Wikileaks: Julian Assange's internet access 'cut' • Hacker News Board

Re: Wikileaks: Julian Assange's internet access 'cut'

#391

Post by mejari » Mon, Oct 17, 2016, 4:52 PM UTC

jeffmould wrote: post #382

joshuaheard wrote: post #319

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't think Assange is a partisan. He's Australian after all and has no stake in this election. I think he is releasing info on Hillary because that is what he has and is timing the release for maximum public exposure. If he had similar info on Trump, I firmly believe he would be doing the same thing.

Assange actually has said that he has info on Trump, however, the info is nothing worse than what Trump already says publicly. ( http://www.breitbart.com/tech/2016/08/27/wikileaks-info-dona... )

And yet he won't release it so we can be sure of that, while we just have to know Podesta's risotto recipe.

Re: Wikileaks: Julian Assange's internet access 'cut'

#392

Post by willvarfar » Mon, Oct 17, 2016, 4:53 PM UTC

cloakandswagger wrote: post #365

willvarfar wrote: post #258

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Occam would say that access problems are really very very common and are not the results of state actors. Was it a "state actor" the last time your internet stopped working?

Either the internet is out due to a routine failure, or it was shut down intentionally. The same number of assumptions are made in either case, so Occam's Razor doesn't apply.

The spirit of Occam's Razor is that the simplest explanation is probably the correct one.

Re: Wikileaks: Julian Assange's internet access 'cut'

#393

Post by VMG » Mon, Oct 17, 2016, 4:54 PM UTC

PJDK wrote: post #358

VMG wrote: post #339

Earlier quoted context omitted.

State actors can jam the spectrum and make wireless communication impossible.

Yeah, but not secretly while in the middle of central london

Maybe not, but I haven't seen confirmations one way or another.

I don't know about wireless standards to say whether or not it's possible to selectively disable regions or devices.

Re: Wikileaks: Julian Assange's internet access 'cut'

#394

Post by not_kurt_godel » Mon, Oct 17, 2016, 4:54 PM UTC

grandalf wrote: post #346

DougN7 wrote: post #187

I am getting so damn sick of all of the corruption we're seeing in governments all around the world, including the US/UK. Makes me want to vote for Trump and take the whole crooked system down (unfortunately, that would cause a LOT of pain for good everyday people).

A vote for any third party candidate is a bigger statement, and maximizes your voter power even in a non swing-state.

A vote for third-party doesn't maximize your voter power, it diminishes it: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=s7tWHJfhiyo

Re: Wikileaks: Julian Assange's internet access 'cut'

#395

Post by [deleted] » Mon, Oct 17, 2016, 4:54 PM UTC

[deleted]

Re: Wikileaks: Julian Assange's internet access 'cut'

#396

Post by jacquesm » Mon, Oct 17, 2016, 4:54 PM UTC

mikeash wrote: post #337

malz wrote: post #307

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't know about the embassy but I enjoy the non-ironic claim that "The ambassador has not yet responded to emails."

The whole story was prompted by a non-ironic tweet that their internet was cut off, so it fits.

That tweet could have been in response to a dead-mans switch being activated.

Re: Wikileaks: Julian Assange's internet access 'cut'

#397

Post by mejari » Mon, Oct 17, 2016, 4:55 PM UTC

dlss wrote: post #347

mikeash wrote: post #329

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I have no direct evidence. My bet is based on the simple fact that 1) the claim of access being cut off by a state actor is pretty huge and completely unsubstantiated, and 2) random internet outages are not uncommon.

It looks like you're also assuming: 3) whoever posted to the wikileaks twitter account didn't first consider the more obvious hypotheses. Which seems like a rather large issue with your theory.

Whoever runs the Wikileaks twitter has posted anti-Semitic tweets and wild conspiracy theories. You're also assuming that whoever posts to the Wikileaks twitter account doesn't want people to believe the most sympathetic, conspiratorial possibility.

Re: Wikileaks: Julian Assange's internet access 'cut'

#398

Post by monocasa » Mon, Oct 17, 2016, 4:55 PM UTC

tptacek wrote: post #196

foldr wrote: post #185

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's an absurd request. No country could issue such a document. For one thing, it would establish a precedent that the government could arbitrarily decide to overall any future decisions of the judiciary. For another, it would probably violate Sweden's treaty obligations.

He has in fact more protections against extradition in Sweden than he does in the UK, both because the UK has a friendlier bilateral extradition agreement with the US and because the ECHR would require the consent of both the UK and Sweden at this point for him to be extradited.

Except the fact that Sweden in the past has subverted their judicial process to hand non Swedish citizens over to the CIA.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Repatriation_of_Ahmed_Agiza_an...

Re: Wikileaks: Julian Assange's internet access 'cut'

#399

Post by JumpCrisscross » Mon, Oct 17, 2016, 4:55 PM UTC

joshuaheard wrote: post #319

HillRat wrote: post #260

Earlier quoted context omitted.

On the other hand, "state actor" could certainly refer to Ecuador deciding to turn off Assange's access. WikiLeaks tends to be fairly economical with the truth about its own operations, so being purposefully ambiguous isn't anything new for them. And, while Ecuador hasn't had to deal with meaningful diplomatic repercussions from sheltering Assange, the high-profile role WL is taking in the 2016 elections, and specifi…

I don't think Assange is a partisan. He's Australian after all and has no stake in this election. I think he is releasing info on Hillary because that is what he has and is timing the release for maximum public exposure. If he had similar info on Trump, I firmly believe he would be doing the same thing.

There is Assange's alleged Russian sponsorship [1]. The lack of Wikileaks activity critical of Russia and the attribution of some of its content to Russian intelligence operations [2] supports that.

[1] http://mobile.nytimes.com/2016/09/01/world/europe/wikileaks-...

[2] http://www.salon.com/2016/10/11/russian-propaganda-on-wikile...

Re: Wikileaks: Julian Assange's internet access 'cut'

#400

Post by Tomte » Mon, Oct 17, 2016, 4:56 PM UTC

steamer25 wrote: post #362

staticelf wrote: post #130

From a Swedish perspective the Julian Assange case is particular close to the heart since it really shows how corrupt even our courts and politicians are. Sweden is rated as one of the countries with the lowest corruption but still 6 years have passed without even interviewing him for the pathetic accusations. The entire case is a joke and whatever the US-election result is, it's bad for the entire world since our co…

If https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rape_in_Sweden#Legislation is to be believed, six years imprisonment is the maximum penalty for rape. At this point they could credit the majority of his sentence for time served.

Certainly not. He is not under any kind of arrest, but freely and voluntarily visiting his Ecuadorean friends.

Why should that count towards any prison term?

BTW, I don't think Assange would really face prison in Sweden. My best guess of what would have happened had he been extradited to Sweden:

An interview, being held a few weeks, then released to a country of his choosing.

He is inside the embassy because he likes the martyrdom that his followers clearly recognize. Not because there is any factual reason for it.