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CRYPTOGRAPHY | meaning in the Cambridge English Dictionary

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These examples are from the Cambridge English Corpus and from sources on the web. Any opinions in the examples do not represent the opinion of the Cambridge Dictionary editors or of Cambridge University Press or its licensors.

The most obvious and common application of cryptography is for securing communications, thus ensuring confidentiality and privacy.

The implementation of a publickey cryptography package needs to ensure that the random number object used in the generation of key pairs cannot be accessed by clients of the package.

Components for these systems are now commercially available, and it seems very likely that quantum cryptography will be an important technology long before quantum computers of useful size are constructed.

The sections on quantum cryptography, quantum proper ties of squeezed light, and experimental effor ts to measure gravitational waves provide adequate introduction to these exciting applications of quantum optics.

In contrast to symmetric cryptosystems, public key cryptography is a form of cryptography which generally allows users to communicate securely without having prior access to a shared secret key.

Recall that, in case of asymmetric cryptography, the decryption key for a ciphertext is the inverse of the key that was used to create the ciphertext.

I turn now to the specific field covered by this debate in the field of cryptography.

There will be no mandatory link between key escrow and being an approved provider of cryptography services under the proposed e-commerce legislation.

A register of approved providers of cryptography support services will be established.

If we abandoned those words, the problem is that we would end up with a completely circular definition of cryptography support services.

Cryptography, that is, the electronic coding of data, has advantages in terms of confidentiality, but it also offers a refuge for organized crime.

A key tool to secure the confidentiality of electronic communications is encryption or cryptography.

In other words cryptography can be used as an electronic signature.

Cryptography is a crucial point in the debate on protecting citizens and businesses.

I am not sure that the section on approved cryptography providers could not have been dropped altogether.

See all examples of cryptography

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CRYPTOGRAPHY | meaning in the Cambridge English Dictionary

Email encryption – Wikipedia

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Email encryption is encryption of email messages to protect the content from being read by entities other than the intended recipients. Email encryption may also include authentication.

Email is prone to disclosure of information. Most emails are currently transmitted in the clear (not encrypted) form. By means of some available tools, persons other than the designated recipients can read the email contents.[1]

Email encryption can rely on public-key cryptography, in which users can each publish a public key that others can use to encrypt messages to them, while keeping secret a private key they can use to decrypt such messages or to digitally encrypt and sign messages they send.

With the original design of email protocol, the communication between email servers was plain text, which posed a huge security risk. Over the years, various mechanisms have been proposed to encrypt the communication between email servers. Encryption may occur at the transport level (aka "hop by hop") or end-to-end. Transport layer encryption is often easier to set up and use; end-to-end encryption provides stronger defenses, but can be more difficult to set up and use.

One of the most commonly used email encryption extensions is STARTTLS . It is a TLS (SSL) layer over the plaintext communication, allowing email servers to upgrade their plaintext communication to encrypted communication. Assuming that the email servers on both the sender and the recipient side support encrypted communication, an eavesdropper snooping on the communication between the mail servers cannot use a sniffer to see the email contents. Similar STARTTLS extensions exist for the communication between an email client and the email server (see IMAP4 and POP3, as stated by RFC 2595). STARTTLS may be used regardless of whether the email's contents are encrypted using another protocol.

The encrypted message is revealed to, and can be altered by, intermediate email relays. In other words, the encryption takes place between individual SMTP relays, not between the sender and the recipient. This has both good and bad consequences. A key positive trait of transport layer encryption is that users do not need to do or change anything; the encryption automatically occurs when they send email. In addition, since receiving organizations can decrypt the email without cooperation of the end user, receiving organizations can run virus scanners and spam filters before delivering the email to the recipient. However, it also means that the receiving organization and anyone who breaks into that organization's email system (unless further steps are taken) can easily read or modify the email. If the receiving organization is considered a threat, then end-to-end encryption is necessary.

The Electronic Frontier Foundation encourages the use of STARTTLS, and has launched the 'STARTTLS Everywhere' initiative to "make it simple and easy for everyone to help ensure their communications (over email) arent vulnerable to mass surveillance."[2] Support for STARTTLS has become quite common; Google reports that on GMail 90% of incoming email and 90% of outgoing email was encrypted using STARTTLS by 2018-07-24.[3]

Mandatory certificate verification is historically not viable for Internet mail delivery without additional information, because many certificates are not verifiable and few want email delivery to fail in that case.[4] As a result, most email that is delivered over TLS uses only opportunistic encryption. DANE is a proposed standard that makes an incremental transition to verified encryption for Internet mail delivery possible.[5] The STARTTLS Everywhere project uses an alternative approach: they support a preload list of email servers that have promised to support STARTTLS, which can help detect and prevent downgrade attacks.

