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Jacob Appelbaum detained at U.S. border, questioned about Wikileaks

74 points by Rod 16y ago

Gianteye 16y ago
I wonder if this is part of a policy to try and debase wikileaks by making it clear that if you affiliate with them or support them that life will be made hard for you. I know Jake. I was a member of Noisebridge. I feel the work that Wikileaks is doing is incredibly important, and I know he's got the fortitude to deal with the bullshit and continue fighting the good fight.
- rick888 16y ago
  Wikileaks may be important, but they should really think of the consequences of their actions: http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/asia/afghanistan/7917955/Wikileaks-Afghanistan-Taliban-hunting-down-informants.html http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/asia/afghanistan/7... If any death results from this "leak", Jake should be held accountable.
  - mixmax 16y ago
    They do, they don't release material that could potentially cause bodily harm to specific individuals. could some of the leaks potentially lead to the Taliban uncovering an agent and murdering him? possibly, but not likely. The New York Times or Washington Post could probably be accused of the same. These are hard questions for Wikileaks, as they have been for the rest of the press for decades.
    - p858snake 16y ago
      They only thoroughly checked about ~2000 of the documents according to a speech Julian gave on Lateline (Australian TV Show), They [wikileaks] did offer the US government a chance to check though and blank any names they found but they did not accept the offer.
      - rick888 16y ago
        "They only thoroughly checked about ~2000 of the documents according to a speech Julian gave on Lateline (Australian TV Show), They [wikileaks] did offer the US government a chance to check though and blank any names they found but they did not accept the offer." Why take the chance? Why not blank out all the names? They don't seem to care about the potential loss of human life.
        chc 16y ago
        "Why take the chance?" is just fearmongering, not a rational argument. Every time you get in a car, you could cause numerous deaths. Why take the chance? Giving the government the chance to redact is a much greater precaution than any of us take when operating deadly machinery. The question is why the government, which was in a position to know their sensitive nature, didn't blank out all the names.
    - drivebyacct2 16y ago
      I'm crazy about the idea of wikileaks but the Journal's article brings up good points. These documents are unlikely to fundamentally change peoples' opinion on the war(s), yet the documents have already been found to name afghan informants by full name, village and father's name.
      - cma 16y ago
        Sounds like a case of "collateral damage." Our military's stance is that such damage is completely ok no matter what proportionalities are involved.
        rick888 16y ago
        Right. So seeing a questionable video involving a few asshole US soldiers means that it's perfectly okay for hundreds more to die needlessly. what the hell kind of reasoning is that?
        cma 16y ago
        I said it was our military's stance, not my stance.
        drivebyacct2 16y ago
        I understand your point, but isn't the idea to be better? It's hard to argue that information should be free when the direct results of this will be human casualties. I mean, that's how it is being played and will be played. Note, I'm speaking literally when I say "hard to argue". I think it's the correct ideal and I think our government could use doses of unexpected transparency but it's the Fox News I'm thinking about.
      - jacquesm 16y ago
        I wrote about exactly that: http://jacquesmattheij.com/In+defense+of+wikileaks http://jacquesmattheij.com/In+defense+of+wikileaks
        16y ago
  - Gianteye 16y ago
    I don't want to engage in a long discussion, especially as I'm not acquainted with all the facts, but who is held accountable for the deaths caused by our government funding a security organization that directly undermines efforts in Afghanistan? It seems that there are no risk free way to unravel great injustices. In what has become an incredibly contracted and bloody conflict, it seems absurd to try and apportion blame and fault to an organization that's trying to reduce net suffering. It seems similar to someone exposing human rights violations in a company, the company performing poorly because of the press, and them being blamed for all the jobs lost.
  - Rod 16y ago
    Who has the moral authority to hold Jake accountable? He exposed the truth. By contrast, Bush, Cheney & Rumsfeld gave us Gulf of Tonkin II, the meretricious congressmen gave the executive branch all the power it wanted, we know that we invaded a country based on lies, 100,000s have died, and noone has been held accountable. What's the rule here? You kill 1 it's a tragegy, but if you kill 1,000,000 it's a statistic?
    - Gianteye 16y ago
      I concur. Additionally I think it's interesting how blame is being specifically ascribed to Jake and Julian, the most visible speakers for wilileaks, when the number of people contributing, editing, managing, and supporting wikileaks is in the hundreds. I feel it might be part of an urge people have to latch on to concrete and explicable causes for events they feel an emotional repulsion to, ie: "You, specific human being (Obama, Bush, Jake, Jesus, what have you) are to blame for the evils in the world." as opposed to "You, complex social phenomenon that may or may not be capable of being influenced by any individual action, are to blame for the evils of the world."
    - rick888 16y ago
