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ciarannolan

> ASSANGE Agrees to Help Manning Crack a Password [1]

Is this what Assange is accused of doing?

1. Receiving a password hash from Manning

2. Telling Manning he'll try to crack it

3. Following up asking for more info about it (related usernames or something)

4. Never actually cracking it and no further action

Does anyone have any more specifics on what Assange actually did here to break the law? The indictment is pretty vague on this and it seems to be the central issue.

[1] https://www.justice.gov/opa/press-release/file/1289641/downl... (page 9)

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Conspiracy is the agreement to commit a crime.

Assange and Manning agreed to try to gain unauthorized access to some U.S. government computer system.

Unauthorized computer access is a federal crime, see 18 U.S.C. section 1030.

The federal conspiracy charged (18 U.S.C section 371 in this case) also requires that one of the conspirators take an 'overt act' to further conspiracy. This is to stop idle talk about crimes being prosecuted as conspiracies.

In this case, Manning actually provided Assange with the hashed password. That's the overt act.

But, fundamentally, the conspiracy is the agreement to commit a crime.

That makes sense, thanks. What is Assange's alleged overt act? Or is it just required of one of the conspirators?

Only one.

Is it clear Assange knew the password was to a U.S. government computer system?

Let's say Manning had the files at some point and encrypted them on his own machine with some password which would NOT give access to any U.S. government computer system? Then it wouldn't be a conspiracy to gain access to a U.S. government computer system, would it?

> Is it clear Assange knew the password was to a U.S. government computer system?

Yes, very clear. Skim the indictment a bit, it goes into some detail re: their communication.

There's no proof, at this time, that Assange is one using this Jabber account to talk to Manning.

No! conspiracy is the agreement to commit a crime AND an overt action in furtherance of the plan.

Cracking a hashed password isn't obviously part of a crime. Using it may be.

Sorry, which part of what I wrote above are you saying "No!" to? I point out the agreement part and the overt act part.

If you're suggesting that the overt act has to itself be criminal: that's wrong.

It's not clear that the person who agreed to decoded the password hash was, in fact, Assange. This is another US allegation but it is by no means proven.

The salient point in this case is that one of those persons was a journalist.

Conspiring with sources to obtain secret information is what investigative journalists do. Doing so illegally is sometimes clearly bad (like the UK Daily Mail hacking celebrity phones), and sometimes clearly good (Manning and Snowden).

Journalists are never normally prosecuted for breaking the Official Secrets Act (and equivalents in other countries). This case is the first time that's happened. It sets a precedent for other cases against journalists in the future as the US and UK governments get more authoritarian and less open.

The initial indictment against Assange was an attempt to draw some kind of line between him and "proper" journalists. The new indictment (which had to be created because, as the prosecution admitted, the first one would have failed) makes no such distinction.

This is bad for society. Assange is a bit of a twat, but this needs to stop because the ramifications are enormous.

I think there's a genuine argument about whether Assange is a journalist; but let's leave that aside (more heat than light in that discussion as I have found out).

One of the counts of the indictment is not about cajoling a source, or receiving secret documents: it's about actively engaging in an attempt to gain unauthorized access to a U.S. Government computer system.

Isn't there an ethical line, at some point, in terms of the length a journalist can go to get the story? The UK scandal (News of the World; I think; not Daily Mail) you mentioned resulted in journalists going to prison for similar crimes.

I think we're in a really peculiar place if distinctions like this turn on whether it's the right or wrong kind of public interest.

"Journalists are never normally prosecuted for breaking the Official Secrets Act "

So what is the legal definition of 'journalist' ...

... and what kinds of things are they allowed to hack? Because there are surely some things that are not in the public interest. So where is that line drawn?

It seems like a lot of shades of grey there, it's hard to fathom what's a crime and what's not if it's not clear.

That's part of the problem here: there is no legal definition of journalist.

A journalist is "someone who does journalism". Traditionally that meant publishing stories in a newspaper, radio or television company, and it was fairly clear-cut who was a journalist and who wasn't. Nowadays not so much - the main question being "is a blogger a journalist?".

Assange was supplying information to, and co-operating with, major media organisations. I think any definition of journalism would have to include the activities of Wikileaks, and therefore Assange is a journalist.

Where the line is drawn is also a good question. Government would like it drawn at the lines laid out in the pertinent secrecy laws. But clearly if just classifying something as "Secret" would then put it out of reach of journalists and make unauthorised knowledge of it a criminal offence, then that's not serving society. All sorts of political misbehaviour would be classified.

And yeah, there are lots of shades of grey. Lots of things we have to decide as a society:

Are governments allowed to keep things secret?

Who should decide what is kept secret?

If someone discovers that a government agent is doing something illegal, but the activity (or agent) is covered by secrecy laws, how do they make sure that the activity is prevented and/or punished?

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