In end-to-end encryption, the data is encrypted and decrypted only at the end points. In other words, an email sent with end-to-end encryption would be encrypted at the source, unreadable to service providers like Gmail in transit, and then decrypted at its endpoint. Crucially, the email would only be decrypted for the end user on their computer and would remain in encrypted, unreadable form to an email service like Gmail, which wouldn't have the keys available to decrypt it.[6] Some email services integrate end-to-end encryption automatically.

Notable protocols for end-to-end email encryption include:

OpenPGP is a data encryption standard that allows end-users to encrypt the email contents. There are various software and email-client plugins that allow users to encrypt the message using the recipient's public key before sending it. At its core, OpenPGP uses a Public Key Cryptography scheme where each email address is associated with a public/private key pair.

OpenPGP provides a way for the end users to encrypt the email without any support from the server and be sure that only the intended recipient can read it. However, there are usability issues with OpenPGP it requires users to set up public/private key pairs and make the public keys available widely. Also, it protects only the content of the email, and not metadata an untrusted party can still observe who sent an email to whom. A general downside of end to end encryption schemeswhere the server does not have decryption keysis that it makes server side search almost impossible, thus impacting usability.

The Signed and Encrypted Email Over The Internet demonstration has shown that organizations can collaborate effectively using secure email. Previous barriers to adoption were overcome, including the use of a PKI bridge to provide a scalable public key infrastructure (PKI) and the use of network security guards checking encrypted content passing in and out of corporate network boundaries to avoid encryption being used to hide malware introduction and information leakage.

Transport layer encryption using STARTTLS must be set up by the receiving organization. This is typically straightforward; a valid certificate must be obtained and STARTTLS must be enabled on the receiving organization's email server. To prevent downgrade attacks organizations can send their domain to the 'STARTTLS Policy List'[7]

Most full-featured email clients provide native support for S/MIME secure email (digital signing and message encryption using certificates). Other encryption options include PGP and GNU Privacy Guard (GnuPG). Free and commercial software (desktop application, webmail and add-ons) are available as well.[8]

While PGP can protect messages, it can also be hard to use in the correct way. Researchers at Carnegie Mellon University published a paper in 1999 showing that most people couldn't figure out how to sign and encrypt messages using the current version of PGP.[9] Eight years later, another group of Carnegie Mellon researchers published a follow-up paper saying that, although a newer version of PGP made it easy to decrypt messages, most people still struggled with encrypting and signing messages, finding and verifying other people's public encryption keys, and sharing their own keys.[10]

Because encryption can be difficult for users, security and compliance managers at companies and government agencies automate the process for employees and executives by using encryption appliances and services that automate encryption. Instead of relying on voluntary co-operation, automated encryption, based on defined policies, takes the decision and the process out of the users' hands. Emails are routed through a gateway appliance that has been configured to ensure compliance with regulatory and security policies. Emails that require it are automatically encrypted and sent.[11]

If the recipient works at an organization that uses the same encryption gateway appliance, emails are automatically decrypted, making the process transparent to the user. Recipients who are not behind an encryption gateway then need to take an extra step, either procuring the public key, or logging into an online portal to retrieve the message.[11][12]

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Email encryption - Wikipedia

Demonizing Edward Snowden: Which Side Are You On? | The …

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As I write this, a bunch of reporters are flying from Moscow to Havana on an Aeroflot Airbus 330, but Edward Snowden isnt sitting among them. His whereabouts are unknown. He might still be in the V.I.P. lounge at Sheremetyevo International Airport. He could have left on another plane. There are even suggestions that he has taken shelter in the Ecuadorian Embassy in Moscow.

What we do know is that, on this side of the Atlantic, efforts are being stepped up to demonize Snowden, and to delegitimize his claim to be a conscientious objector to the huge electronic-spying apparatus operated by the United States and the United Kingdom. This is an individual who is not acting, in my opinion, with noble intent, General Keith Alexander, the head of the National Security Agency, told ABCs This Week on Sunday. What Snowden has revealed has caused irreversible and significant damage to our country and to our allies. Over on CBSs Face the Nation, Senator Dianne Feinstein, head of the Senate Intelligence Committee, said, I dont think this man is a whistle-blower he could have stayed and faced the music. I dont think running is a noble thought.

An unnamed senior Administration official joined the Snowden-bashing chorus, telling reporters, Mr. Snowdens claim that he is focussed on supporting transparency, freedom of the press, and protection of individual rights and democracy is belied by the protectors he has potentially chosen: China, Russia, Cuba, Venezuela, and Ecuador. His failure to criticize these regimes suggests that his true motive throughout has been to injure the national security of the U.S., not to advance Internet freedom and free speech.