      "Who has the moral authority to hold Jake accountable? He exposed the truth. By contrast, Bush, Cheney & Rumsfeld gave us Gulf of Tonkin II, the meretricious congressmen gave the executive branch all the power it wanted, we know that we invaded a country based on lies, 100,000s have died, and noone has been held accountable. What's the rule here? You kill 1 it's a tragegy, but if you kill 1,000,000 it's a statistic?" So you claim nobody has the "moral authority" to hold the people from wikileaks accountable, yet you want to hold Bush, Cheney, and Rumsfeld accountable (it's interesting you would use only republicans as examples btw) for their actions? If I intentionally gave out your address to criminals and told them when you wouldn't be home (and they robbed your house), would you hold me accountable? I'm just "exposing the truth" This information has the possibility of getting thousands killed. On a side note, I'm hoping I can get jake's full address and phone number so I can give it out to some people. I'm sure he won't mind. I'm just "exposing the truth"
      - 16y ago
  - niekmaas 16y ago
    It's a bit harsh to hold Jake accountable for deaths. I think that's the reason people downvote the comment. It is a true concern though whether or not exposing data like the Afghan documents could endanger the lives of people in Afghanistan and people working in the area affiliated with the coalition forces. After reading this article http://www.newsweek.com/2010/07/30/taliban-says-it-will-target-names-exposed-by-wikileaks.html http://www.newsweek.com/2010/07/30/taliban-says-it-will-targ... it becomes clear that the Taliban is checking the documents to find Afghan people that supply the coalition forces with information. If found they will be 'punished'. This doesn't take away the value of the documents exposed. I'm just trying to point out that besides the great value of this exposure some damage to (relative) innocent people might be done as well.
  - hyperbovine 16y ago
    Assange gave the Guardian, that paper's main competition, advance access to the docs. Bitter much? To date, there is absolutely no evidence of these sort of reprisals actually taking place, other than a vaguely worded threat from some token Taliban mouthpiece. And you know how uncommon that is...
  - deleted 16y ago
    [deleted]
- endlessvoid94 16y ago
  How was Jake associated with noisebridge? I was just there a few days ago...
  - Gianteye 16y ago
    He's a cofounder, though I'm not sure how much he is involved these days.
  - aerique 16y ago
    The article said he co-founded it.
gruseom 16y ago
It would be a good thing if more prominent people became associated with Wikileaks and diluted the one-man-show aspect. It's the principles that matter. Interesting that FBI agents at Defcon said they wanted to know if "human rights" were being "trampled". Is that a clumsy way of establishing rapport with the subject, or are there actually FBI agents who think like that?
- pradocchia 16y ago
  Is that a clumsy way of establishing rapport with the subject, or are there actually FBI agents who think like that? No no, they were getting to know their subject, building a profile, seeing how he responds. Did they deliver the question straight? Then see how he colors it. With sarcasm? See how he deals with antagonism. etc.
- quadhome 16y ago
  One of the best parts of Defcon is the opportunity to party with feds all night long. You discover they're just like you.
  - deleted 16y ago
    [deleted]
  - substack 16y ago
    Can any individual government agent in such a capacity ever really be "just like me"? I don't take orders from anyone. They do. In that respect, they are nothing like me at all. A large part of what makes tales of government harassment like this one so troubling is how similar, reasonable, and even pleasant the agents are. If they are just like us, then why is there so much injustice?
    - jacquesm 16y ago
      > If they are just like us, then why is there so much injustice? Politics.
  - tomjen3 16y ago
Niten 16y ago
> [...] when he was pulled aside by customs and border protection agents who told him he was randomly selected for a security search > [...] Receipts from his bag were photocopied and his laptop was inspected but it's not clear in what manner, the sources said. Officials from the Immigration and Customs Enforcement and the U.S. Army then told him he was not under arrest but was being detained, the sources said. They asked questions about Wikileaks, asked for his opinions about the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan and asked where Wikileaks founder Julian Assange is, but he declined to comment without a lawyer present, according to the sources. He was not permitted to make a phone call, they said. What's more worrisome to me is that doublespeak like nonrandom "random searches" and "not arrested but detained" — not to mention state officials imprisoning citizens and holding them up to some political litmus test over their opinions of our foreign wars while searching through their documents and confiscating their equipment without a warrant — has apparently become such a norm in the USA that even more open-minded news sources like Wired don't bother to question it.
- vaksel 16y ago
  yeah def has a feel of communist Russia
  - rdtsc 16y ago
    Except that in Communist Russia he would have probably "disappeared" into some labor camp in Siberia. We are still far from that. However, at the same time, in Communist Russia nobody had the illusion that it was a free, open, morally superior country. All that propaganda bullshit was recognized as bullshit. Except for some old WWII veterans who believed in the "system", everyone in private knew it was all a spectacle. In case of the American society, the majority still think they live in a democracy, where they can do whatever they like, say whatever they like, that the government doesn't spy on them, doesn't put people on black lists, that searches are really "random" and so on. And I like how the FBI agents want to talk about "human rights". Wow! Such a cheap shot at creating rapport. They couldn't really come up with anything better !?
    - kragen 16y ago
rick888 16y ago
I hope that when there are discussions about the "drug war" in the US in the future, that people blame the cartels for murders and not the fact that drugs are illegal. After all, the government isn't the one doing the shooting. This seems to be the defense of the Wikileaks guys.

