikileaks is playing some sort of weird joke on the press. The organization, whose entire reason for being is publishing documents whose authors don't wish them to be published has bizarrely sent a list of 140 things reporters are not supposed to say about Assange (if this is a troll by Assange, you have to wonder if the 140 -- Twitter's original character limit -- is somehow on purpose). We'll get to the list in a moment, but first, the list included this hilarious statement:

CONFIDENTIAL LEGAL COMMUNICATION
NOT FOR PUBLICATION.

Ha, ha. Good one, Julian. Very funny. First of all, you don't send "confidential legal communications" to the media. That's not how it works. Second, unless there's already a pre-agreed upon deal not to publish certain materials, you don't get to email reporters willy nilly and insist that they can't report on it. That is also not how it works. Finally, this is Wikileaks we're talking about. I mean, come on.

Incredibly, Reuters, who first wrote about the existence of this list did not publish the list. Instead, that was initially left to FOIA/transparency/national security guru Emma Best who published the full list on her site. A few other publications followed later.

It is entirely possible that this is some sort of reverse Streisand Effect attempt, in which Assange purposefully put the idiotic "not for publication" line atop the email knowing that would make it more likely that the document would get attention, but no matter where you sit, for reporters, this now seems like a list of 140 things that Julian Assange is now calling for everyone to investigate. Of course, some of them are really just silly. For example:

It is false and defamatory to suggest that Julian Assange stinks.
It is false and defamatory to suggest that Julian Assange has ever tortured a cat or dog.
It is false and defamatory to suggest that Julian Assange does not use cutlery or does not wash his hands.
It is false and defamatory to suggest that Julian Assange lives, or has ever lived, in a basement, cupboard or under the stairs.

Um... what? Why even bring up any of these? Of course, much of the list involves some of the more serious claims that people have made against Assange over the years, especially regarding any connection with Russian Intelligence and or any attempt to influence the US election. And, while these don't necessarily break new ground, for investigative reporters, it seems like there could be some interesting breadcrumbs in the list of things Julian Assange really, really doesn't want the press to say about him.

Also, it appears that in a later version of the list that was posted to Pastebin, Wikileaks removed the line about Assange stinking and living in a cupboard under the stairs (that was Harry Potter, you see...). Emma Best set up a comparison of the two "leaked" copies of the list, if you're interested in delving into the details of what I guess is now up for discussion (does Assange have a scar in the shape of lightening bolt?).

Separately, each of the items on the list begin "it is false and defamatory to...." At the very least, this suggests that Assange has a fairly limited understanding of what "defamatory" actually means. Defamation requires a bit more than saying that Julian Assange stinks. Others may be false, but would hardly be "defamatory." For example:

It is false and defamatory to deny that Julian Assange co-founded the Freedom of the Press Foundation with John Perry Barlow.

I mean, it is a false statement since Assange did not co-found the Freedom of the Press Foundation with JPB (he was just one of their first beneficiaries). But, what is possibly "defamatory" about that sentence?

Either this is all an elaborate troll by Assange, or he's so freaking full of himself that he doesn't realize how petty and immature this whole thing looks (oops, is that on the list of things we can't say?).

Filed Under: defamation, emma best, julian assange, leaks, secrecy, streisand effect, transparency
Companies: wikileaks

Manafort's Daughter's Lawyer Wants Twitter To Vanish Tweets Linking To Text Message Database

from the man-wields-hammer,-demands-Twitter-produce-nails dept

The leak of text messages sent and received by Paul Manafort's daughter might be old news, but new wrinkles keep appearing. Originally obtained by hackers, the texts have been perused by journalists, resulting in articles discussing Manafort's apparent complicity in violence in Ukraine. The full set of texts has been around since at least early 2017, but no searchable database of the texts themselves existed publicly.

Apparently, Wikileaks had the full dataset in searchable form but refused to release it. FOIA/transparency activist Emma Best decided to call out Wikileaks on its perceived duplicity (the dumping of the Podesta/DNC emails but not the release of the Manafort text messages) and made the database publicly available. As she wrote then, the likelihood of the text message dump leading to further issues for Manafort's daughter was minimal, given that it had been more than a year since it became public knowledge their phones had been hacked.

Now, more than two months after Emma Best made the texts available in searchable form, a lawyer representing Manafort's daughter is demanding the removal of Best's tweets linking to her post about the text message database. This summary of events comes from Joseph Cox at Motherboard:

Shortly after that publication and Best’s tweet, Shand’s lawyer, Matthew Crowl from law firm RSHC, flagged the tweet to Twitter through its normal reporting mechanisms, judging by the letter Crowl sent to the company days later. Twitter said the tweet did not violate its policy on distributing private information, according to the letter.

“That response is unacceptable,” Crowl wrote. “After these private, stolen messages were linked in the offending Tweet, several members of my client’s family have received harassing and threatening messages.” Crowl highlights Twitter has various options to “protect Ms. Shand’s privacy,” including suspending or terminating an offending account, and points to how Twitter’s rules say users “may not publish or post other people’s private information without their express authorization and permission.” The tweet itself did not contain any of the hacked text messages, but contained a link that went to a page which led to the text cache.