It is easy to understand, though not to approve of, why Administration officials, who have been embarrassed by Snowdens revelations, would seek to question his motives and exaggerate the damage he has done to national security. Feinstein, too, has been placed in a tricky spot. Tasked with overseeing the spooks and their spying operations, she appears to have done little more than nod.

More unnerving is the way in which various members of the media have failed to challenge the official line. Nobody should be surprised to see the New York Post running the headline: ROGUES GALLERY: SNOWDEN JOINS LONG LIST OF NOTORIOUS, GUTLESS TRAITORS FLEEING TO RUSSIA. But where are Snowdens defenders? As of Monday, the editorial pages of the Times and the Washington Post, the two most influential papers in the country, hadnt even addressed the Obama Administrations decision to charge Snowden with two counts of violating the Espionage Act and one count of theft.

If convicted on all three counts, the former N.S.A. contract-systems administrator could face thirty years in jail. On the Sunday-morning talk shows I watched, there werent many voices saying that would be an excessive punishment for someone who has performed an invaluable public service. And the person who did aggressively defend Snowdens actions, Glenn Greenwald, the Guardian blogger who was one of the reporters to break the story, found himself under attack. After suggesting that Greenwald had aided and abetted Snowden, David Gregory, the host of NBCs Meet the Press, asked, Why shouldnt you, Mr. Greenwald, be charged with a crime?

After being criticized on Twitter, Gregory said that he wasnt taking a position on Snowdens actionshe was merely asking a question. Im all for journalists asking awkward questions, too. But why arent more of them being directed at Hayden and Feinstein and Obama, who are clearly intent on attacking the messenger?

To get a different perspective on Snowden and his disclosures, heres a portion of an interview that ABCthe Australian Broadcasting Company, not the Disney subsidiarydid today with Thomas Drake, another former N.S.A. employee, who, in 2010, was charged with espionage for revealing details about an electronic-eavesdropping project called Trailblazer, a precursor to Operation Prism, one of the programs that Snowden documented. (The felony cases against Drake, as my colleague Jane Mayer has written, eventually collapsed, and he pleaded guilty to a misdemeanor.)

INTERVIEWER: Not everybody thinks Edward Snowden did the right thing. I presume you do

DRAKE: I consider Edward Snowden as a whistle-blower. I know some have called him a hero, some have called him a traitor. I focus on what he disclosed. I dont focus on him as a person. He had a belief that what he was exposed toU.S. actions in secretwere violating human rights and privacy on a very, very large scale, far beyond anything that had been admitted to date by the government. In the public interest, he made that available.

INTERVIEWER: What do you say to the argument, advanced by those with the opposite viewpoint to you, especially in the U.S. Congress and the White House, that Edward Snowden is a traitor who made a narcissistic decision that he personally had a right to decide what public information should be in the public domain?

DRAKE: Thats a government meme, a government coverthats a government story. The government is desperate to not deal with the actual exposures, the content of the disclosures. Because they do reveal a vast, systemic, institutionalized, industrial-scale Leviathan surveillance state that has clearly gone far beyond the original mandate to deal with terrorismfar beyond.

As far as Im concerned, that about covers it. I wish Snowden had followed Drakes example and remained on U.S. soil to fight the charges against him. But I cant condemn him for seeking refuge in a country that doesnt have an extradition treaty with the United States. If hed stayed here, he would almost certainly be in custody, with every prospect of staying in a cell until 2043 or later. The Obama Administration doesnt want him to come home and contribute to the national-security-versus-liberty debate that the President says is necessary. It wants to lock him up for a long time.

And for what? For telling would-be jihadis that we are monitoring their Gmail and Facebook accounts? For informing the Chinese that we eavesdrop on many of their important institutions, including their prestigious research universities? For confirming that the Brits eavesdrop on virtually anybody they feel like? Come on. Are there many people out there who didnt already know these things?

Snowden took classified documents from his employer, which surely broke the law. But his real crime was confirming that the intelligence agencies, despite their strenuous public denials, have been accumulating vast amounts of personal data from the American public. The puzzle is why so many media commentators continue to toe the official line. About the best explanation Ive seen came from Josh Marshall, the founder of T.P.M., who has been one of Snowdens critics. In a post that followed the first wave of stories, Marshall wrote, At the end of the day, for all its faults, the U.S. military is the armed force of a political community I identify with and a government I support. Im not a bystander to it. Im implicated in what it does and I feel I have a responsibility and a right to a say, albeit just a minuscule one, in what it does.

