Coruscation

Analysis: WikiLeaks Julian Assange and Facebook banter over an accusation that the site offers back-door access to U.S. spy agencies.
By Dan Tynan, ITworld May 8, 2011 11:13 am

Facebook's an appalling spy machine? That's what WikiLeakers founder (and Martina Navratilova impersonator) Julian Assange is saying. In an interview with Russia Times, the floppy-haired leaker extraordinaire declares:

Facebook in particular is the most appalling spying machine that has ever been invented. Here we have the world's most comprehensive database about people, their relationships, their names, their addresses, their locations and the communications with each other, their relatives, all sitting within the United States, all accessible to US intelligence. Facebook, Google, Yahoo -- all these major US organizations have built-in interfaces for US intelligence. It's not a matter of serving a subpoena. They have an interface that they have developed for US intelligence to use.

Now, is it the case that Facebook is actually run by U.S. intelligence? No, it's not like that. It's simply that U.S. intelligence is able to bring to bear legal and political pressure on them. And it's costly for them to hand out records one by one, so they have automated the process. Everyone should understand that when they add their friends to Facebook, they are doing free work for United States intelligence agencies in building this database for them.

Julian Assange (Credit: Wikicommon)How does Mr. Assange come to be in possession of this knowledge? I suspect he made a few rather large logical leaps, based on the confidential document WikiLeaks just made available on PublicIntelligence.net: Facebook's 2010 Law Enforcement Guidelines.