Emma Best posted screenshots of the threat letter to Twitter, noting she is not going to voluntarily delete the tweets targeted by Matthew Crowl. Twitter apparently isn't going to delete them either, leaving Crowl with little more than a blustery threat on law firm letterhead. Crowl intends to pursue "all legal remedies" to get the tweets removed, which will probably include a lawsuit he has little chance of winning.

The publication of the texts is clearly in the public's interest, even if a vast majority of them are not newsworthy. Prior to this publication, people were dependent on journalists to sift through the mass of texts to surface those deemed newsworthy. Independent investigations of the messages' content was all but impossible before Best published a searchable database.

While there may be some privacy implications in the released texts, those relating directly to Paul Manafort and his actions -- especially those discussing his relationship with Russian entities -- carry minimal privacy concerns, at least when weighed against the public's interest in the content of those messages. Best's upload simply made it easier to find newsworthy text messages, even if the unavoidable side effect was the easy perusal of texts containing nothing of public interest.

Any legal action undertaken by Crowl will have to go head-to-head with the First Amendment. Even if Crowl finds a judge willing to buy his arguments, the dissemination of the database ensures the burial of Best's article/tweets will do nothing to prevent the public from continuing to dig through the 285,000 messages obtained by hackers. While it's understandable his client is unhappy this has happened, a lawsuit victory would be about as effective as hanging Emma Best in effigy. It might make a few people feel better, but it won't turn back the clock. The only thing it's guaranteed to do is create a chilling effect that will deter future publications of newsworthy data obtained from third parties.

Filed Under: emma best, paul manafort, transparency, whistleblowing
Companies: twitter

Wikileaks Refused To Publish Manafort Family Texts, So Someone Else Did

from the hypocrisy? dept

Update: A quick correction/clarification here. The hacked texts in questions were from Manafort's daughter, rather than Manafort himself, but included texts between Manafort and his daughter, as well as other texts about Paul that his daughter sent or received. Wikileaks, for its part, says it didn't publish the texts because they weren't verified. Except that multiple people confirmed the legitimacy of those texts including Paul Manafort himself. The point of the article still stands.

We just wrote about why it would be a dangerous move for press freedom for the DOJ to prosecute Julian Assange for publishing leaked documents. In that post, we noted that even if you think Julian Assange is a horrible human being and proactively trying to undermine US electoral sovereignty, the mere act of publishing leaked documents should not be criminal. But, that doesn't mean that Assange can't be hypocritical and one-sided. Obviously, during the 2016 election, when Wikileaks helped spread both John Podesta's emails and the DNC's emails, some wondered if Assange would have published similar messages from the Trump campaign. While publicly Assange insisted he disliked both campaigns equally, other reports and leaked (of course) chat messages certainly suggested otherwise, as did at least some of his apparent attempts to ingratiate himself with Trump insiders, including asking Don Jr. to leak his father's tax returns to Assange to "dramatically improve the perception of our impartiality."

Of course, when faced with an opportunity to post the equivalent of the Podesta emails on the Trump side, it appears that Assange decided not to do it. Public records-savant Emma Best recently chose to publish the entire collection of leaked Manafort family texts in a searchable database. These texts have long been out there and available if you knew where to look -- and had received widespread reporting in early 2017. However, beyond the excerpts, they were not fully available in a way that was searchable for most users.

Best communicated with Wikileaks, who admitted that it had the entire collection as well, but chose not to publish it -- which certainly can be read as hypocrisy on Assange's part, considering the similarities with the Podesta emails. As Best notes in discussing the decision to publish these in a more accessible format:

The public haven’t had access to the messages, and the press (including high profile and high budget outlets) haven’t had access to an easily searchable version – instead only to an unwieldy database.

This was nearly not the case, however – WikiLeaks had a copy of the database, but ultimately didn’t publish it, despite its newsworthiness and their willingness to publish unredacted information on the Democrats. Their unexplained decision not to put the database into a searchable format and make it public struck me as questionable at the time, but in light of the disclosure of their preference for the GOP it has become not only questionable, but hypocritical. WikiLeaks’ decision can no longer be trusted prima facie or viewed in terms of presumed good faith.

[....]

This noteworthy refusal, along with ongoing probes and charges filed against Manafort by the Special Counsel’s office, makes the text messages and their contents undoubtedly newsworthy. Their relevance to the general public may go beyond this, as the personal reality reflected in the messages presents the Manaforts as real people, rather than merely as abstract figures. This same reality is, of course, also relevant to news and current events, and to understanding the character and actions of those involved.

There may be reasons why Wikileaks chose not to publish these texts, but the fact that it eagerly published the Podesta emails, yet held back on publishing these texts should at least raise serious questions. Obviously, every publisher makes different decisions on what to publish and what not to publish. And there's no rule saying that you absolutely must publish every "equivalent" set of data or stories. But given all of the background here, and the high profile nature of this, it is noteworthy to point out the different approaches Wikileaks chose to take with two similar sets of data on different sides of the 2016 election.

Filed Under: emails, emma best, hypocrisy, john podesta, julian assange, paul manafort, texts, transparency
Companies: wikileaks