I suspect that many Washington journalists, especially the types who go on Sunday talk shows, feel the way Marshall does, but perhaps dont have his level of self-awareness. Its not just a matter of defending the Obama Administration, although theres probably a bit of that. Its something deeper, which has to do with attitudes toward authority. Proud of their craft and good at what they do, successful journalists like to think of themselves as fiercely independent. But, at the same time, they are part of the media and political establishment that stands accused of ignoring, or failing to pick up on, an intelligence outrage thats been going on for years. Its not surprising that some of them share Marshalls view of Snowden as some young guy Ive never heard of before who espouses a political philosophy I dont agree with and is now seeking refuge abroad for breaking the law.

Mea culpa. Having spent almost eighteen years at The New Yorker, Im arguably just as much a part of the media establishment as David Gregory and his guests. In this case, though, Im with Snowdennot only for the reasons that Drake enumerated but also because of an old-fashioned and maybe nave inkling that journalists are meant to stick up for the underdog and irritate the powerful. On its side, the Obama Administration has the courts, the intelligence services, Congress, the diplomatic service, much of the media, and most of the American public. Snowdens got Greenwald, a woman from Wikileaks, and a dodgy travel document from Ecuador. Which side are you on?

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Demonizing Edward Snowden: Which Side Are You On? | The ...

What is the open source way? | Opensource.com

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The open source wayis about applying the principles of open source software development beyond software. Beyond technology. Opensource.com is about sharing how the open source way can change our world in the same way the open source model has changed software.

We can learn more from each other when information is open. A free exchange of ideas is critical to creating an environment where people are allowed to learn and use existing information toward creating new ideas.

When we are free to collaborate, we create. We can solve problems that no one person may be able to solve on their own.

Rapid prototypes can lead to rapid failures, but that leads to better solutions found faster. When you're free to experiment, you can look at problems in new ways and look for answers in new places. You can learn by doing.

In a meritocracy, the best ideas win. In a meritocracy, everyone has access to the same information. Successful work determines which projects rise and gather effort from the community.

Communities are formed around a common purpose. They bring together diverse ideas and share work. Together, a global community can create beyond the capabilities of any one individual. It multiplies effort and shares the work. Together, we can do more.

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What is the open source way? | Opensource.com

AMD Secure Encrypted Virtualization (SEV) – AMD

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Hardware accelerated memory encryption for data-in-use protection. Takes advantage of new security components available in AMD EPYC processors

AMD Secure Memory Encryption (SME)

Uses a single key to encrypt system memory. The key is generated by the AMD Secure Processor at boot. SME requires enablement in the system BIOS or operating system. When enabled in the BIOS, memory encryption is transparent and can be run with any operating system.

AMD Secure Encrypted Virtualization (SEV)

Uses one key per virtual machine to isolate guests and the hypervisor from one another. The keys are managed by the AMD Secure Processor. SEV requires enablement in the guest operating system and hypervisor. The guest changes allow the VM to indicate which pages in memory should be encrypted. The hypervisor changes use hardware virtualization instructions and communication with the AMD Secure processor to manage the appropriate keys in the memory controller.

AMD Secure Encrypted Virtualization-Encrypted State (SEV-ES)

Encrypts all CPU register contents when a VM stops running. This prevents the leakage of information in CPU registers to components like the hypervisor, and can even detect malicious modifications to a CPU register state.

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AMD Secure Encrypted Virtualization (SEV) - AMD

WikiLeaks – Spy Files Russia

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English |

Today, September 19th 2017, WikiLeaks starts publishing the series "Spy Files Russia" with documents from the Russian company - (PETER-SERVICE). This release includes 209 documents (34 base documents in different versions) dated between 2007 and 2015.

PETER-SERVICE was founded 1992 in St. Petersburg as a provider for billing solutions and soon became the major supplier of software for the mobile telecommunications industry in Russia. Today it has more than 1000 employees in different locations in Russia, and offices in major cities in Russia and Ukraine. The technologies developed and deployed by PETER-SERVICE today go far beyond the classical billing process and extend into the realms of surveillance and control. Although compliance to the strict surveillance laws is mandatory in Russia, rather than being forced to comply PETER-SERVICE appears to be quite actively pursuing partnership and commercial opportunities with the state intelligence apparatus.

As a matter of fact PETER-SERVICE is uniquely placed as a surveillance partner due to the remarkable visibility their products provide into the data of Russian subscribers of mobile operators, which expose to PETER-SERVICE valuable metadata, including phone and message records, device identifiers (IMEI, MAC addresses), network identifiers (IP addresses), cell tower information and much more. This enriched and aggregated metadata is of course of interest to Russian authorities, whose access became a core component of the system architecture.

The base architecture of the software from PETER-SERVICE (SVC_BASE) includes components for data retention (DRS [en], [ru]), long-term storage in SORM (SSP, Service -), IP traffic analysis (Traffic Data Mart, TDM) and interfaces (adapters) for state agencies to access the archives.

