Risks and Responsibilities in wikileaks

Are risks from WikiLeaks overstated by government?
National Security Archive historian: "The Pentagon is hyping"
By ROBERT BURNS, Associated Press


Although the Pentagon warns that WikiLeaks could have blood on its hands for publishing classified U.S. war documents that name Afghan sources, history shows that similar disclosures have not always led to violence.

It is difficult to find clear-cut examples of the public exposure of informants leading to their deaths, although there are documented cases of a deadly ending to the secret unmasking of foreign agents. Recall the Aldrich Ames espionage case of the early 1990s: The now-jailed CIA turncoat ratted on Soviet informants and at least nine of them were believed executed by the KGB.

The WikiLeaks leak is unrivaled in its scope, but so far there is no evidence that any Afghans named in the leaked documents as defectors or informants from the Taliban insurgency have been harmed in retaliation.

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In an overzealous move to block WikiLeaks, the communist regime also blocked the unrelated
sites Wikipedia, Wikisource.
When WikiLeaks released Nov. 29 classified documents involving sensitive issues in China, the
communist regime’s Central Propaganda Department (CPD) ordered: "No news reports about
the WikiLeaks."
Meanwhile, a number of websites with names similar to WikiLeaks are also being blocked,

China Blocks WikiLeaks

apparently as insurance that no Web site that includes “Wiki” in the name gets through,
including the popular Wikipedia.
WikiLeaks released more than 250,000 secret U.S. diplomatic cables on the 29th. The
organization’s editor-in-chief, Australian-born Julian Assange dubbed this release, “Cablegate.”
These recent documents also reveal some embarrassing relations: China’s association with the
arms trade between North Korea and Iran, China's Politburo member(s) ordering the intrusion
into Google's computer systems, and China’s wariness ("scared to death") over a visit by U.S.
House Speaker Nancy Pelosi.
According to The Telegraph, "The files contain 3,297 cables from [U.S. embassy in] Beijing,
555 from Shanghai, 662 from Guangzhou, 260 from Chengdu 260, 120 from Shenyang, 120
and 950 from Hong Kong, and Beijing will be watching anxiously to see what they contain."
Radio Free Asia (RFA) reported that, previously, China commended WikiLeaks for publishing
nearly 400,000 documents in October of classified information about the Iraq War. QQ.com, the
largest web portal in China, published an article about these documents that was sent to its over
100 million users. The incident was acclaimed by Chinese netizens as the highest level news
publication in China.
This time, however, the CPD ordered, "No news reports about WikiLeaks." Further, online
articles, such as "Diplomatic Risks Caused By WikiLeaks," were also deleted.
According to RFA, "A Chinese foreign ministry spokesman called on Washington to 'properly
handle' the situation arising from the WikiLeaks release of documents."
After the release of the documents, WikiLeaks received DDos (distributed denial of service)
cyber attacks, similar to those Goggle received previously. The Great Firewall has been
employed to prevent the majority of Chinese people from visiting WikiLeaks, reported RFA. The
above denial tactics were not seen when documents regarding the Iraq War were released.
This censorship order also affected websites with similar names. The Wikipedia and the
Wikisource library were blocked by China.
In the past, Wikipedia has been blocked by China for a few times. After 2008, however, people
in China could visit webpages on Wikipedia, except those related to the Tiananmen Square
Massacre and Falun Gong.
Chinese Wikipedia spokesman Shizhao told RFA, "I don't know why the Wikisource has been
blocked. It's a bit strange, because Wikipedia, WikiLeaks, and Wikisource have no connection
with each other."

by:D.Chaitanyakumar (ee09b084)