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      Glen Greenwald, Micah Lee - 20190412

      https://theintercept.com/2019/04/11/the-u-s-governments-indictment-of-julian-assange-poses-grave-threats-t

      In April, 2017, Pompeo, while still CIA chief, delivered a deranged speech proclaiming that “we have to recognize that we can no longer allow Assange and his colleagues the latitude to use free speech values against us.” He punctuated his speech with this threat: “To give them the space to crush us with misappropriated secrets is a perversion of what our great Constitution stands for. It ends now.”

      From the start, the Trump DOJ has made no secret of its desire to criminalize journalism generally. Early in the Trump administration, Sessions explicitly discussed the possibility of prosecuting journalists for publishing classified information. Trump and his key aides were open about how eager they were to build on, and escalate, the Obama administration’s progress in enabling journalism in the U.S. to be criminalized.

      Today’s arrest of Assange is clearly the culmination of a two-year effort by the U.S. government to coerce Ecuador — under its new and submissive president, Lenín Moreno — to withdraw the asylum protection it extended to Assange in 2012. Rescinding Assange’s asylum would enable the U.K. to arrest Assange on minor bail-jumping charges pending in London and, far more significantly, to rely on an extradition request from the U.S. government to send him to a country to which he has no connection (the U.S.) to stand trial relating to leaked documents.

      Indeed, the Trump administration’s motive here is clear. With Ecuador withdrawing its asylum protection and subserviently allowing the U.K. to enter its own embassy to arrest Assange, Assange faced no charges other than a minor bail-jumping charge in the U.K. (Sweden closed its sexual assault investigation not because they concluded Assange was innocent, but because they spent years unsuccessfully trying to extradite him). By indicting Assange and demanding his extradition, it ensures that Assange — once he serves his time in a London jail for bail-jumping — will be kept in a British prison for the full year or longer that it takes for the U.S. extradition request, which Assange will certainly contest, to wind its way through the British courts.

      The indictment tries to cast itself as charging Assange not with journalistic activities but with criminal hacking. But it is a thinly disguised pretext for prosecuting Assange for publishing the U.S. government’s secret documents while pretending to make it about something else.

      Whatever else is true about the indictment, substantial parts of the document explicitly characterize as criminal exactly the actions that journalists routinely engage in with their sources and thus, constitutes a dangerous attempt to criminalize investigative journalism.

      The indictment, for instance, places great emphasis on Assange’s alleged encouragement that Manning — after she already turned over hundreds of thousands of classified documents — try to get more documents for WikiLeaks to publish. The indictment claims that “discussions also reflect Assange actively encouraging Manning to provide more information. During an exchange, Manning told Assange that ‘after this upload, that’s all I really have got left.’ To which Assange replied, ‘curious eyes never run dry in my experience.’”

      But encouraging sources to obtain more information is something journalists do routinely. Indeed, it would be a breach of one’s journalistic duties not to ask vital sources with access to classified information if they could provide even more information so as to allow more complete reporting. If a source comes to a journalist with information, it is entirely common and expected that the journalist would reply: Can you also get me X, Y, and Z to complete the story or to make it better? As Edward Snowden said this morning, “Bob Woodward stated publicly he would have advised me to remain in place and act as a mole.”

      Investigative journalism in many, if not most, cases, entails a constant back and forth between journalist and source in which the journalist tries to induce the source to provide more classified information, even if doing so is illegal. To include such “encouragement” as part of a criminal indictment — as the Trump DOJ did today — is to criminalize the crux of investigative journalism itself, even if the indictment includes other activities you believe fall outside the scope of journalism.

      As Northwestern journalism professor Dan Kennedy explained in The Guardian in 2010 when denouncing as a press freedom threat the Obama DOJ’s attempts to indict Assange based on the theory that he did more than passively receive and publish documents — i.e., that he actively “colluded” with Manning:


      The problem is that there is no meaningful distinction to be made. How did the Guardian, equally, not “collude” with WikiLeaks in obtaining the cables? How did the New York Times not “collude” with the Guardian when the Guardian gave the Times a copy following Assange’s decision to cut the Times out of the latest document dump?

      For that matter, I don’t see how any news organisation can be said not to have colluded with a source when it receives leaked documents. Didn’t the Times collude with Daniel Ellsberg when it received the Pentagon Papers from him? Yes, there are differences. Ellsberg had finished making copies long before he began working with the Times, whereas Assange may have goaded Manning. But does that really matter?

