Wikileaks Ethics

Bradley Manning had access to confidential files and record as an Army intelligence analyst in Iraq. In the year 2010, Manning revealed confidential information to the website called WikiLeaks. The material contained various sensitive information such as videos of the July 12, 2007 Baghdad airstrike, and the 2009 Granai airstrike in Afghanistan; 250,000 U.S. diplomatic cables; and 500,000 Army reports that came to be known as the Iraq War logs and Afghan War logs. The majority of this information was published by the website WikiLeaks or the like. Bradley Manning’s case was somewhat complex because he didn’t initially express his reasoning for doing this and he appeared to have indiscriminately released numerous amounts of government records. Manning’s defense lawyer claimed that WikiLeaks is a valid media outlet, while the opposition claims that Manning was not a whistleblower leaking to a news outlet, but just a fame-seeker who released the information indiscriminately for his own purposes. ("What Bradley Manning Leaked.") Whether WikiLeaks is a valid reporting and journalistic media outlet or not, the case unfolded as the United States’ government began to scrutinize all media and information disclosures to the public.

Edward Snowden isn’t the only person who believes what the U.S. had done was wrong, but also many American leaders, and other nations around the world. The United States had not only been collecting data on their own citizens, but also of other countries leaders and citizens. The release of these documents had strained political relationships between the U.S. and other allied nations. The knowledge and truth other leaders and nations had gained

Edward Snowden and the PRISM leak: On June 6, 2013, The Guardian broke the news that the U.S. National Security

Many people have always wondered what the word ethics mean. To me ethics is the feeling of right and wrong. Many people have their own way of defining ethics and but this is what ethics mean to me. Ethics to other people might mean following the laws and some may say ethics is determined by what society is believed is right and wrong. For example Edward Snowden, a 30 year old man was born in North Carolina in 1983 (Edward snowden.biography, 2013, para. 1). Edward Snowden was a security guard that worked for the National Security Agency (NSA), after three months Edward Snowden started to collect NSA files and fled to Hong Kong and leaked the files. China started to print out report of the files that Edward Snowden has leaked to China

In “Assessing the First Amendment as a Defense for WikiLeaks and Other Publishers of Previously Undisclosed Government Information,” Janelle Allen explores whether WikiLeaks should be entitled to the same protections that traditional media outlets are given when they publish classified information. In her work, she goes over two possible avenues that the government can take if it wants to silence WikiLeaks; the two options are: prior restraint (censorship) and the Espionage Act. Allen, in order to bolster her argument that WikiLeaks should be entitled to the same protections given to traditional media outlets, goes over cases that fall under what is known as the Daily Mail Principle. This principle allows publications to publish material

Edward Snowden, the former National Security Agency (N.S.A) subcontractor turned whistle-blower is nothing short of a hero. His controversial decision to release information detailing the highly illegal ‘data mining’ practices of the N.S.A have caused shockwaves throughout the world and have raised important questions concerning how much the government actually monitors its people without their consent or knowledge. Comparable to Mark Felt in the Watergate scandals, Daniel Ellsberg with the Pentagon Papers, Edward Snowden joins the rank of infamous whistleblowers who gave up their jobs, livelihood, and forever will live under scrutiny of the public all in the service to the American people. Edward Snowden released information detailing the

Are government whistleblowers acting in the public interest, or do they endanger the public by exposing classified information? Just as government transparency has waned in recent years, there have been several instances of very public national intelligence whistle-blowing. Large scale leaks such as those published by The Guardian and WikiLeaks have prompted debate on issues of government secrecy, as well as the balance between security and liberty. High profile whistleblowers like Bradley Manning, Julian Assange, and Edward Snowden have, at great personal risk, leaked classified information to the public in the interest of transparency. Leaked media and documents range from embarrassing, to potentially dangerous. Heightened levels of

