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Comment by marknutter | Hacker News Reader

It's certainly false.

How can you say this when the current understanding is that Guccifer 2.0 was a persona operated by the Russian military? Even if Assange was acting in good faith (a big assumption) , he was used to push Russian propaganda.

There's no question he was a tool of the Russian government.

Any organization dedicated to publishing leaks can be used by any state to push its political propaganda. But that's the price of free speech. In a society that eshrines the right to free speech, unless you're sworn to secrecy, you're allowed to publish leaks, no matter what your motives, and no matter who those leaks help.

You might argue it was for the greater good but Wikileaks was a tool nonetheless.

True, in the same way Facebook and Twitter are tools.

The argument against them is the same, does the benefit outweight the damage that can also be done?

That charge makes no sense. By that logic, were Mark Zuckerberg and Jack Dorsey also tools of the Russian government?

I would argue that Wikileaks should be held more accountable for what it publishes under its own name than Zuckerberg for anything posted on Facebook.

That said, I have no problem saying Facebook was a tool of Russian propaganda.

> I would argue that Wikileaks should be held more accountable

Accountable for what? In what way?

Because I don't buy that Guccifer 2.0 was a persona operated by the Russian military. Simple as that.

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