The Ethical dilemmas of WikiLeaks
Wikileaks is an international company that publishes unidentified submissions and leaks the information in the document while still hiding its source. A self-described nonprofit making organization was initially launched in Australia, in the year 2006 under the sunshine press. The organization has released a considerable number of documents, which have become indispensable news items. The first document to be released was the equipment expenditure and holdings of the war in Afghanistan and the Kenyan corruption. In April 2010, they published footage on the Baghdad airstrike that left many Iraqi reporters killed by an Apache helicopter. In July, the same year, they released a journal on the Afghan war. In October, they released thousands of documents known as the Iraq war logs that worked together with commercial media firms. This is what allowed all deaths at that time in Iraq and Iran to be mapped (Roberta, 2003).
In the month of November, the same year, Wikileaks joined hands with significant global media firms to release the American diplomatic department cables. This was nicknamed the cable gate referencing implying that it was a dramatic presidential indignity. In September 2011, the corrupted version of wiki leaks ‘gigantic archives of the American department cables were known to be public. The cables had been available for a long time, and Wikileaks blamed its former partner for the same. On the other hand, the partner blamed Wikileaks. The cables released expressed fears allover as they could endanger lives of innocent people. This so far has not been proved (Berg, 2011).
Currently, Wikileaks is hosted by Bahnhof in a place that was a nuclear foxhole. Many servers are located in different parts of the world including Sweden, which is the central location of the servers. Julian Assange who is the chief editor of the Wikileaks said that the main server was specifically located in Sweden because of the legal protection offered in that country for the disclosures. He says that the Swedish constitution fully provides security to any information provider. This makes it hard for the authorities to take Wikileaks offline. After sometime, Wikileaks sites in Sweden became the target of denial attack from hackers. This is because of introduction of a Swedish pirate party that managed all Wikileaks servers. Therefore, this made Wikileaks move its sites to servers in the Amazons. However, later and conditions given by the amazons. Wikileaks decided to install itself on the servers in France after the website was removed from the Amazon servers. This is because Wikileaks was not adhering to the terms of criticism by the French government. Therefore, the organization sought legality from the court in Lille to host Wikileaks. It is the base on some software packages, which strongly encourages posting through Tor because of its privacy (Willa, 2001).
Wikileaks has made it clear that, it does not release documents before it assesses them. It has said that the misguiding leaks are currently in the mainstream media and that it has no assistance to the media. According to Assange, released documents are assessed by at least five members of Wikileaks who are experts in different fields. These same experts investigate the leakers of any misleading information and assesses whether his or her identity is recognizable. Assange has the last decision about the document to be released. The Wikileaks occurrence is complicated. However, we minimize its ethical assessment to two questions, which are, is whistle blowing ethical even when motivated to harm its target? Secondly, is Wikileaks facilitation ethical, even if it endangers the lives of innocent persons? A deontologist said that telling the truth should be an absolute must and that it is the right thing to do. This will appreciate whistle blowing despite the intentions behind it.
On the other hand, a consequentialist will support Wikileaks in order to maximize the welfare of a large number of persons. This is more so if the risks involved are reduced by eliminating the dangerous information. Both the Wikileaks and the whistle blower may be advantageous willed and have the best intentions but are not restricted to a set of code of conduct or requirements of the law. In this case, Wikileaks blackmails the world by disclosing dangerous information via its insurance files, should something happen to Wikileaks spokesperson Assange or to Wikileaks. The new Wikileaks states that releasing information to the public increases transparency, which creates a conducive society for people. This information also makes possible for people to create a world that they would love to bring about. This is why personal information about religion and sexual details should be protected (Beckette, 2011).
The legality of Wikileaks is intricate; this is because the spokesperson, Assange considers it a whistle blower protector. Instead of leaking it to the press directly, causing fear and vengeance, whistle blower leaks to Wikileaks, which again leaks the same to the press on their behalf. A criminal probe on the Wikileaks and its founder Julian Assange was opened by the American justice unit. The Attorney General of the American government confirmed that the probe was not a rattling game but an active criminal investigation. The justice department in the Washington post said that the charges should be under the Espionage Act. Some supreme law courts in the United States of America have established that the American constitution protects any information that is acquired illegally so long as the provider did not go against any rule while acquiring it. The prosecutors also considered prosecuting Julian for trafficking government property like the diplomatic cables. Any arrest of Assange required him to be extradited in America, and each of these steps made it more complicated and it delayed proceeding to Sweden. Assange’s lawyers said that they were preventing extradition to Sweden since it would lead to extradition in America (Leigh, 2011).