74 points by Rod 16y ago

I wonder if this is part of a policy to try and debase wikileaks by making it clear that if you affiliate with them or support them that life will be made hard for you. I know Jake. I was a member of Noisebridge. I feel the work that Wikileaks is doing is incredibly important, and I know he's got the fortitude to deal with the bullshit and continue fighting the good fight.

rick888 16y ago
Wikileaks may be important, but they should really think of the consequences of their actions: http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/asia/afghanistan/7917955/Wikileaks-Afghanistan-Taliban-hunting-down-informants.html http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/asia/afghanistan/7... If any death results from this "leak", Jake should be held accountable.
- mixmax 16y ago
  They do, they don't release material that could potentially cause bodily harm to specific individuals. could some of the leaks potentially lead to the Taliban uncovering an agent and murdering him? possibly, but not likely. The New York Times or Washington Post could probably be accused of the same. These are hard questions for Wikileaks, as they have been for the rest of the press for decades.
  - p858snake 16y ago
    They only thoroughly checked about ~2000 of the documents according to a speech Julian gave on Lateline (Australian TV Show), They [wikileaks] did offer the US government a chance to check though and blank any names they found but they did not accept the offer.
    - rick888 16y ago
      "They only thoroughly checked about ~2000 of the documents according to a speech Julian gave on Lateline (Australian TV Show), They [wikileaks] did offer the US government a chance to check though and blank any names they found but they did not accept the offer." Why take the chance? Why not blank out all the names? They don't seem to care about the potential loss of human life.
      - chc 16y ago
        "Why take the chance?" is just fearmongering, not a rational argument. Every time you get in a car, you could cause numerous deaths. Why take the chance? Giving the government the chance to redact is a much greater precaution than any of us take when operating deadly machinery. The question is why the government, which was in a position to know their sensitive nature, didn't blank out all the names.
  - drivebyacct2 16y ago
    I'm crazy about the idea of wikileaks but the Journal's article brings up good points. These documents are unlikely to fundamentally change peoples' opinion on the war(s), yet the documents have already been found to name afghan informants by full name, village and father's name.
    - cma 16y ago
      Sounds like a case of "collateral damage." Our military's stance is that such damage is completely ok no matter what proportionalities are involved.
      - rick888 16y ago
        Right. So seeing a questionable video involving a few asshole US soldiers means that it's perfectly okay for hundreds more to die needlessly. what the hell kind of reasoning is that?
        cma 16y ago
        I said it was our military's stance, not my stance.
      - drivebyacct2 16y ago
        I understand your point, but isn't the idea to be better? It's hard to argue that information should be free when the direct results of this will be human casualties. I mean, that's how it is being played and will be played. Note, I'm speaking literally when I say "hard to argue". I think it's the correct ideal and I think our government could use doses of unexpected transparency but it's the Fox News I'm thinking about.
    - jacquesm 16y ago
      I wrote about exactly that: http://jacquesmattheij.com/In+defense+of+wikileaks http://jacquesmattheij.com/In+defense+of+wikileaks
      - 16y ago
- Gianteye 16y ago