      Most of the reports about the Assange indictment today have falsely suggested that the Trump DOJ discovered some sort of new evidence that proved Assange tried to help Manning hack through a password in order to use a different username to download documents. Aside from the fact that those attempts failed, none of this is new: As the last five paragraphs of this 2011 Politico story demonstrate, that Assange talked to Manning about ways to use a different username so as to avoid detection was part of Manning’s trial and was long known to the Obama DOJ when they decided not to prosecute.

      There are only two new events that explain today’s indictment of Assange: 1) The Trump administration from the start included authoritarian extremists such as Sessions and Pompeo who do not care in the slightest about press freedom and were determined to criminalize journalism against the U.S., and 2) With Ecuador about to withdraw its asylum protection, the U.S. government needed an excuse to prevent Assange from walking free.

      A technical analysis of the indictment’s claims similarly proves the charge against Assange to be a serious threat to First Amendment press liberties, primarily because it seeks to criminalize what is actually a journalist’s core duty: helping one’s source avoid detection. The indictment deceitfully seeks to cast Assange’s efforts to help Manning maintain her anonymity as some sort of sinister hacking attack.

      The Defense Department computer that Manning used to download the documents which she then furnished to WikiLeaks was likely running the Windows operating system. It had multiple user accounts on it, including an account to which Manning had legitimate access. Each account is protected by a password, and Windows computers store a file that contains a list of usernames and password “hashes,” or scrambled versions of the passwords. Only accounts designated as “administrator,” a designation Manning’s account lacked, have permission to access this file.

      The indictment suggests that Manning, in order to access this password file, powered off her computer and then powered it back on, this time booting to a CD running the Linux operating system. From within Linux, she allegedly accessed this file full of password hashes. The indictment alleges that Assange agreed to try to crack one of these password hashes, which, if successful, would recover the original password. With the original password, Manning would be able to log directly into that other user’s account, which — as the indictment puts it — “would have made it more difficult for investigators to identify Manning as the source of disclosures of classified information.”

      Assange appears to have been unsuccessful in cracking the password. The indictment alleges that “Assange indicated that he had been trying to crack the password by stating that he had ‘no luck so far.’”

      Thus, even if one accepts all of the indictment’s claims as true, Assange was not trying to hack into new document files to which Manning had no access, but rather trying to help Manning avoid detection as a source. For that reason, the precedent that this case would set would be a devastating blow to investigative journalists and press freedom everywhere.

      Journalists have an ethical obligation to take steps to protect their sources from retaliation, which sometimes includes granting them anonymity and employing technical measures to help ensure that their identity is not discovered. When journalists take source protection seriously, they strip metadata and redact information from documents before publishing them if that information could have been used to identify their source; they host cloud-based systems such as SecureDrop, now employed by dozens of major newsrooms around the world, that make it easier and safer for whistleblowers, who may be under surveillance, to send messages and classified documents to journalists without their employers knowing; and they use secure communication tools like Signal and set them to automatically delete messages.

      But today’s indictment of Assange seeks to criminalize exactly these types of source-protection efforts, as it states that “it was part of the conspiracy that Assange and Manning used a special folder on a cloud drop box of WikiLeaks to transmit classified records containing information related to the national defense of the United States.”

      The indictment, in numerous other passages, plainly conflates standard newsroom best practices with a criminal conspiracy. It states, for instance, that “it was part of the conspiracy that Assange and Manning used the ‘Jabber’ online chat service to collaborate on the acquisition and dissemination of the classified records, and to enter into the agreement to crack the password […].” There is no question that using Jabber, or any other encrypted messaging system, to communicate with sources and acquire documents with the intent to publish them, is a completely lawful and standard part of modern investigative journalism. Newsrooms across the world now use similar technologies to communicate securely with their sources and to help their sources avoid detection by the government.

      The indictment similarly alleges that “it was part of the conspiracy that Assange and Manning took measures to conceal Manning as the source of the disclosure of classified records to WikiLeaks, including by removing usernames from the disclosed information and deleting chat logs between Assange and Manning.”

  • Egypte/Constitution : Le Comité aurait adopté un article interdisant la censure des médias et la fermeture de journaux et chaînes de télévision, sauf en cas de guerre ou de menaces à la sécurité nationale - Egypt independant

    http://www.egyptindependent.com/news/constitution-committee-moves-forbid-media-censorship-spokesperson
    Plusieurs chaînes ont été fermées après la destitution du président Morsi.

