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The United States diplomatic cables leak began on 28 November 2010 when the website WikiLeaks and five major newspapers published confidential documents of detailed correspondences between the U.S. State Department and its diplomatic missions around the world. The publication of the U.S. embassy cables is the third in a series of U.S. classified document "mega-leaks" distributed by WikiLeaks in 2010, following the Afghan War documents leak in July, and the Iraq War documents leak in October. The cables describe international affairs from 274 embassies dated from 1966–2010, containing diplomatic analysis of world leaders, an assessment of host countries, and a discussion about international and domestic issues.

The first 291 of the 251,287 documents were published on 28 November, with simultaneous press coverage from El País (Spain), Le Monde (France), Der Spiegel (Germany), The Guardian (United Kingdom), and The New York Times (United States). Over 130,000 of the documents are unclassified; none are classified as "top secret" on the classification scale; some 100,000 are labeled "confidential"; and about 15,000 documents have the higher classification "secret". As of December 8, 2010 1060 individual cables had been released. WikiLeaks plans to release the entirety of the cables in phases over several months.

Reactions to the leak ranged from negative to positive. Some western governments expressed strong disapproval and condemnation, and criticized WikiLeaks for potentially jeopardizing international relations and global security. The leak also generated intense interest from the public, journalists, and media analysts. WikiLeaks received support from some commentators who questioned the necessity of government secrecy in a democracy that serves the interests of its people and depends on an informed electorate. Some political leaders referred to Julian Assange, editor-in-chief of WikiLeaks, as a criminal, but also blamed the U.S. Department of Defense for security lapses that led to the leak. Supporters of Assange have referred to him as a heroic defender of free speech and freedom of the press. White House Press Secretary Robert Gibbs said that an "open and transparent government is something that the President believes is truly important. But the stealing of classified information and its dissemination is a crime".

Background

It was reported in June that the U.S. State Department and embassy personnel were concerned that Bradley Manning, who had been charged with the unauthorized download of classified material while he was stationed in Iraq, had leaked diplomatic cables. The report, written by Wired, was rejected as inaccurate by WikiLeaks: "Allegations in Wired that we have been sent 260,000 classified U.S. embassy cables are, as far as we can tell, incorrect". Manning was suspected to have uploaded all of what he obtained to WikiLeaks, which chose to release the material in stages so as to have the greatest possible impact.

According to The Guardian, all the diplomatic cables were marked "Sipdis", denoting "secret internet protocol distribution", which means they had been distributed via the closed U.S. SIPRNet, the U.S. Department of Defense’s classified version of the civilian internet. Though more than three million U.S. government personnel and soldiers have access to this network, "top secret" documents are not included in the system. Such a large quantity of secret information was available to a wide audience because, as The Guardian alleged, after the September 11 attacks an increased focus had been placed on sharing information since gaps in intra-governmental information sharing had been exposed. More specifically the diplomatic, military, law enforcement, and intelligence communities would be able to do their jobs better with this easy access to analytic and operative information. A spokesman said that in the previous weeks and months additional measures had been taken to improve the security of the system and prevent leaks.

On 22 November, an announcement was made by WikiLeaks' Twitter feed that the next release would be "7× the size of the Iraq War Logs". U.S. authorities and the media had speculated, at the time, that they could contain diplomatic cables. Prior to the expected leak, the government of the United Kingdom (UK) sent a DA-Notice to UK newspapers, which requested advance notice from newspapers regarding the expected publication. According to the Index on Censorship, "there is no obligation on media to comply". Under the terms of a DA-Notice, "ewspaper editors would speak to Defence, Press and Broadcasting Advisory Committee prior to publication". The Guardian was revealed to have been the source of the copy of the documents given to The New York Times in order to prevent the British government from obtaining any injunction against its publication. The Pakistani newspaper Dawn stated that the U.S. newspapers The New York Times and The Washington Post were expected to publish parts of the diplomatic cables on 28 November, including 94 Pakistan-related documents.

On 26 November, Assange sent a letter to the U.S. Department of State, via his lawyer Jennifer Robinson, inviting them to "privately nominate any specific instances (record numbers or names) where it considers the publication of information would put individual persons at significant risk of harm that has not already been addressed". Harold Koh, the Legal Adviser of the Department of State, rejected the proposal, stating: "We will not engage in a negotiation regarding the further release or dissemination of illegally obtained U.S. Government classified materials". Assange responded in turn by writing back to the State Department that "you have chosen to respond in a manner which leads me to conclude that the supposed risks are entirely fanciful and you are instead concerned to suppress evidence of human rights abuse and other criminal behaviour".

