This is technically accurate since I found out myself this week when browsing the AKP email leak. Some of the attachments in the emails were clearly malware of some sort. See for example: https://wikileaks.org/akp-emails/emailid/27482
Google tags Wikileaks as a dangerous site
11–20 of 167 posts
Re: Google tags Wikileaks as a dangerous site
#12I'm not sure that this is completely tin-foil hat worthy. I was working at a defense contractor in 2010 when the big leak of all the cables occurred, and was forced to learn a lot of things I wouldn't have otherwise, including something that maybe a lot of people don't fully grasp: When stuff like this leaks, if any of the information is considered sensitive/classified/restricted in any manner, the act of it being le…
> When stuff like this leaks, if any of the information is considered sensitive/classified/restricted in any manner, the act of it being leaked does not dissolve its restricted status. In other words, if you are a regular US citizen and you go to Wikileaks and look at something that is classified without having the proper security clearance, then you're now on the wrong side of the law. I'm pretty sure this is wrong:…
Correct. The press can report on whatever it wants and regular citizens can read it (I vaguely remember there being something like a clear and present danger exception for the former). Otherwise, it would be illegal for any news organization to write about drone strikes.
Re: Google tags Wikileaks as a dangerous site
#13Earlier quoted context omitted.
> When stuff like this leaks, if any of the information is considered sensitive/classified/restricted in any manner, the act of it being leaked does not dissolve its restricted status. In other words, if you are a regular US citizen and you go to Wikileaks and look at something that is classified without having the proper security clearance, then you're now on the wrong side of the law. I'm pretty sure this is wrong:…
There's a good chance this is true: I'm going off what I was told, which being that I was at a government contractor was probably largely FUD because they didn't want me doing anything that would jeopardize their business (I may not have ended up in jail but I would have cost them a lot of money and probably would have been fired). Somebody much more knowledgeable than me can chime in on this.
Yeah, and if it was a defense contractor, its quite likely that a substantial number of people (maybe everyone) in the firm may have actually been subject to the kind of rules you describe, even when most citizens are not.
Re: Google tags Wikileaks as a dangerous site
#14I'm not sure that this is completely tin-foil hat worthy. I was working at a defense contractor in 2010 when the big leak of all the cables occurred, and was forced to learn a lot of things I wouldn't have otherwise, including something that maybe a lot of people don't fully grasp: When stuff like this leaks, if any of the information is considered sensitive/classified/restricted in any manner, the act of it being le…
This has nothing to do with morality or ethics. This is an automated system that detected malware on the wikileaks site. There's no reason to think a human was even involved in the decision to apply this label.
The site may have been hacked (and just because it looks OK when you visit doesn't mean it hasn't been hacked). It could even be a state-sponsored attacker trying to exploit a zero day to monitor wikileaks visitors. Or, as someone points out below, it could be run-of-the-mill malware contained in attachments of some of the recently released email dumps.
Re: Google tags Wikileaks as a dangerous site
#15I'm not sure that this is completely tin-foil hat worthy. I was working at a defense contractor in 2010 when the big leak of all the cables occurred, and was forced to learn a lot of things I wouldn't have otherwise, including something that maybe a lot of people don't fully grasp: When stuff like this leaks, if any of the information is considered sensitive/classified/restricted in any manner, the act of it being le…
Only if you have a clearance.
If you're not cleared you've made no such agreement with USG and you can freely look at leaked classified material as an American citizen.
Re: Google tags Wikileaks as a dangerous site
#16I'm not sure that this is completely tin-foil hat worthy. I was working at a defense contractor in 2010 when the big leak of all the cables occurred, and was forced to learn a lot of things I wouldn't have otherwise, including something that maybe a lot of people don't fully grasp: When stuff like this leaks, if any of the information is considered sensitive/classified/restricted in any manner, the act of it being le…
This has nothing to do with morality or ethics. This is an automated system that detected malware on the wikileaks site. There's no reason to think a human was even involved in the decision to apply this label. The site may have been hacked (and just because it looks OK when you visit doesn't mean it hasn't been hacked). It could even be a state-sponsored attacker trying to exploit a zero day to monitor wikileaks vis…
This is probably an even better counterpoint.
Re: Google tags Wikileaks as a dangerous site
#17Earlier quoted context omitted.
> When stuff like this leaks, if any of the information is considered sensitive/classified/restricted in any manner, the act of it being leaked does not dissolve its restricted status. In other words, if you are a regular US citizen and you go to Wikileaks and look at something that is classified without having the proper security clearance, then you're now on the wrong side of the law. I'm pretty sure this is wrong:…
There's a good chance this is true: I'm going off what I was told, which being that I was at a government contractor was probably largely FUD because they didn't want me doing anything that would jeopardize their business (I may not have ended up in jail but I would have cost them a lot of money and probably would have been fired). Somebody much more knowledgeable than me can chime in on this.
Classification is provided by the government, internal to the government ergo a citizen that is neither government nor contractually associated with said government can read anything they like.
Re: Google tags Wikileaks as a dangerous site
#18it could be political, but it's probably because they're hosting all of the attachments from all of the e-mails that were leaked - including spam
(Tedious disclaimer: my opinion only, not speaking for anybody else. I'm an SRE at Google.)
What you want to be thinking is: all of the attachments including malware. Safebrowsing is an anti-malware system. Large collections of unfiltered email invariably contain malware.
(I can't say much more than that, sorry)
Re: Google tags Wikileaks as a dangerous site
#19I'm not sure that this is completely tin-foil hat worthy. I was working at a defense contractor in 2010 when the big leak of all the cables occurred, and was forced to learn a lot of things I wouldn't have otherwise, including something that maybe a lot of people don't fully grasp: When stuff like this leaks, if any of the information is considered sensitive/classified/restricted in any manner, the act of it being le…
This has nothing to do with morality or ethics. This is an automated system that detected malware on the wikileaks site. There's no reason to think a human was even involved in the decision to apply this label. The site may have been hacked (and just because it looks OK when you visit doesn't mean it hasn't been hacked). It could even be a state-sponsored attacker trying to exploit a zero day to monitor wikileaks vis…
This has nothing to do with morality or ethics.
Regardless of the means, any entity which performs some form of censorship --- especially if that entity is through which a nontrivial amount of the population gets their knowledge and can be influenced by, like Google --- automatically makes itself the subject of moral and ethical scrutiny.
There's no reason to think a human was even involved in the decision to apply this label.
The decision was made long ago when Google started to classify sites as "unsafe" or "safe", and that was definitely a human decision. IMHO Google should still be held accountable for whatever effects their automated systems have.
This reminds me of how cracks, keygens, and other... anti-authoritarian (for lack of a better term) tools will often be detected by antivirus as "unwanted" and/or "suspicious", despite not actually doing anything the user didn't want. It might just be heuristics that happen to cast such a wide net, but it also means the authors made that decision, that moral and ethical choice.
Re: Google tags Wikileaks as a dangerous site
#20Shows me "not dangerous" at UTC 00:43 22.07.2016.