  I don't want to engage in a long discussion, especially as I'm not acquainted with all the facts, but who is held accountable for the deaths caused by our government funding a security organization that directly undermines efforts in Afghanistan? It seems that there are no risk free way to unravel great injustices. In what has become an incredibly contracted and bloody conflict, it seems absurd to try and apportion blame and fault to an organization that's trying to reduce net suffering. It seems similar to someone exposing human rights violations in a company, the company performing poorly because of the press, and them being blamed for all the jobs lost.
- Rod 16y ago
  Who has the moral authority to hold Jake accountable? He exposed the truth. By contrast, Bush, Cheney & Rumsfeld gave us Gulf of Tonkin II, the meretricious congressmen gave the executive branch all the power it wanted, we know that we invaded a country based on lies, 100,000s have died, and noone has been held accountable. What's the rule here? You kill 1 it's a tragegy, but if you kill 1,000,000 it's a statistic?
  - Gianteye 16y ago
    I concur. Additionally I think it's interesting how blame is being specifically ascribed to Jake and Julian, the most visible speakers for wilileaks, when the number of people contributing, editing, managing, and supporting wikileaks is in the hundreds. I feel it might be part of an urge people have to latch on to concrete and explicable causes for events they feel an emotional repulsion to, ie: "You, specific human being (Obama, Bush, Jake, Jesus, what have you) are to blame for the evils in the world." as opposed to "You, complex social phenomenon that may or may not be capable of being influenced by any individual action, are to blame for the evils of the world."
  - rick888 16y ago
    "Who has the moral authority to hold Jake accountable? He exposed the truth. By contrast, Bush, Cheney & Rumsfeld gave us Gulf of Tonkin II, the meretricious congressmen gave the executive branch all the power it wanted, we know that we invaded a country based on lies, 100,000s have died, and noone has been held accountable. What's the rule here? You kill 1 it's a tragegy, but if you kill 1,000,000 it's a statistic?" So you claim nobody has the "moral authority" to hold the people from wikileaks accountable, yet you want to hold Bush, Cheney, and Rumsfeld accountable (it's interesting you would use only republicans as examples btw) for their actions? If I intentionally gave out your address to criminals and told them when you wouldn't be home (and they robbed your house), would you hold me accountable? I'm just "exposing the truth" This information has the possibility of getting thousands killed. On a side note, I'm hoping I can get jake's full address and phone number so I can give it out to some people. I'm sure he won't mind. I'm just "exposing the truth"
    - 16y ago
- niekmaas 16y ago
  It's a bit harsh to hold Jake accountable for deaths. I think that's the reason people downvote the comment. It is a true concern though whether or not exposing data like the Afghan documents could endanger the lives of people in Afghanistan and people working in the area affiliated with the coalition forces. After reading this article http://www.newsweek.com/2010/07/30/taliban-says-it-will-target-names-exposed-by-wikileaks.html http://www.newsweek.com/2010/07/30/taliban-says-it-will-targ... it becomes clear that the Taliban is checking the documents to find Afghan people that supply the coalition forces with information. If found they will be 'punished'. This doesn't take away the value of the documents exposed. I'm just trying to point out that besides the great value of this exposure some damage to (relative) innocent people might be done as well.
- hyperbovine 16y ago
  Assange gave the Guardian, that paper's main competition, advance access to the docs. Bitter much? To date, there is absolutely no evidence of these sort of reprisals actually taking place, other than a vaguely worded threat from some token Taliban mouthpiece. And you know how uncommon that is...
- deleted 16y ago
  [deleted]
endlessvoid94 16y ago
How was Jake associated with noisebridge? I was just there a few days ago...
- Gianteye 16y ago
  He's a cofounder, though I'm not sure how much he is involved these days.
- aerique 16y ago
  The article said he co-founded it.