Ahead of the leak of the documents, U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton contacted officials in Afghanistan, the United Kingdom, the People's Republic of China, France, Saudi Arabia, Germany, and the United Arab Emirates about the impending release, while other diplomats apparently spoke with the leaders in India, Iraq, Turkey, Canada, Israel, Australia, New Zealand, Italy, Pakistan, Denmark, Russia, Norway, Iceland, Colombia, Finland, Sweden and the Netherlands.

Release

WikiLeaks began releasing the cables on 28 November 2010, with a plan to release the cables in phases over several months due to its global scope and significance. The first batch of leaks comprised 243 cables. Further cables were subsequently made available on the WikiLeaks website.

• † This number documents the number of cables released at the given time stamp.

Attack on WikiLeaks

About an hour prior to the planned release of the initial documents, WikiLeaks announced it was experiencing a massive distributed denial-of-service attack, but vowed to still leak the cables and documents via pre-agreed prominent media outlets El País, Le Monde, Der Spiegel, The Guardian, and The New York Times.

According to Arbor Networks, an internet analyst group, the DDoS attack accounted for between two and four gigabits per second (Gbit/s) of additional traffic to the WikiLeaks host network, compared to an average traffic of between twelve and fifteen Gbit/s under ordinary conditions. The attack was slightly more powerful than ordinary DDoS attacks, though well below the maximum of 60 to 100 Gbit/s of other major attacks during 2010. The attack was claimed to have been carried out by a person by the name of "Jester", who describes himself as a "hacktivist". Jester took credit for the attack on Twitter, stating that WikiLeaks "threaten the lives of our troops and 'other assets.'"

On 2 December 2010, EveryDNS, a domain name registrar, dropped WikiLeaks from its entries, citing denial-of-service attacks (DDoS) that "threatened the stability of its infrastructure", but the site was still reachable at http://46.59.1.2 and http://213.251.145.96, as well as several other addresses.

Print media

The Guardian released its coverage of the leaked cables in numerous articles, including an interactive database, on 28 November. Der Spiegel also released its preliminary report, with extended coverage promised for the next day. Its cover for 29 November was also leaked with the initial report. The New York Times covered the story in a nine-part series spanning nine days, with the first story published simultaneously with the other outlets. The New York Times was not originally intended to receive the leak, allegedly due to their unflattering portrayal of the site's founder, but The Guardian decided to share coverage, citing earlier cooperation while covering the Afghan and Iraqi war logs. The Washington Post reported that it also requested permission to see the documents, but were rejected for undisclosed reasons. El País released its report saying there was an agreement between the newspapers for simultaneous publication of the "internationally relevant" documents, but that each newspaper was free to select and treat those documents that primarily relate to its own country.

The editor-in-chief of El País, Javier Moreno, stated that the release of the documents does not put the lives of anybody at risk and that the attacks on such a release of information to the general public are the same line of reaction seen in other leaks, such as the Pentagon Papers in 1971. He added that the only thing at risk here is the career of officials and diplomats within the compromised governments.

CNN was originally supposed to receive an advance copy of the documents as well, but did not after they refused to sign a confidentiality agreement with WikiLeaks. The Wall Street Journal also refused advance access, apparently for similar reasons as CNN.

Push-back by the U.S. government

Official efforts by the U.S. government to limit access to, conversation about, and general spread of the cables leaked by WikiLeaks were revealed by leading media organizations. A 4 December 2010 article by MSNBC, reported that the Obama administration has warned federal government employees and students in educational institutions studying towards careers in public service that they must refrain from downloading or linking to any WikiLeaks documents. According to a 3 December 2010 article in The Guardian, access to WikiLeaks has been blocked for federal workers. The U.S. Library of Congress, the U.S. Commerce Department and other government agencies have confirmed that the ban is already in place.

A spokesman for Columbia University confirmed on 4 December that its Office of Career Services sent an e-mail warning students at the School of International and Public Affairs to refrain from accessing WikiLeaks cables and discussing this subject on the grounds that "discourse about the documents would call into question your ability to deal with confidential information". However, this was quickly retracted on the following day. The SIPA Dean, John H. Coatsworth, wrote that “Freedom of information and expression is a core value of our institution, thus, SIPA’s position is that students have a right to discuss and debate any information in the public arena that they deem relevant to their studies or to their roles as global citizens, and to do so without fear of adverse consequences.”

