Powerful words, by an even more powerful man- who has the ability to access thousands of secret documents illegally, in order to educate the public of what the big guys are keeping from us.
In a bid to further my knowledge on the story behind the Wikileaks phenonenom, I typed the words 'wikileaks' and 'julian assange' into two seperate browser searches and was absolutely bombarded with results. A total of 21 million on the creator of Wikileaks, and 125 million on the site itself, all within 0.22 seconds. By entering the Wikileaks official site, every Tom, Dick and Harry have access to thousands of videos and documents deemed "private" or "secret"by large-scale commercial media organizations. The main issue here seems to be how the information is obtained by Assange and his co-workers.
Nobody likes a hacker. The thought of somebody being able to access my bank details and usernames/ passwords without being in the same room (or country) as me sends shivers down my spine. There is absolutely nothing ethical about hacking- it removes peoples privacy and is simply illegal. However, when the hacking is done for the greater good of society, that's when things get tricky. There is nothing okay with how Wikileaks hackers obtain their information, but after viewing the military shooting video in class this week I say hack away Assange, hack away.
"Truth will always win" is certainly a great collection of words that come together to create a powerful meaning. This Julian Assange quote gives truth hope and belief, just like some of the leaks by Assange and WikiLeaks. I also agree that hacking is not at all right, but in certain cases and causes like this, I think it's more than ok.
ReplyDeleteEmma, I also agree with you in that the idea of someone hacking my own information is very confronting, however I am a big supporter of Wikileaks. The fact that governments around the world are constantly deciding FOR us what they deem newsworthy is an even scarier thought. Although some people may have been endangered by the release of such documents, having seen the collateral damage video myself, I believe such hacking is done for the greater good.
ReplyDeleteHey Emma
ReplyDeleteAs you say, in general hacking is a bad thing - though normally would be done for identity theft (i.e. to steal money). My problem is that you say after watching Collateral Murder that this has chaged your mind for this instance. My problem is (and one that I know is shared by @tegannadine) is that where do you draw the line of when hacking is ok and when it is not.
The fact that all people share different values/ beliefs complicates this, though Julian himself is a prime example with his belief that the "truth will always win".
There seem to be many different kinds of hackers, and I totally agree that some accessing your bank accounts and personal details. Just the other day, a friends mother was called up by the bank and told that some one in Africa is using her account. She's never been to Africa! So scary! BUT when people are lying or hiding the truth, I do think that the information should be provided to everyone. As Ben says, drawing the line between a good and a bad hacker is very hard.
ReplyDeleteI also agree that hacking is not good and make people feel unsafe, but it's different when accessing files of such an importance as the ones Wikileaks has published. It's a different kind of hacking and I think it's necessary to keep people aware of what their governments are doing with their taxes and how are they jeopardizing everyone's lives and future.
ReplyDeleteI think this is an excellent post Emma. It is a tricky issue. The video screened in the tutorial is appalling to watch and disturbing to think that this was a general occurrence and has been attempted to be kept secret from the masses. I applaud Wikileaks for publishing the video as it really exposes the governments military misconduct and reveals how journalistic reporting during war time is saturated with agendas for glorifying the government and armed forces for ‘helping’ the civilians, when in reality is it most definitely not the case. So I say yes to hacking if it is for the greater good of society!
ReplyDeleteThe reason why hacking is not good is because there are not a lot of ethical hackers out there. Ethical hackers truly exist, they thrive on finding errors that tighten your bank security so that the bad hackers cannot get in there. There are the white hats and black hats... Julian Assange is a grey hat. He finds some pretty amazing stuff but his methods of finding this information is questionable. The truth always surfaces, sometimes quicker than the person keeping it hidden would like to think. I do not condone hacking, i do condone revealing information we should and are privy to know when it comes to democracy been in infringed on. Good post.
ReplyDeleteI’m in complete agreement with Fergus on this as well as a couple of the other points above – The hacking of my information I only care about when it impacts me in some negative way. If the only result of the hack is that it helped make the system more secure than I wouldn’t mind finding out that my account had been hacked. Similarly if they took all my money I would be phenomenally pissed (which has happened once before). It’s this balance of intent and use that I am concerned with before I label hacking as ethical or unethical.
ReplyDelete