    A lire, sur Orient XXI
    Égypte : mauvaise presse pour Al-Jazira
    http://orientxxi.info/lu-vu-entendu/egypte-mauvaise-presse-pour-al,0356

    Maspero, un crime impuni
    http://orientxxi.info/magazine/maspero-un-massacre-de-coptes,0385

    Au même moment, la télévision d’État relaie en direct la propagande du pouvoir. Elle affirme que les coptes sont manipulés par l’étranger. Ils ont volé des armes, tiré sur l’armée et portent atteinte à la sécurité du pays, accuse-t-elle avant d’appeler les « braves Égyptiens » à « protéger leur armée ». Certains obéissent. Au total, environ une trentaine de manifestants sont tués et plus de trois cent trente, blessés. C’est l’événement le plus sanglant en Égypte depuis la chute du président Moubarak le 11 février 2011 et l’arrivée officielle au pouvoir du Conseil suprême des forces armées (CSFA).

    #médias #freespeech

  • Le porte-parole de la présidence égyptienne accuse The Guardian d’être devenu le « porte-parole de la contre-révolution. » | Mada Masr

    http://www.madamasr.com/content/presidential-spokesperson-slams-guardian-coverage

    Le journal s’est distingué par ses enquêtes sur le massacre de Rabea Al Adaweya ou la tuerie de la Garde républicaine. Depuis le 30 juin, le reporter Patrick Kingsley a d’ailleurs été arrêté plusieurs fois par la police.

    C’est aussi le Guardian qui avait publié en exclusivité un rapport mettant en cause l’armée, accusée de tortures et meurtres durant son passage officiel au pouvoir. http://www.theguardian.com/world/2013/apr/10/egypt-army-torture-killings-revolution

    Les journalistes sont souvent ciblés par le pouvoir. Ils auraient encore plus de difficultés à travailler depuis le 30 juin.

    A lire, sur Orient XXI
    Égypte : mauvaise presse pour Al-Jazira http://orientxxi.info/lu-vu-entendu/egypte-mauvaise-presse-pour-al,0356

    Et Portrait de l’Égypte en midinette, l’humoriste Bassem Youssef sur une corde raide

    Sa prestation de vendredi était attendue comme un baromètre de la marge de manœuvre dont peuvent se prévaloir les journalistes à l’ombre grandissante du général Abdel Fattah al-Sissi.

    http://orientxxi.info/magazine/portrait-de-l-egypte-en-midinette,0406

    #médias #presse #journalisme #BassemYoussef #censure #freespeech

  • Algérie : un blogueur incarcéré pour « outrage » et « apologie du terrorisme » (avocat) | AFP | L’Orient-Le Jour
    http://www.lorientlejour.com/article/836855/algerie-un-blogueur-incarcere-pour-outrage-et-apologie-du-terrorisme-

    Abdelghani Aloui, 24 ans, a été inculpé et placé sous mandat de dépôt le 25 septembre.

    Le blogueur est poursuivi pour « atteinte à la personne du président de la République et outrage à corps constitués ». Il est reproché à M. Aloui d’avoir publié sur sa page Facebook des caricatures brocardant M. Bouteflika et son Premier ministre Abdelmalek Sellal, a précisé Me Sidhoum.

    Le blogueur doit être jugé également pour « apologie du terrorisme » car il "était en possession d’une écharpe sur laquelle était inscrite la formule « La ilaha illa Allah » (il n’y a d’autre divinité que Dieu)".
    (...)
    En juin 2012, un blogueur a été condamné à huit mois de prison avec sursis et 1.000 euros d’amende à Alger pour avoir appelé sur le net à boycotter les élections législatives en Algérie.

    #freespeech #Algérie

    • Attention, la mention indique que c’est son avocat qui établit un lien de cause à effet entre la simple possession d’une écharpe avec la formule religieuse fondamentale de l’Islam et l’accusation d’« apologie du terrorisme ».

      De toute façon, la formulation retenue par cette dépêche AFP me semble déjà particulièrement dangereuse (le genre de raccourci qui fait que la moitié des capitales arabes se retrouvent avec des émeutes devant les ambassades de l’Algérie).