The Traffic Data Mart is a system that records and monitors IP traffic for all mobile devices registered with the operator. It maintains a list of categorized domain names which cover all areas of interest for the state. These categories include blacklisted sites, criminal sites, blogs, webmail, weapons, botnet, narcotics, betting, aggression, racism, terrorism and many more. Based on the collected information the system allows the creation of reports for subscriber devices (identified by IMEI/TAC, brand, model) for a specified time range: Top categories by volume, top sites by volume, top sites by time spent, protocol usage (browsing, mail, telephony, bittorrent) and traffic/time distribution.

The data retention system is a mandatory component for operators by law; it stores all communication (meta-)data locally for three years. State intelligence authorities use the Protocol 538 adapter built into the DRS to access stored information. According to PETER-SERVICE, their DRS solution can handle 500,000,000 connections per day in one cluster. The claimed average search time for subscriber related-records from a single day is ten seconds.

In SORM call monitoring functions are concentrated in control points ( , ) which are connected to network operators. The Service - is a data exchange interface based on HTTPS between components in SVC_BASE/DRS and SORM. The interface receives search requests from state intelligence authorities and delivers results back to the initiator. Search requests for lawful interceptions (based on a court order) are processed by the operator on the same system.

As a related document, this first release contains a publically available slide show presentation given by (Valery Syssik, Director of Development) from PETER-SERVICE at the Broadband Russia Forum in 2013. Titled "National stacks of DPI / BigData / DataMining technologies and solutions for collection and analysis of information, as well as means of predicting social and business trends - the key to digital and financial sovereignty of the state and business in the XXI century", the presentation - which appears to already be publicly available on PETER-SERVICE's website - is not targeted at the usual telecom provider, but at a closed group of people from the (FSB, Russian Federal Security Service), (Interior ministry of Russia) and the ("three pillars of Power" - legislature, executive and judiciary).

The presentation was written just a few months after Edward Snowden disclosed the NSA mass surveillance program and its cooperation with private U.S. IT-corporations such as Google and Facebook. Drawing specifically on the NSA Prism program, the presentation offers law enforcement, intelligence and other interested parties, to join an alliance in order to establish equivalent data-mining operations in Russia. PETER-SERVICE claims to already have access to a majority of all phone call records as well as Internet traffic in Russia, and in the description of the current experiences, it claims to have deployed technology for Deep Packet Inspection "with not just the headings of IP packets, but the contents of whole series". PETER-SERVICE is presented as a natural ally for intelligence agencies in "the most lucrative business [of] manipulating minds".

However, the core of the presentation is about a new product (2013) called DPI*GRID - a hardware solution for "Deep Packet Inspection" that comes literally as "black boxes" that are able to handle 10Gb/s traffic per unit. The national providers are aggregating Internet traffic in their infrastructure and are redirecting/duplicating the full stream to DPI*GRID units. The units inspect and analyse traffic (the presentation does not describe that process in much detail); the resulting metadata and extracted information are collected in a database for further investigation. A similar, yet smaller solution called MDH/DRS is available for regional providers who send aggregated IP traffic via a 10Gb/s connection to MDH for processing.

PETER-SERVICE advertises its experience in SORM technologies - especially DPI - and its ability to collect, manage and analyse "Big Data" for commercial and intelligence purposes. "From DPI solutions for SORM to contextual advertising, we have the experience and the solution. We are offering to coordinate a scalable national solution for control of the digital network. We strive for effective cooperation within a symbolic network alliance: operator - vendor - search engine - business - state organs."

The above graphics shows the Internet backbone infrastructure in Russia and the nodes at various providers that run components of the proposed DPI*GRID system in different locations. The node TopGun most likely refers to a multi terabit DPI system developed by PETER-SERVICE.

SORM is the technical infrastructure for surveillance in Russia. It dates back to 1995 and has evolved from SORM-1 (capturing telephone and mobile phone communications) and SORM-2 (interception of Internet traffic, 1999) to the current SORM-3. SORM now collects information from all forms of communication, providing long-term storage of all information and data on subscribers, including actual recordings and locations. In 2014, the system was expanded to include social media platforms, and the Ministry of Communications ordered companies to install new equipment with Deep Packet Inspection (DPI) capability. In 2016, SORM-3 added additional classified regulations that apply to all Internet Service providers in Russia. The European Court for Human Rights deemed Russia's SORM legislation in breach of the European Convention on Human Rights in 2015 (Zakharov v. Russia).

, 19- 2017 , WikiLeaks " " - (PETER-SERVICE). 209 (34 ), 2007 2015 .

