In the past couple of weeks Wikileaks has been in the news, I am still wondering why it is not trending on twitter anyway. I guess it is not the most important thing on the minds of the online citizens. I have read widely on this matter with one objective - to find out if Wikileaks is right or wrong. I must admit I haven't gotten to that conclusion yet. I however came by one major point I found interesting and wouldn't mind sharing with you.
For a media organisation that is based on the principles of the defence of freedom of speech and media publishing, the improvement of our common historical record and the support of the rights of all people to create new history, I would have expected them to be open with their information as well. Wikileaks accepts (but does not solicit for) documents from anyone who would wants to leak information. The documents are then taken through a thorough process of verification before released into the public domain.
My only problem is that Wikileaks sees it fit to keep the source of all leaked information anonymous and till date it has kept the security details of its electronic drop box secret. If Wikileaks believes for the sake of continuity of its process and the safety of its partners such information should be kept secret, why are they publishing the documents of other organisations then. The question is who has the right to tell what parts of documents should be kept secret or otherwise? If Wikileaks believes in Freedom of Information, I would challenge them to live by this pillar. Sources of documents and other media resources received should be revealed, together with a full description of its security algorithm behind the existence of it electronic drop box. If they find this difficult to do, I dare say then that Wikileaks has no moral right to reveal or publish what others have kept secret.
1 comment:
I disagree on your last point on wiki publishing it's electronic drop box. While those governments and organisation are directly funded by tax-payer money (meaning the people accept that those monies be paid for a service to be done on their part, Wiki isn't. Number 2, the kind of job it's doing means if they publish that, the US government together with its allies would hack into it, steal whatever they want or block it utterly. The implication? Wiki would not exist to leak anything.
So they can't live by any such pillar as you have sort to write.
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