  • UN report: The link between State surveillance and freedom of expression | Privacy International
    https://www.privacyinternational.org/blog/un-report-the-link-between-state-surveillance-and-freedom-of-e

    Importantly, the report recognizes the vital role of the private sector, in both the advancement of communications technology as well as facilitators of, or at worst complicit in, State surveillance. Innovations and research by the private sector undoubtedly have contributed greatly to how we communicate. What the report cautions, however, is the nature of the relationship between the state and corporations when it comes to surveillance.

    Since the 1990s, governments have increasingly sought to require communication technologies and digital networks to allow for easy access to communications data, ie backdoors. The private sector not only interfaces with the State to deal with these requests, but how they store and process data, making them huge repositories of personal information available to the state at virtually any time, according to the report.

    But the greatest danger, the report cautions, is the global industry that has developed around the sale of invasive and mass surveillance technologies to governments. The industry, the report highlights, remains virtually unregulated and often operates outside of existing legal standards. Repressive regimes are commonly the buyers of the technology, making it more likely that the products being sold and serviced by private companies will be used to carry out human right abuses. The report calls on governments to “ensure that the private sector is able to carry out its functions independently in a manner that promotes individuals’ human rights”. At the same time, the report states that corporations “cannot be allowed to participate in activities that infringe upon human rights, and States have a responsibility to hold companies accountable in this regard.”

    #freespeech #privacy #statesurveillance #complicity #privatesector #UN

  • John Stewart prend la défense de Bassem Youssef, qui n’a pas fini de faire parler de lui...
    http://www.mediaite.com/tv/stewart-destroys-pres-morsi-for-going-after-egypts-jon-stewart-after-vowin
    ...Alors que le président Morsi nie être à l’origine des poursuites à son encontre
    http://www.dailystar.com.lb/News/Middle-East/2013/Apr-03/212410-mursi-says-fully-respects-press-freedom.ashx#axzz2PO6pmtaW

    Au cas où vous ne connaîtriez pas Bassem Youssef, voici quelques infos sur lui
    http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DEJS6cwJ_yI


    / http://youtu.be/JgLmu2ErRPs
    / http://www.rue89.com/2013/01/24/bassem-youssef-le-clown-de-la-revolution-egyptienne-238956

    Son cas est représentatif du difficile exercice de la liberté d’expression dans une jeune démocratie.
    Bassem Youssef est un symbole, et ça, les médias occidentaux l’ont compris. Pourtant, il ne faut pas oublier que des Egyptiens n’acceptent pas de voir leur président raillé. La grille de lecture est encore une fois à prendre en considération.

    Et pendant ce temps, l’ambassade US au Caire et la présidence égyptienne s’échangent des tweets pas très diplomatiques (que le FJP dénonce http://www.ikhwanweb.com/article.php?id=30797)...
    Dernier update sur le sujet : http://liveblog.egyptindependent.com/content/us-embassy-twitter-account-mysteriously-disappears-after-

    #BassemYoussef #Egypte #bernameg #freespeech

  • For Twitter, free speech matters — not real names — Tech News and Analysis
    http://gigaom.com/2011/10/18/for-twitter-free-speech-is-what-matters-not-real-names

    “The free-speech wing of the free-speech party”

    Being used by dissidents in Tunisia and Egypt and Iran and elsewhere to communicate information, and allowing virtually anyone to commit acts of “citizen journalism” (as Sohaib Athar of Pakistan did when he live-tweeted the raid on Osama bin Laden’s compound) is a pretty vital role to play, and part of the ongoing disruption of media that Om has called the “democratization of distribution.” So it’s refreshing to hear Costolo putting a stake in the ground about freedom of speech. As he put it in his interview, quoting Twitter’s general counsel Alex MacGillivray:

    This isn’t just an idle boast either — Twitter’s commitment to this principle has been put to the test more than once already. In Britain, the company was hauled on the carpet by the British authorities along with Facebook and Research In Motion after the riots in London, because the governing party was considering blocking access to networks such as Twitter and BlackBerry instant messaging. In his Web 2.0 interview, Costolo said that the company resisted this idea, and instead pointed out that many of the Twitter messages about the riot were actually about cleaning up or promoting good behavior rather than inciting violence as many critics of the service seemed to suggest. Said Costolo:

    One of our core values is respect and the need to defend the user’s voice.

    #twitter #freespeech