"I invoke." —

This text file purports to be a transcript of David House's grand jury testimony. House is a friend and supporter of Bradley Manning, the U.S. Army private accused of sending secret documents to Wikileaks, and hence to the press. [via @Glinner and @azzamckazza] — Rob •

I've just finished Rebecca MacKinnon's Consent of the Networked, and now I'm kicking myself for letting it languish in my review pile for as long as I did. It is an absolutely indispensable account of the way that technology both serves freedom and removes it. MacKinnon is co-founder of the Global Voices project, and a director of the Global Network Initiative, and is one of the best-informed, clearest commentators on issues of networks and freedom from a truly global perspective.

MacKinnon does a fantastic job of tying her theory and analysis to real-world stories. She illustrates how governments are figuring out how to use networks to take freedom away, to control debate, to find and crush dissent. She shows how Internet corporations -- even the ones with a good track-record on protecting their users -- are prone to cooperating with the worst, most repressive instincts of governments (including supposedly liberal western governments).

But she also describes how technology contributes to freedom, and how savvy use of technology, combined with activism in the realm of Internet governance, lawmaking, and corporate affairs can turn technology into a force for liberation, accountability and freedom. She teases out the good and the bad of technology, working from recent examples like the Arab Spring uprisings, and names names and cites facts and figures when it comes to companies and governments who worked to undo the liberating power of technology.

Most of all, MacKinnon lays out a roadmap for tipping the technological balance towards freedom. She describes how diverse groups, including ones she works with, provide opportunities for all of us to work for positive change, in our capacity as citizens, employees of corporations, members of government, and as clued-in techies.

MacKinnon is a realist, but never a cynic, and provides a much-needed straight-shooting, levelheaded account of how the Internet changes power-relationships. This book should be read by anyone who cares about freedom today and in the decades to come.

Consent of the Networked: The Worldwide Struggle For Internet Freedom

Official book site

A rare moment of sanity from the US courts relating to Bradley Manning: David Maurice House, an MIT researcher and high profile supporter of Manning has been given the go-ahead to sue the US government for punitively searching his stuff when he came back to the USA after a holiday in Mexico.

“Although the agents may not need to have any particularized suspicion for the initial search and seizure at the border for the purpose of the Fourth Amendment analysis, it does not necessarily follow that the agents, as is alleged in the complaint, may seize personal electronic devices containing expressive materials, target someone for their political association and seize his electronic devices and review the information pertinent to that association and its members and supporters simply because the initial search occurred at the border,” U.S. District Court Judge Denise Casper wrote.

MEMORANDUM AND ORDER: UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT, DISTRICT OF MASSACHUSETTSPDF

Politically Motivated Border Searches Could Be Unconstitutional, Judge Rules (Wired.com/Kim Zetter)

The Guardian reports that Juan Mendez, special rapporteur on torture for the United Nations, has "formally accused the US government of cruel, inhuman and degrading treatment towards Bradley Manning, the US soldier who was held in solitary confinement for almost a year on suspicion of being the WikiLeaks source. PDF of the report is here.

Snip: "The special rapporteur concludes that imposing seriously punitive conditions of detention on someone who has not been found guilty of any crime is a violation of his right to physical and psychological integrity as well as of his presumption of innocence."

Today, Wikileaks releases its "Global Intelligence Files," a trove of more than 5,000,000 emails from Stratfor, a Texas based "global intelligence" company. The dump includes emails detailing Stratfor's work with the US government on discrediting Wikileaks itself, as well as a lot of extremely dirty geopolitical laundry.

"[Is it] possible for us to get some of that 'leak-focused' gravy train? This is an obvious fear sale, so that's a good thing. And we have something to offer that the IT security companies don't, mainly our focus on counter-intelligence and surveillance that Fred and Stick know better than anyone on the planet... Could we develop some ideas and procedures on the idea of ´leak-focused' network security that focuses on preventing one's own employees from leaking sensitive information... In fact, I'm not so sure this is an IT problem that requires an IT solution."