WikiLeaks plans to shine light on what’s really happening behind closed doors. They feel like the people should know everything that is going on in their own government and the secrets and lies should stop. A video called Collateral Murder was posted on the website, where innocent Iraqis and two reporters from Reuters were murdered by U.S. helicopter gunner soldiers. One of the reporters was taking pictures and mistaken for having a RPG; which gave the okay to kill on sight. Two children were also seriously injured. When the helicopter gunners found out children were injured in their shooting escapade, the soldier’s exact words were “Well it’s their fault for bringing their kids into a battle”. They showed no emotion; it was all fun and games to them

Greenwald, who had written many journalistic pieces about government surveillance, was unaware of the turn of events that was about to take place when he received an email from “Cincinnatus”. The email, unknown to Glenn Greenwald at the time, was from a twenty-nine year old former NSA employee named Edward Snowden who was looking to blow the whistle on the United States government’s extensive surveillance of

Case 6-B titled “WikiLeaks” discusses the controversy surrounding Julian Assange, CEO and editor of an organization called WikiLeaks. Assange started his career as an Australian hacker, with the ethical thought that keeping secrets, especially national secrets were bad. Assange was first brought to media attention after WikiLeaks released video footage of Iran citizens gunned down by an American Apache

Introduction- Julian Assange was born on July 3, 1971, in Townsville, Australia. He used his genius IQ to hack into the databases of many high profile organizations. In 2006, Assange began working on Wikileaks, a Web site to collect and share confidential information of high profile organizations on an international scale. The information his organization released earned him strong supporters and powerful enemies. For his efforts, the internet activist earned the Time magazine "Person of the Year" title in 2010. After arriving at the Ecuadorean Embassy in London in June 2012, seeking to avoid extradition to Sweden, Assange was granted political asylum by the Ecuadorean government in August 2012.

In early 2013 a man by the name of Edward Joseph Snowden began leaking classified National Security Agency (NSA) documents to media outlets, which in turn ended up in public ears. These documents, mainly involving intelligence Snowden acquired while working as an NSA contractor, are mostly related to global surveillance programs run by the NSA. This has raised multiple ethical issues ranging from national security, information privacy and the ethics behind whistleblowing in general. The reach and impact of these leaks have gone global and have put in question the very government that protects us as well as the extent of the public’s rights on privacy. Various foreign

analyses.” They get their sources from anonymous people and groups all over the world, which led to the publication of over 10 million documents and associated analyses. It is stated that, “Although no organization can hope to have a perfect record forever, thus far WikiLeaks has a perfect in document authentication and resistance to all censorship attempts.” Moreover, WikiLeaks won numerous of awards for many years now, which proves that they are really credible sources and they deliver the truth that everyone deserves to know. “We publish without fear or favor, bringing transparency to powerful factions and secretive institutions, not taking any sides except that of the truth. We believe in the democratization of information and the power that knowledge gives to people to further peace, accountability and self-determination.” A recent news is about the thousands of deleted emails of Hillary Clinton when she was the Secretary of State and went against the law by using her own private server. These email leaks may have affected the last presidential election since citizens discovered something that they do not like. It is indicated that, “WikiLeaks has contractual relationships and secure communications paths to more than 100 major media organizations from around the world. This gives WikiLeaks sources negotiating power, impact and technical protections that would otherwise be difficult or impossible to achieve.”

Related to that, this essay is written as an effort to comprehend the role of individual in globalized world, especially by studying the case of Julian Assange and Wikileaks. This essay is divided in three parts. The first part of this essay explains background as well as global controversy surrounding Wikileaks and its spokesman, Julian Assange. The second part identifies the areas that Assange have directly impacted, especially in terms of participation, journalism practice and privacy. Finally, the last part of this essay reflects on Assange’s role in the globalized media economy, particularly drawing on his background as an Australian as well as the position of Australia in global economy.

Earlier in 2010, a cache of a quarter-million confidential American diplomatic cables was posted on WikiLeaks, an organization devoted to revealing secret government documents. These documents provide “an unprecedented look at backroom bargaining by embassies around the world, brutally candid views of foreign leaders and frank assessments of nuclear and terrorist threats” (Shane and Lehren). The disclosure sent shudders through the diplomatic establishment, and strained relationships between multiple countries, influencing international affairs in unpredictable ways (Shane and Lehren).