Burn the Internet!

Trying to work out quite what is going on is Senator Joe Liebermann (Free Man if I translate correctly*...) and Co's mind - Threat Level:

Senator Joseph Lieberman and other lawmakers on Thursday introduced legislation that would make it a federal crime for anyone to publish the name of a U.S. intelligence source, in a direct swipe at the secret-spilling website WikiLeaks.

“The recent dissemination by Wikileaks of thousands of State Department cables and other documents is just the latest example of how our national security interests, the interests of our allies, and the safety of government employees and countless other individuals are jeopardized by the illegal release of classified and sensitive information,” said Lieberman in a written statement.

“This legislation will help hold people criminally accountable who endanger these sources of information that are vital to protecting our national security interests,” he continued.

The so-called SHIELD Act (Securing Human Intelligence and Enforcing Lawful Dissemination) would amend a section of the Espionage Act that already forbids publishing classified information on U.S. cryptographic secrets or overseas communications intelligence — i.e., wiretapping. The bill would extend that prohibition to information on HUMINT, human intelligence, making it a crime to publish information “concerning the identity of a classified source or informant of an element of the intelligence community of the United States,” or “concerning the human intelligence activities of the United States or any foreign government” if such publication is prejudicial to U.S. interests.

To an extent this is what made me grumpy with Wikileaks - by them going over the top on "freeing your data" all they have done is released the rabid fundamentalists of The Establishment and polarised the whole privacy debate. In other words, "moderate" people like us wind up either having to defend a way too open view of privacy (everything is open, always, regardless of impact) or a too closed one (Liebermann et al). Enter opportunists and idealists of both stripes, exeunt rational thought.

Well, a pox on both their houses!

But if there is barricade to man today, it is this one - to resist those who would restrict freedom to publish all sorts of embarassing things (to the Great and Good) in the name of "not in the public interest" when it very much is. There has been a massive abuse of "scary people" legislation by Western governments since 9/11 to restrict public freedoms hard-won over 100+ years of protests. Liebermann and Co remind me too much of those who throughout the ages have sought to "burn the books" of seditious thought. It's nearly always a marker for the start of a fairly nasty period of crackdown and oppression, so better to get on the barricades sooner than later. Now it's the Internet they want to burn (we don't see quite the same blazing ire being directed at the Olde Media publishing the same stuff, nor do we see them exactly rushing to defend Wikileaks despite making money from the data) and so far the US Internet Bourgeosie (Amazon et al) have rolled over and taken it.

For example, the diagram we have above is not illegal - it is a list of the leaks and what they impact. It is metadata, yet yesterday Liebermann et al strong-armed a US hoster, Tableau Software, to remove it. We feel this is wrong - the metadata is not illegal and this sort of abuse needs to be stood up to.

But ultimately these people are public servants, working (in theory) for their own taxpayers. Thus, to act so high handed before knowing the will of the peole they (allegedly) serve seems a tad premature. Whatever happened to the "I hate what you say, but I will defend your right to say it" ethos? Or even "Innocent until proven guilty (in Court)". They know they haven't a leg to stand on in court, which is why this sort of behaviour (and the DDoS attacks) are being resorted to.

So, this is Broadstuff on the barricades. Will more of you join.....

Update - rumours are abounding on the Internet that the next tranche of leaks was about the banking system, and that is driving the higher degree of crackdown from the US Authorities. Totally unsubstantiated, but interesting....

Update 2: Online interview with assange in the Grauniad - he made two fascinating comments - "We should always look at censorship as an economic signal that reveals the potential power of speech in that jurisdiction"



*More accurately Nice or Dear Man