Hosting and financing issues

Amazon.com removed WikiLeaks from its servers on 1 December 2010 at 19:30 GMT, and the latter website was unreachable until 20:17 GMT when the site had defaulted to its Swedish servers, hosted by Bahnhof. U.S. Senator Joe Lieberman, among the members of the U.S. Senate Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee who had questioned Amazon in private communication on the company's hosting of Wikileaks and the "illegally" obtained documents, commended Amazon for the action; WikiLeaks, however, responded by stating on its official Twitter page that "WikiLeaks servers at Amazon ousted. Free speech the land of the free--fine our $ are now spent to employ people in Europe", and later that "If Amazon are so uncomfortable with the first amendment, they should get out of the business of selling books".

On 4 December, Paypal cut off the account used by WikiLeaks to collect donations. On 6 December, the Swiss bank PostFinance announced that it had frozen the assets of Assange; on the same day, MasterCard stopped payments to WikiLeaks, with VISA following them on 7 December.

Contents

The contents of the U.S. diplomatic cables leak describe in detail events and incidents surrounding international affairs from 274 embassies dating from 28 December 1966 to 28 February 2010. The diplomatic cables revealed numerous unguarded comments and revelations: critiques and praises about the host countries of various US embassies, discussion and resolutions towards ending ongoing tension in the Middle East, efforts and resistance towards nuclear disarmament, actions in the War on Terror, assessments of other threats around the world, dealings between various countries, U.S. intelligence and counterintelligence efforts, and other diplomatic actions.

Reactions

Many governments said the leaks could damage diplomatic relationships between countries and put people at risk. U.S. Secretary of State Hilary Clinton condemned the leak as an attack not just on the U.S. but on all governments:

Let's be clear: This disclosure is not just an attack on America's foreign policy interests. It is an attack on the international community, the alliances and partnerships, the conversations and negotiations that safeguard global security and advance economic prosperity. Now, I'm aware that some may mistakenly applaud those responsible, so I want to set the record straight. There is nothing laudable about endangering innocent people, and there is nothing brave about sabotaging the peaceful relations between nations.

The American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) criticized the overclassification of information that should otherwise be available to the public for discussion. The ACLU called on President Obama to "recommit to the ideals of transparency he invoked at the beginning of his presidency. The American public should not have to depend on leaks to the news media and on whistleblowers to know what the government is up to." Ben Wizner, Litigation Director of the ACLU National Security Project, issued a statement about the Khalid El-Masri cable leak revelations, calling for public accountability and the strengthening of the rule of law and democracy in the United States.

In the wake of the leak, politicians called for action. U.S. Congressman Peter T. King proposed designating WikiLeaks as a terrorist organization, and Julian Assange became a target of repeated attacks and incitements to violence. According to Assange:

I have been accused of treason, even though I am an Australian, not a US, citizen. There have been dozens of serious calls in the US for me to be "taken out" by US special forces. Sarah Palin says I should be "hunted down like Osama bin Laden", a Republican bill sits before the US Senate seeking to have me declared a "transnational threat" and disposed of accordingly. An adviser to the Canadian Prime Minister's office has called on national television for me to be assassinated. An American blogger has called for my 20-year-old son, here in Australia, to be kidnapped and harmed for no other reason than to get at me.

Reporters Without Borders raised concerns over the extreme comments made by American authorities concerning WikiLeaks and its founder Assange. It issued a statement saying that "this is the first time we have seen an attempt at the international community level to censor a website dedicated to the principle of transparency. We are shocked to find countries such as France and the United States suddenly bringing their policies on freedom of expression into line with those of China." The group also condemned the subsequent blocking and the massive distributed denial-of-service attack on the WikiLeaks website.

A cable from the US State Department sent in February 2009 listed installations and infrastructure worldwide considered critical to US interests. WikiLeaks had deliberately removed details of names and locations before release. It includes key facilities that if attacked could disrupt the global supply chain and global communications, as well as goods and services important to the US and its economy. The publishing of this cable has been followed by strong criticism. US State Department spokesman P.J. Crowley said the disclosure was "gives a group like al-Qaeda a targeting list." Also British prime minister David Cameron stated that the list was damaging to the national security of both his country and the United States, "and elsewhere". WikiLeaks spokeswoman Kristinn Hrafnsson said with reference to the cable: "This further undermines claims made by the US Government that its embassy officials do not play an intelligence-gathering role. Part of the cable read: "Posts are not/not being asked to consult with host governments with respect to this request."

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External links

• Secret US Embassy Cables website by WikiLeaks.
• The US embassy cables by The Guardian.
• State's Secrets by The New York Times.
• WikiLeaks Diplomatic Cables by Der Spiegel
• The Arrest of Julian Assange and the U.S. "War on WikiLeaks" - video report by Democracy Now!

• Current events from November 2010
• Classified documents
• United States historical documents
• WikiLeaks
• 2010 in international relations