WikiLeaks threatens legal action against Google and US after email revelations

WikiLeaks journalist Sarah Harrison addresses the media at the Geneva Press Club on Tuesday. Photograph: Pierre Albouy/Reuters

WikiLeaks is fighting back in an escalating war with both Google and the US government, threatening legal action the day after demanding answers for the tech giants wholesale handover of its staffers Gmail contents to US law enforcement.

The targets of the investigation were not notified until two and a half years after secret search warrants were issued and served by the FBI, legal representatives for WikiLeaks said in a press conference on Monday.

Were looking at legal action not only with Google but to those who actually turned in the order, said Baltasar Garzn, the head of Julian Assanges legal defence team. Calling the order illegal and arbitrary, Garzn said insisted any information that would be used from the taking of documents [this way] will be considered as biased, illegal and will cancel the whole proceedings.

Im not sure what craziness what desperation went into the US to make them behave this way, but this is a clear violation of rights, Garzn said.

Our policy is to tell people about government requests for their data, except in limited cases, like when we are gagged by a court order, which sadly happens quite frequently, a Google spokesperson said in a statement to the Guardian. Weve challenged many orders related to WikiLeaks which has led to disclosures to people who are affected. Weve also pushed to unseal all the documents related to the investigation.

Michael Ratner, a member of the Assange legal team in the US and president emeritus of the Center for Constitutional Rights, said that WikiLeaks had sent a letter to Googles executive chairman, Eric Schmidt, asking why the company waited so long before notifying the targets of the warrants.

On Monday, Ratner went further, saying that WikiLeaks would decide on what legal action to take depending on Googles response to the letter, which he said was expected within a week.

The notification of the court order was sent by email from Google to WikiLeaks on 23 December 2014 just before Christmas, a typically quiet time for the news cycle and was published on WikiLeaks site. Google said the legal process was initially subject to a nondisclosure or gag order that prohibited Google from disclosing the existence of the legal process.

Ratner told the Guardian that there were several questions as to what that legal process entailed. Did Google go to court at all? Ratner said. Would they have notified us that that we went to court and we lost? I dont know.

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WikiLeaks threatens legal action against Google and US after email revelations