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Comment by Sephr | Hacker News Reader

WikiLeaks' online presence was taken over in October, when riseup.net got an NSL to give access to the email accounts associated with the WL Twitter accounts and other WL properties. Around that time WL removed some insurance file torrent links from wikileaks.org, distributed new pre-commitment hashes, and stopped responding to PGP-encrypted email.

People who work for WikiLeaks are still probably involved, but they are no longer in control. Ever since late October, their behavior across all of their Twitter accounts has been markedly different.

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> when riseup.net got an NSL to give access to the email accounts

This is simply not true. An NSL cannot be used to compel access to any communication content—and certainly not control of an account; they're limited solely to metadata (e.g. phone call records, IP addresses, billing metadata, etc.). I'm not a fan of NSLs, and strongly support repealing the section 505 expansion, but it behooves no one to lie about what an NSL is and what it can compel.

I was almost certain the things you're suggesting were true, however I also thought Julian assange was no longer alive, or not free/able to reach out, as did the people who came up with and spread the theories that something big went down. However this week Hannity flew to the UK and interviewed Julian Assange who is alive and well. Don't you think he might have hinted at the fact that such was the case during the interview or via an alternate channel? I'm fairly certain that the majority of the people who believed WikiLeaks was taken over or underwent a change of management/control no longer believe so since that interview, which was the first proof of life in months, and the first since the suspicious events occured.

See https://twitter.com/oheard/status/817486353801900032

It's entirely plausible that the video interview was not actually Assange.

AFAIK there has been no cryptographic verification, that's the only thing that could prove all is well.

If there was cryptographic verification, the same people doubting that video would suspect that his cryptographic keys had been compromised.

(Which, come to think of it, is a lot more likely than actors as disparate as Sean Hannity, John Pilger, the Swedish prosecutor, the Ecuadorean embassy and Pamela Anderson all being very happy to pretend to interact with a Fake Assange who keeps making very similar arguments to the inexplicably-disappeared Real Assange.)

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Right, I'm only suggesting that no one might have ever become concerned that WikiLeaks lost control of their Twitter account had the same people who held that belief known Julian Assange was alive and well and not under duress. I also find it hard to believe that Julian Assange wouldn't inform everyone that such is the case. Judging by the amount of time JA spends talking about WikiLeaks' perfect track record and referencing their reliability when it comes to accuracy and trustworthiness, I would say it is one of, if not his most valuable asset; the foundation of his safety, leverage, and sustained relevance/coverage. I can't imagine he would neglect transparency there, as it would undermine his entire lifes work, discredit him, and make him irrelevant - undermining his safety, which is largely due to the public eye on him. Edit: Typo/Grammer

So it's likely they got an NSL, but what implies it was an NSL for WikiLeaks?

It's fairly obvious something happened. Their twitter feed has felt different. They've also been pretty hostile towards people asking for proof.

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