PETER-SERVICE 1992 - . 1000 , . PETER-SERVICE . , PETER-SERVICE .

PETER-SERVICE , - , , (IMEI MAC-), (IP-), . , .

PETER-SERVICE (SVC_BASE) ( [], []), (- -), IP- ( TDM) () , .

TDM , IP- , . , , . , , , -, , , , , , , . ( IMEI/TAC , , ) : , , , , , (, , , ) /.

; (-) . DRS 538 . PETER-SERVICE DRS 500,000,000 . .

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- PETER-SERVICE 2013 . : " / / , - XXI ", - , , PETER-SERVICE - , , (" " - , ).

, , Google Facebook. PRISM, , . PETER-SERVICE , , - , , , " IP-, ". PETER-SERVICE " [] ".

- (2013 ) DPI*GRID- "Deep Packet Inspection", " ", 10 / . - / DPI*GRID. ( ); . , , MDH/DRS, , IP- 10 / MDH .

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, DPI* . TopGun, , PETER-SERVICE.

. 1995 -1 ( ) -2 ( -, 1999 ) -3. SORM , , . 2014 -, Deep Packet Inspection (DPI). 2016 -3 , . SORM 2015 ( . ).

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WikiLeaks - Spy Files Russia

We Steal Secrets: The Story of WikiLeaks – Wikipedia

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We Steal Secrets: The Story of WikiLeaks

Theatrical release poster

Productioncompany

Jigsaw ProductionsGlobal Produce

Release date

Running time

We Steal Secrets: The Story of WikiLeaks is a 2013 American independent documentary film about the organization started by Julian Assange, and people involved in the collection and distribution of secret information and media by whistleblowers. It covers a period of several decades, and includes considerable background material.

The 1989 WANK worm attack on NASA computers, originally thought to threaten the Galileo spacecraft, is depicted as the work of Australian hackers, including Assange. The founding of Wikileaks in 2006 is followed by coverage of several key events: its 20092010 leaks about the Icelandic financial collapse, Swiss banking tax evasion, Kenyan government corruption, toxic-waste dumping, Chelsea (formerly Bradley) Manning's communications with Adrian Lamo, uploads to Wikileaks of the Iraq and Afghanistan war documents, diplomatic cables, and video, exposure to the FBI by Lamo, and the accusations of sexual assault made against Assange. Interview subjects include Julian Assange, Heather Brooke, James Ball, Donald Bostom, Nick Davies, Mark Davis, Jason Edwards, Timothy Douglas Webster, Michael Hayden, Adrian Lamo, J. William Leonard, Gavin MacFadyen, Smri McCarthy, Iain Overton, Kevin Poulsen and Vaughan Smith.[4]

Assange did not participate in the production, so previously recorded interviews were used.[5] Manning was also unavailable.[6] John Young and Deborah Natsios contributed contacts and research material, but declined to be interviewed for the film upon learning it was tentatively titled "Unnamed Wikileaks Project".[7] About 35 minutes of chat animations, headline effects, and other visual effects were designed and rendered by Framestore in New York.[8]

The film previewed in December 2012,[9] and debuted January 21, 2013 at the Sundance Film Festival.[1] It was scheduled to be released May 24, 2013 in New York and Los Angeles, and widely in June.[10][11]

We Steal Secrets has been widely praised by film reviewers, with film review site Rotten Tomatoes noting that 92% of critics have reviewed the film positively.[12] Nonetheless it has been criticized by journalists and professors including Chris Hedges,[13] Alexa O'Brien,[14] and Robert Manne[15] who was interviewed in the documentary.

The Hollywood Reporter writer David Rooney found the film to be a "tremendously fascinating story told with probing insight and complexity".[16] David Edelstein of New York Magazine wrote that the film is a "twisty, probing, altogether enthralling movie," adding that it is "a documentary with the overflowing texture of fiction." [17] Steven Rea of the Philadelphia Inquirer, who calls the film "riveting and revelatory," notes that the director "lines up an A-list of experts, observers, cohorts, and adversaries, tracing how Assange's and Manning's worlds collide - virtually, and violently - and how a noble quest for transparency and truth turned into a tale of conspiracy and paranoia."[18]

Several reviewers have noted that despite the film's strengths, some flaws remain. In the UK Guardian, Jeremy Kay gave the film 3 of 5 stars, asserting that, although the film explored facts and themes thoroughly and thoughtfully, and provided "insightful commentary" from government, media, and WikiLeaks insiders, the film revealed little about Assange, who remained unavailable to be interviewed by the director. Kay wrote, "It's probably too soon for a meaningful perspective on the WikiLeaks saga."[5] In Variety, Peter Debruge found the film "dramatically lacking" a central core conflict, especially when compared with Gibney's previous work. Like Kay in The Guardian, Debruge found Manning's story the most compelling part of the film.[4]

