Protests, cyber-skirmishes rage over WikiLeaks
LONDON Skirmishes raged across cyberspace between WikiLeaks
supporters and the companies they accuse of trying to stifle the group,
with websites on both sides of the battle line taken out of service or
choked off by attacks.
The U.N.’s top human rights official raised the alarm Thursday over
officials’ and corporations’ moves to cut off WikiLeaks’ funding and
starve it of server space” something she described as “potentially
violating WikiLeaks’ right to freedom of expression.”
Navi Pillay also expressed surprise at the scale of the online
attacks that have targeted major American financial players” in some
cases denying access to their websites for hours at a time.
“It’s truly what media would call a cyber-war. It’s just astonishing
what is happening,” Pillay told reporters in Geneva.
In the Netherlands, a 16-year-old boy suspected of being involved in
digital attacks by Wikileaks supporters was arrested.
U.S. Attorney General Eric Holder said the Justice Department was
looking into cyber attacks on opponents of WikiLeaks and companies that
have stopped doing business with it. Holder spoke at a news conference
following a meeting with European Union law enforcement partners on
cybersecurity, counterterrorism and data protection.
WikiLeaks has been under intense pressure since it began publishing
some 250,000 secret U.S. diplomatic cables, with attacks on its websites
and threats against its founder, Julian Assange, who is now in a British
jail fighting extradition to Sweden on sex crime allegations.
U.S.officials say WikiLeaks’ actions have thrown diplomacy into
disarray, caused countries to curtail dealings with America and, in the
case of an earlier release of classified military documents, put the
lives of informants at risk.
While U.S. allies have also criticized WikiLeaks, some world leaders
have questioned the arrest of Assange.
Russian Prime Minister Vladimir Putin, questioning the reliability of
leaked U.S. cables referring to his nation as undemocratic and corrupt,
said the fact that Assange is in custody shows the West has its own
problems with democracy.
“Why was Mr. Assange hidden in prison?” Putin asked at a news
conference. “Is this democracy?” Brazilian President Luiz Inacio Lula da
Silva said he was surprised by the lack of outcry against Assange’s
arrest.
“This WikiLeaks guy was arrested and I’m not seeing any protest for
freedom of expression,” Silva said Thursday in Brasilia. “There is
nothing, nothing for freedom of expression and against the imprisonment
of this guy who was doing better work than many of the ambassadors.”
Many U.S.-based Internet companies have cut their ties to WikiLeaks,
including MasterCard Inc., Visa Inc., Amazon.com, PayPal Inc. and
EveryDNS. Those moves have hurt WikiLeaks’ ability to accept donations
and support publishing efforts “ and touched off a bout of Web-based
warfare.
Retaliatory attacks” which WikiLeaks says it does not sanction” have
been claimed by a loose-knit group of “hacktivists” who gather under the
handle “Anonymous.” They are using a modified version of software
generally used to conduct “stress testing” on websites, according to
Paul Mutton, an analyst with the London-based company Netcraft, which is
tracking the attacks.
The technique allows even unsophisticated supporters to participate
in attacks because all they have to do is download the file, which is
then remotely operated to send a stream of bogus page requests to target
websites.
Mutton said the number of computers spewing out spam had jumped from
400 to 2,000 machines on Wednesday — relatively small numbers, he
said, but still apparently enough to overwhelm MasterCard and Visa.
“I’ve been surprised at how effective its been,” he said. “You don’t
need huge numbers of people to carry out an attack like that.”
The surprise was shared by Internet activist Gregg Housh, who is
involved with Anonymous. “I was surprised Visa and MasterCard went
down,” he told The Associated Press.
Housh said the number of computers at Anonymous’ disposal was rising
rapidly, now about 3,000 strong. But he also said supporters were
running out of anti-WikiLeaks targets.
“So far today, no one has stood up and said, `Me next,’” he said,
noting that some companies threatened by online action” such as Twitter
and Amazon.com, were considered too powerful to bring down.
WikiLeaks supporters in Switzerland and Germany have threatened
lawsuits against U.S. financial companies who have cut their ties to the
website, while judicial authorities in France have put the brakes on the
French government’s effort to purge WikiLeaks from the country’s
computer servers.
The Germany-based Wau Holland Foundation, which has described itself
as WikiLeaks’ main backer, on Thursday protested PayPal’s decision to
cut ties with WikiLeaks and said about ?10,000 ($13,000) in donations
had been frozen.
The foundation rejected PayPal’s allegation it was supporting illegal
activity and said its lawyer had demanded that PayPal restore access to
the account.
WikiLeaks’ payment processor, DataCell ehf, said it was preparing to
sue Visa and MasterCard over their refusal to process donations to
WikiLeaks.
DataCell CEO Andreas Fink said he would seek damages from the U.S.
credit card companies, saying “it is simply ridiculous to think
WikiLeaks has done anything criminal.”
Pillay said if WikiLeaks had broken the law “then this should be
handled through the legal system and not through pressure and
intimidation.”
The flow of online support has also sparked some solidarity on the
streets. One pro-WikiLeaks protest in Australia sent about 250
demonstrators into the streets of Brisbane, while in the central
Pakistani city of Multan, dozens took to the streets to burn U.S. and
British flags to protest Assange’s detention.
Organizer Tariq Naeemullah called for the Australian’s immediate
release.
“The brave man was arrested because he was exposing the real face of
the big powers,” he said.
More pro-WikiLeaks protests are planned for Friday in Brisbane and
Monday in London.
- AP
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