Just as United States has the freedom of speech, they also have the freedom of information; it is not exactly the same type of meaning. The Freedom of Information Act was established in 1966 and signed by President Johnson and in 1996 a more modern act was constructed, the Electronic Freedom of Information Act. These acts were designed for an individual to have the ability to obtain unreleased information or documents controlled by the United States government. An organization named WikiLeaks has changed the law to a whole new level. Government transparency is their goal. The WikiLeaks website has released undocumented files in large amounts to the public. According to author of “From FOI World to WikiLeaks World”, WikiLeaks "…has been claimed to be the biggest leaker of secret information in history” (Hood, 2011). WikiLeaks has gone over the line of what stays secret or not. The organization is influencing many to join in a more transparent world but the information that is being put out has two sides of the effect; one may shine light on some things, but on the other the exposure of confidential information can be for the worst.
WikiLeaks is a non-profit mass media organization that was founded by an Australian activist, Julian Assange in 2006. Their motivation is to expose secret, private or classified information, documents and media from governments and corporations. Christopher Hood (2011) announces that, WikiLeaks “releases include nearly 80,000 documents about Afghan war, some 400,000 Iraq war documents, and diplomatic cables from 274 U.S. embassies around the world” (Hood, 2011). The gathered information is from anonymous news sources, news leaks, hackers, and whistleblowers. The organization feels the need to impro...
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...s. Retrieved from, http://topics.nytimes.com/top/reference/timestopics/organizations/w/wikileaks/index.html
Hood C. (2011) From FOI world to wikiLeaks world: a new chapter in the transparency story?. Governance [serial online]. 24(4):635-638. Retrieved from, http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/j.1468-0491.2011.01546.x/abstract
Aftergood S, Le Coz C, Soldatov A. Does wikileaks matters? (2011). Wilson Quarterly [serial online]. 35(4):8-10 Retrieved from, http://ezproxy.bloomu.edu/login?url=http://search.ebscohost.com/login.aspx?direct=true&db=a9h&AN=66423679&site=ehost-live&scope=site
Pontin, J. Transparency and secrets. (2011); Technology Review [serial online]. 114(2):70-73. Retrieved from, http://web.ebscohost.com/ehost/detail?vid=5&hid=13&sid=7ec9c86e-c02e-4001-ad6c-dc38ad2ac244%40sessionmgr12&bdata=JnNpdGU9ZWhvc3QtbGl2ZSZzY29wZT1zaXRl#db=a9h&AN=61356679
McCraw, David, and Stephen Gikow. “The End to a Unspoken Bargain? National Security and Leaks in a Post-Pentagon Papers World.” Harvard Civil Rights-Civil Liberties Law Review 48.2 (2013): 473-509. Academic OneFile. Web. 5 Dec. 2013.
Chamberlain, Kenneth, “History: The Day the Freedom of Information Act Expanded”. Nationaljournal.com 20 Nov. 2012 General OneFile. Web 26 April 2014.
Edward Snowden, former CIA employee and contractor for the NSA, revealed last year the secret NSA surveillance programs that were used to monitor the United States and foreign countries for terrorists. In May 2013, he met with journalists Glenn Greenwald and Laura Poitras and disclosed countless NSA files, that were then published. The files contained information on several secret surveillance programs, as well as other not yet published files. Snowden has fled to other countries for asylum, since the United States government has charged him with espionage and theft of government property. A charge that was expected, as he he predicted that they would "say I have broken the Espionage Act and helped our enemies, but that can be used against anyone who points out how ma...
Keck, Zachary. "Yes, Edward Snowden Is a Traitor." The Diplomat. N.p., 21 Dec. 2013. Web. 21 Feb. 2014
The legacy of Ashes: The History of the CIA, is a novel written by Tim Weiner which the author discusses how the CIA had started and how the CIA have managed to hide all the horrific failures from the world’s knowledge. I thought that this novel was going to be jaw dropping and catching your attention at every page, but unfortunately that was not the case. Tim Weiner had provided a decent amount of information about how the CIA had failed the citizens of America as well as destroy the reputation and left the agency in worse shape than when each leader had obtained it in.
Everyday citizens often live unaware of their government’s inner workings. The knowing of political espionage is often too heavy of a subject to be inducted in conversation. True, prima facie, modest twists and turns of information may not be considered substantial, but this inconsideration leaves much to be uncontrolled. It is easy for political leaders to become power crazed, to not realize the massive implications that come of their actions. Only after all is said and done do the people actually realize their government is an opaque mask of deception. The Watergate Scandal substantially impacted Americans’ trust in their government.