We Steal Secrets was among five films nominated for the 2013 International Documentary Association ABC News Videosource Award.[19]

Robert Manne, who was interviewed in the film, considered it to be a "superficially impressive but ultimately myopic film". He detailed his criticism in The Monthly.[15] Based on this article Manne and Gibney had a written debate.[20]

In his Truthdig review, journalist Chris Hedges called the film "agitprop for the security and surveillance state," adding that it "dutifully peddles the state's contention that WikiLeaks is not a legitimate publisher and that Chelsea Manning, who passed half a million classified Pentagon and State Department documents to WikiLeaks, is not a legitimate whistle-blower."[13] Salon reporter Andrew O'Hehir claimed that many of Hedges's statements about the film are patently false, and that his "alarming accusations and peculiar misreadings of the film" are "an attempt to attack Gibney's integrity and sabotage his reputation."[21]

WikiLeaks published a transcript of the film, annotated with comments, asserted to be corrections, by WikiLeaks.[22][23] Director Gibney responded that the transcript was incomplete, lacked Private Manning's words, and was from an unreleased, incomplete version of the film.[24] Later, Gibney published his own annotated version of the WikiLeaks transcript, responding to the criticisms and assertions made by Assange and his supporters.[25][26]According to the film's executive producer Jemima Khan, We Steal Secrets was "denounced before seeing" by Assange,[27] who tweeted "an unethical and biased title in the context of pending criminal trials. It is the prosecution's claim and it is false".[27] Khan asserted the title was based on a quote in the film "from Michael Hayden, a former director of the CIA, who told Gibney that the US government was in the business of 'stealing secrets' from other countries".[27]

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We Steal Secrets: The Story of WikiLeaks - Wikipedia

WikiLeaks Turns Its Attention to the French Elections …

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WikiLeaks has served notice that it will enter the fray of the French presidential election.

On Tuesday, its Twitter account promoted 3,630 documents from its archives on center-right presidential candidate Franois Fillon.

None were of the salacious variety, yet the move has stoked fears among European security officials that WikiLeaks will repeat its U.S. electoral influence performance in France and perhaps elsewhere in Europe. Some even worry that the propaganda apparatus will partner again with Russian operatives with the aim of tilting the outcome of elections in favor of Kremlin-friendly candidates.

According to Martin Michelot, the deputy director of Europeum, there is definitely concern that WikiLeaks will try to influence the French election. During the U.S. election, WikiLeaks served as a central dumping ground for Russian operatives, according to American intelligence officials.

French Defense Minister Jean-Yves Le Drian said this month that France is no less vulnerable to Russian meddling than the United States.

Russian President Vladimir Putin has not come out and campaigned for Fillons main opponent, Marine Le Pen, leader of Frances far-right National Front. But the two seem to be simpatico.

Le Pen has called Russias annexation of Crimealegal and said a Trump-Putin-Le Pen triumvirate would be good for world peace. In 2014, she took a loan fromaMoscow-based lender, First Czech Russian Bank, to pay for National Front expenses. And media reports said she was looking again to Russia for funding after that bankfailed. Le Pen is understood to be the candidate with the backing of Russia, Michelot said.

This isnt WikiLeaks first foray into European presidential politics. In December, the propaganda apparatus released a trove of documents describing recent intelligence cooperation between the United States and Germany, a move seen as an attempt to harm German Chancellor Angela Merkels re-election bid.

To date, WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange has provided only a smattering of material targeting the French election. The Fillon documents do not constitute a new leak but a collection of material on the center-right candidate scattered across the groups archives.

And Fillon isnt WikiLeaks only target. It also highlighted 1,138 documents in its archives featuring Le Pen.

But perhaps tellingly, the documents on Le Pen include such pieces as Marine Le Pen more popular than President Sarkozy, says French poll.

To be sure, Fillons campaign had already hit some headwinds. On Tuesday, he claimed to be the victim of a professional operationmeant to weaken his campaign with three months to go before the election. This came after French media reports alleged his wife and children had received roughly 1 million euro inpublic funds to serve as parliamentary aides to Fillon.

Photo credit:ERIC PIERMONT/AFP/Getty Images

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WikiLeaks Turns Its Attention to the French Elections ...

Bradley Manning’s Attorney Asks Obama to Pardon Him

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Army Pfc. Bradley Manning's attorney has called on President Obama to pardon his client.

"What's at stake here is how do we as a public want to be informed about what our government does," attorney David Coombs said in a news conference soon Wednesday, soon after Manning was sentenced to 35 years in prison for leaking hundreds of thousands of classified documents to the anti-secrecy group WikiLeaks.