gruseom 16y ago

It would be a good thing if more prominent people became associated with Wikileaks and diluted the one-man-show aspect. It's the principles that matter. Interesting that FBI agents at Defcon said they wanted to know if "human rights" were being "trampled". Is that a clumsy way of establishing rapport with the subject, or are there actually FBI agents who think like that?

pradocchia 16y ago
Is that a clumsy way of establishing rapport with the subject, or are there actually FBI agents who think like that? No no, they were getting to know their subject, building a profile, seeing how he responds. Did they deliver the question straight? Then see how he colors it. With sarcasm? See how he deals with antagonism. etc.
quadhome 16y ago
One of the best parts of Defcon is the opportunity to party with feds all night long. You discover they're just like you.
- deleted 16y ago
  [deleted]
- substack 16y ago
  Can any individual government agent in such a capacity ever really be "just like me"? I don't take orders from anyone. They do. In that respect, they are nothing like me at all. A large part of what makes tales of government harassment like this one so troubling is how similar, reasonable, and even pleasant the agents are. If they are just like us, then why is there so much injustice?
  - jacquesm 16y ago
    > If they are just like us, then why is there so much injustice? Politics.
- tomjen3 16y ago

Niten 16y ago

> [...] when he was pulled aside by customs and border protection agents who told him he was randomly selected for a security search > [...] Receipts from his bag were photocopied and his laptop was inspected but it's not clear in what manner, the sources said. Officials from the Immigration and Customs Enforcement and the U.S. Army then told him he was not under arrest but was being detained, the sources said. They asked questions about Wikileaks, asked for his opinions about the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan and asked where Wikileaks founder Julian Assange is, but he declined to comment without a lawyer present, according to the sources. He was not permitted to make a phone call, they said. What's more worrisome to me is that doublespeak like nonrandom "random searches" and "not arrested but detained" — not to mention state officials imprisoning citizens and holding them up to some political litmus test over their opinions of our foreign wars while searching through their documents and confiscating their equipment without a warrant — has apparently become such a norm in the USA that even more open-minded news sources like Wired don't bother to question it.

vaksel 16y ago
yeah def has a feel of communist Russia
- rdtsc 16y ago
  Except that in Communist Russia he would have probably "disappeared" into some labor camp in Siberia. We are still far from that. However, at the same time, in Communist Russia nobody had the illusion that it was a free, open, morally superior country. All that propaganda bullshit was recognized as bullshit. Except for some old WWII veterans who believed in the "system", everyone in private knew it was all a spectacle. In case of the American society, the majority still think they live in a democracy, where they can do whatever they like, say whatever they like, that the government doesn't spy on them, doesn't put people on black lists, that searches are really "random" and so on. And I like how the FBI agents want to talk about "human rights". Wow! Such a cheap shot at creating rapport. They couldn't really come up with anything better !?
  - kragen 16y ago

rick888 16y ago

I hope that when there are discussions about the "drug war" in the US in the future, that people blame the cartels for murders and not the fact that drugs are illegal. After all, the government isn't the one doing the shooting. This seems to be the defense of the Wikileaks guys.