Board, The Editorial. “Edward Snowden, Whistle-Blower.” The New York Times. The New York Times, 1 Jan. 2014. Web. 18 May. 2014
...on U.S. has access to and how this goes against the civil liberties of the people. Programs like PRISM, MAINWAY, MUSCULAR, Tempora, Boundless Informant and XKeyscore go against the Bill of Right and the US Constitution which clearly states in the fourth amendment that people have the right not to be searched without a proper warrant or valid reasons. The intelligence agencies state that they are doing this to protect U.S. citizens from further terrorist attacks, and even though that may be true, they are also granting access to private information to many people who most likely use it for themselves. It is an unacceptable government behavior since the government was created in order to ensure that the citizens are well treated and that their voice is heard. The agencies have crossed the line, they are going against the civil liberties and they need to be stopped.
Edward Snowden, the former National Security Agency (N.S.A) subcontractor turned whistle-blower is nothing short of a hero. His controversial decision to release information detailing the highly illegal ‘data mining’ practices of the N.S.A have caused shockwaves throughout the world and have raised important questions concerning how much the government actually monitors its people without their consent or knowledge. Comparable to Mark Felt in the Watergate scandals, Daniel Ellsberg with the Pentagon Papers, Edward Snowden joins the rank of infamous whistleblowers who gave up their jobs, livelihood, and forever will live under scrutiny of the public all in the service to the American people. Edward Snowden released information detailing the extent of the N.S.A breaches of American privacy and in doing so, became ostracized by the media and barred from freely reentering America, his home country.
The mainstream thought, between the governments of the United States and other world leaders is that WikiLeaks is a terrible website for divulging state secrets and threatening national security. Even China, on the opposite side of international arguments from the United States tries to block the website. If two countries in a fight for global influence both hate a website then it is by far against the mainstream. Anonymous being a friend of the WikiLeaks is the counter-culture for being an ally for what many people view as a threatening website. WikiLeaks believes it was acting as the moral authority.
...of rights and freedoms guarantees the rights and freedoms set out in it subject only to such reasonable limits prescribed by law as can be demonstrably justified in a free and democratic society. “ (section 1 of the canadian charter of rights and freedom) wikileaks does not measure the risks of its publication and the effects they can cause people. legislation laws and regulation are created so that society is protected and to have a better sense of accountability. When everything is exposed to the public, chaos is bound to follow. Wikileaks jeopardizes and openly defies the right of privacy, right of accountability and confidentiality among descrete information and data and also causes inconvenience to governments, private sectors and even individuals in various walks of life. after all acts of hacking into something private is inappropriate, dangerous and illegal.
Taylor, James Stacey. "In Praise of Big Brother: Why We Should Learn to Stop Worrying and Love Government Surveillance." Public Affairs Quarterly July 2005: 227-246.
The government gives each American citizen a set of unalienable rights that protect them from the government’s power. These rights cannot be broken, yet the government violates the Fourth Amendment daily to find ways to spy on the American public under the guise of protecting against terrorism. In 2007 President Obama said the American administration “acts like violating civil liberties is the way to enhance our securities – it is not.” Americans need to understand that their privacy is worth the fight. The people need to tell their neighbors, their congressmen, and their senators that they will not allow their internet privacy to be violated by needless spying. American citizens deserve the rights given to them and need to fight for the right to keep them by changing privacy laws to include Internet privacy.
The Web. The Web. 22 Jan. 2014. • "Profile: Edward Snowden. "
It is reasonable to argue that, governmental institutions or people with authority are subject to withhold a great deal of information from society. Many may argue that secrets are kept to ensure the safety of the nation. Thus, upholding the governmental duty of protecting the nation against possible threats. On the other hand, many believe that secrets may exist which violate our constitutional rights. Over the last year, Edward Snowden, has made headline news for leaking sensitive governmental information to the press. Edward Snowden is a 29-year-old high school drop-out, who was a tech specialist for the National Security Association. Snowden had discovered and later exposed the NSA for monitoring the nations e-mails, phone calls, and internet searches. As the allegations spread like wild fire, Edward Snowden sought asylum in Russia for one year. Snowden had a valid and justifiable reason to expose the NSA to the world because they were in violation of our fourth Amendment rights to unreasonable searches and seizures. The government called him a traitor, while others viewed him as a hero for exposing the government. Edward Snowden is a whistle blower because he felt that it is up to society to decide if governmental practices are just or unjust. Snowden does “express the highest respect for the law”, and he wanted to protect the right of privacy for American citizens.