The request is a longshot, to say the least: Manning is asking for a pardon from the same government that is prosecuting him. Obama said flatly that Manning "broke the law" even two years before his conviction.

Manning has been convicted of multiple charges, including violations of the Espionage Act. He copied the documents while serving as an intelligence analyst in Iraq.

Also read: WikiLeaks Mole Bradley Manning Sentenced to 35 Years

Coombs said that if Obama does not pardon Manning, he should at least commute his sentence to time served. Manning could have received up to 90 years behind bars.

Coombs also read a statement from Manning, in which he said he acted out of "concern for my country and the world that we live in." He said that while in Iraq, seeing Army dispatches, he "started to question the morality" of the U.S.'s methods of fighting its enemies, and said the U.S. sometimes killed innocent civilians, tortured people, and held prisoners at Guantanamo Bay without due process.

"Patriotism is often the cry extolled when morally questionable acts are advocated by those in power," Manning's statement continued. "When these cries of patriotism drown out any logically based dissension, it is the American solider who is given the order to carry out some ill-conceived mission."

Also read: WikiLeaks Mole Bradley Manning Convicted of Espionage, Acquitted of Aiding the Enemy

He also paraphrased historian Howard Zinn: "There is not a large enough flag to cover the shame of killing innocent people."

Manning had argued in court that he was trying to inform the public about military and government wrongdoing when he supplied WikiLeaks with more than 700,000 pages of classified information in 2010, and did not intend to aid the enemy.

In a recent hearing he apologized for embarrassing American diplomats, among others.

"I am sorry that my actions hurt people. I'm sorry I hurt the United States," he told the court. "I understood what I was doing was wrong, but I didn't appreciate the broader effects of my actions. When I made these decisions I believed I was going to help people, not hurt people."

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Bradley Manning's Attorney Asks Obama to Pardon Him

Chelsea Manning, Alleged Wikileaks Whistleblower Released …

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Chelsea Manning, the first convicted source to Wikileaks is free from prison as of a few hours ago. After an intensive 7 year fight and a huge 35-year sentence set to be served, Manning walks freely from the Fort Leavenworth military prison today. Bringing an end to one of the most controversial criminal cases in American history over the leaking of classified government secrets.

Manning, a military analyst convicted for allegedly turning over classified information from the military to Wikileaks, received an unprecedented 35-year prison sentence during her original trial back in 2013. After spending 7 years behind bars, she was acquitted amid President Barak Obama, after he commuted a bulk of Mannings sentence just before leaving office.

Nor the military nor Mannings legal team released any information on her immediate plans. The military had disallowed reporters from waiting near the gate to the prison barracks. Manning has said that she intends to live in Maryland, near family, once everything settles, taking the next few weeks to adjust. Mannings support network has also raised her an additional $147,000 via a GoFundMe campaign to help her get started.

To celebrate Chelseas release and ensure her safety, she posted the following on her personal Twitter:

Chelsea Manning is the first ever alleged Wikileaks source to have been identified and harshly prosecuted, she is also the first ever alleged Wikileaks source to be released from prison. While she was convicted on charges of leaking classified military documents to Wikileaks, the whistleblowing publication has never revealed a single source, never commenting on the authenticity of the Manning claims.

Chelsea Manning, previously known as Pvt. Bradley Manning in 2010, was arrested on suspicion of having stolen hundreds of thousands of secret military and diplomatic files from a classified computer network, to which she had access to as an intelligence analyst. Three short years after her conviction, she revealed that she was a transgender woman, changing her name to Chelsea.

Mannings heroic actions brought light to a horrific trove of dark war secrets, including raw evidence of unknown civilian killings in the Iraq war, back-room diplomatic dealings and discussion of local corruption around the world, and intelligence assessments about Guantanamo Bay detainees.

Even after being prosecuted under the judgment of her being a traitor, Chelsea has become an icon to anti-war and anti-secrecy activists around the globe. Her harsh treatment within numerous prison facilities and illegal holding sparked dozens on dozens of protests for her freedom. After a lengthy three-year trial, she was convicted of numerous violations of the Espionage act.

Following her 2013 conviction, Manning was taken to Fort Leavenworth to serve her sentence. There she publicly struggled with her transition from a male to a female in an all male military prison. Twice last year she tried to take her own life.

Chelsea Mannings release is monumental in nearly every digital community across the Internet. Free speech activists, Whistleblowers, Privacy activists among dozens of others are showing monumental support for her.

Welcome home Chelsea, its good to have a true hero back!!

For anyone that wants to help Chelsea Manning, you can donate to her directly via her GoFundMe Page here.

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Chelsea Manning, Alleged Wikileaks Whistleblower Released ...


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