WikiLeaks first rose to prominence when it leaked diplomatic cables in 2010, laying bare the true opinions and feelings of diplomats around the world. Since then, the site has largely been overshadowed by the legal troubles of its founder Julian Assange. The site has come under fire recently, however, for its refusal to curate or redact the data of innocent people, and it may be putting lives at risk by refusing to do so.
The Associated Press examined a year’s worth of leaks from the site and found that, essentially, it was posting the data without checking it. That means that private medical files, psychiatric records, financial information, personal identification, and even personal details. Among other recent issues, the site has revealed the names and details of sexual assault survivors, outed a Saudi man as being gay in a part of the world where that can mean a death sentence, and revealed personal details of almost every female voter in Turkey.
WikiLeaks, for its part, claims that some of the story is false:
No, WikiLeaks did not disclose "gays" to the Saudi govt. Data is from govt & not leaked by us. Story from 2015. Re-run now due to election.
— WikiLeaks (@wikileaks) August 23, 2016
Reports that WikiLeaks published data on "Turkish women" are entirely false. US election sees media standards decay. https://t.co/odmpxNB0Jp
— WikiLeaks (@wikileaks) August 23, 2016
It is, however, notably silent on accusations of leaking medical records, and does not appear to have commented on the sexual assault survivor leak.
WikiLeaks has publicly claimed to only be going after secrets governments and other organizations would rather not be public, but increasingly, it’s seemed to be apathetic to the plight of any innocents that might be caught in the line of fire. It’s made them far more enemies than friends, even in the transparency community, most notably Edward Snowden, who chided the site for its failure to both redact data properly and examine the motives of leakers.
The problem, ultimately, is that WikiLeaks increasingly has an agenda. A cursory scan of the last day or so of the site’s Twitter feed finds it pushing the conspiracy theory that Hillary Clinton has CTE and attempting to revive the claim that she was behind the death of Vince Foster, for example.
Clearly the site’s philosophy is that in the quest for transparency, there will be collateral damage on the quest for the greater good. The question, however, is exactly what that greater good might be.
(via CBS News)