Like WikiLeaks’ diplomatic cables, much of the significance of the emails will be revealed over the coming weeks, as our coalition and the public search through them and discover connections. Readers will find that whereas large numbers of Stratfor's subscribers and clients work in the US military and intelligence agencies, Stratfor gave a complimentary membership to the controversial Pakistan general Hamid Gul, former head of Pakistan's ISI intelligence service, who, according to US diplomatic cables, planned an IED attack on international forces in Afghanistan in 2006. Readers will discover Stratfor's internal email classification system that codes correspondence according to categories such as 'alpha', 'tactical' and 'secure'. The correspondence also contains code names for people of particular interest such as 'Izzies' (members of Hezbollah), or 'Adogg' (Mahmoud Ahmedinejad).

Stratfor did secret deals with dozens of media organisations and journalists – from Reuters to the Kiev Post. The list of Stratfor’s "Confederation Partners", whom Stratfor internally referred to as its "Confed Fuck House" are included in the release. While it is acceptable for journalists to swap information or be paid by other media organisations, because Stratfor is a private intelligence organisation that services governments and private clients these relationships are corrupt or corrupting.

WikiLeaks has also obtained Stratfor's list of informants and, in many cases, records of its payoffs, including $1,200 a month paid to the informant "Geronimo" , handled by Stratfor's Former State Department agent Fred Burton.

The Global Intelligence Files - List of Releases

The Global Intelligence Files (Press release)

Wikileaks announced this week that house-arrested frontman Julian Assange would host a new television interview series with "in-depth conversations with key political players, thinkers and revolutionaries from around the world." The theme, according to the announcement: "the world tomorrow."

Today, news that the network involved is none other than RT, the Russian cable television outlet founded by the Kremlin in 2005, which remains funded by and effectively under the editorial control of the Russian state. If you thought Assange's story already read like a pulp spy novel, none of this should be particularly shocking.

In a hyperbolic news release at RT.com, the network today revealed that the program will be filmed at the rural British manse where Assange has been residing under house arrest for more than a year while he fights extradition to Sweden on charges of sexual assault. The first episode will be shot "just a week before Assange's Supreme Court hearing in the UK."

And at the end of that RT announcement: “Details of the episodes and the guests featured are secret for now.” Secret. LOL.

More: NYT Media Decoder blog, Moscow Times, LA Times.

(Original Images: REUTERS)

DC-area photographer Chris Wieland writes in: "Stumbled upon the Wikileaks van guy getting searched by capitol police today!"

As if!

Ellsberg on Manning —

"[President Obama] is involved in a war against leakers, against whistle-blowers." — Xeni •

Army: Manning asked Assange to help crack password —

Wired’s Kim Zetter, reporting from Army Pvt. Bradley Manning’s first hearing on charges of leaking classified documents to Wikileaks: “Manning asked “Nathaniel Frank,” believed to be Assange, about help in cracking the main password on his classified SIPRnet computer so that he could log on to it anonymously. He asked “Frank” if he had experience cracking IM NT hashes (presumably it’s a mistype and he meant NTLM for the Microsoft NT LAN Manager). 'Frank' replied yes, that they had 'rainbow tables' for doing that. Manning then sent him what looked like a hash.” — Rob •

Contrafactual future history of Wikileaks —

Lavir Tidhar's gonzo sf story Enter The Dragon. Later, Enter Another tells of a future, contrafactual history for Wikileaks with cameos from me and Bruce Sterling. (Thanks, Lavie!) — Cory •

Adam Butcher's short film is a portrait of Bradley Manning, the U.S. Army private accused of sending thousands of classified documents to Wikileaks. With dialog based on the chatlogs that incriminated him, and pixel-art rotoscoping of live footage, the overall effect is strangely dehumanizing—an echo of what happens when secrets private and political come to define one's predicament.