The prime minister of Australia Julia Gillard said that the establishment of Wikileaks and the stealing of significant documents from the American government were illegal in foreign nations. She later clarified her words by confirming the original stealing of documents by a junior American person rather than by Mr. Assange. With the various threats by the government towards Assange, legal experts say that Wikileaks founder Julian Assange is the targeted person of a worldwide campaign to demonize him as a terrorist or as a criminal, without any lawful basis (Beckett, 2011).
Since Wikileaks was aware of the cost that could result from publishing all types of the secret information and the leaks, it was remarkably fast to appoint a large set of lawyers to protect it together with any other person who leaked the documents and provided the information. The media have speculated that the leaks can be found within the computer network that connects the American department with the pentagon. This is called the Secret Internet Protocol Router Network and it can be accessed by millions of the US government employees. The man who was believed to be behind the American leaks was arrested in May, 2010 after footage was leaked of An American chopper firing and assassinating Iraqi citizens. On the other hand, a warrant for arrest was issued of Julian Assange on 30 November, 2010. He was arrested in the united kingdom, however, this because of the leaked documents but because of the arrest warrant issued by a court in Stockholm on charges of sexual assault against two ladies in Sweden. Julian Assange, thanks to Wikileaks had actually been named among to contest the 2010- man of the year. On the other hand, Wikileaks has been named as the website that could amend headlines of news globally (Roberta, 2003).
Despite the numerous warnings from the US government to stop releasing any diplomatic cables to the public, Wikileaks declines and continues to do so. The American government resulted in taking action to contain the situation of the consequences of these leaks. Therefore, it involved its allies, who included the Great Britain, Australia, turkey and Israel. Together, they affirmed on the importance of containing these leaks. Washington also tried to improve its image internationally by conducting a public relations campaign. The US government also started to look at the possibility of pressing legal charges against Julian Assange. This was not as easy as it required concrete evidence that the release of this information was a threat to the American state security. Wikileaks released investigated information on the violations against the citizens of Iraq between the years 2003 and 2009. The report also indicated that thousands of Iraqi soldiers were also killed with the number not well recorded. The report also showed the Iranian provision of firearms to Iraq’s Shiite Militias (Willa, 2001).
With all the controversies raised by the Wikileaks website, one would think that it failed to disclose any divisive information but this would be a mistake. Ever since its inception, Wikileaks has been able to reveal many secrets. For example, the secret of the information posted about the members of British National Party, which included their names, jobs and addresses. The members involved the army personnel, the police officials, lawyers, accountants, doctors among others. Wikileaks is not just about leaking secret information concerning the government to the public, but also the dialectical materialization of distinguished appearance of globalization. This converts all matters of state security on their heads.
For the first time in the history of the world’s existence, Wikileaks has made governments all over the world play their games with most of their deals exposed to the public. No one in particular knows whether this will bring harmony to the world or more wars. The terrible thing is that all personal information of people across the globe that is our bank information, activities and personal relations is now open to exposure, blackmail and infiltration. This is a fact that is mostly left out whenever issues about Wikileaks are brought up. The argument is mostly restricted to the issues between the freedom of expression and the personal freedom of individuals. However, the failure to dig deeper into this issue means that other issues relating to privacy rights are ignored. We would all be in danger if our personal or private lives were treated as common property (Leigh, 2011).
References
Beckett, C. & James, B. (2011) Wikileaks. Oxford: Polity, 2011. Print.
Berg, D. & Tina, K. (2011). My Time With Julian Assange At The World’s Most Dangerous
Website. Crown Publishers
Bruce, & Willa, M. (2001). Classics of Administrative Ethics. Boulder: Westview, Print
Johnson, Roberta Ann. (2003). Whistleblowing: When It Works--and Why. Boulder: L. Rienner,
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Leigh, D. & Luke H. (2011). Wikileaks: inside Julian Assange's War on Secrecy. New York:
Public Affairs
