Conspiracy to Commit Espionage

A United States intelligence analyst leaks classified documents

A United States intelligence analyst called Bradley Manning, who was based in Iraq, entered restricted servers in late 2009 and released thousands of private military documents and war logs to the whistleblower website WikiLeaks. A video of US helicopter crew members laughing at civilian fatalities in Baghdad was included in the content. Two correspondents from Reuter’s were among the fatalities. The video was revealed by Julian Assange, the leader of Wiki leaks, who also wanted the information to be published in major newspapers around the world to make a larger impact. Over 500,000 classified government documents were released to the public a few weeks afterward. Julian was accused of communicating with Manning directly but he claimed he had avoided any contact in order to evade charges of conspiracy to commit espionage and be criminally liable for solicitation of material. A hacker contacted by Bradley alerted the pentagon that they might have a security breach and Bradley was arrested.

Critical evaluation of the terrorism content

Modern technology and the post 9/11 data security reforms provided more accessibility to information, since previously compartmentalized data or stove piped data was integrated and shared in real time. Therefore, Bradley could easily share state secrets through his social media, computer students and hacker friends. Being a confused in his twenties, learning about his Gay identity and being tortured for it were some of the qualities that could identify him to be a potential leak. However, the fact that he could bring unclassified information on the base and download confidential information on a memory stick without supervision raises a red flag. There was also no software in place to detect such malpractices and prevent any act of terrorism through confidential information. Traditional media stations started portraying Wiki Leaks as a terrorist supporting group. The classified documents also revealed that detainees held at Guantanamo bay were linked to terrorist activities that involved either al-Qaida or the Taliban. The families of those individuals who identified were at risk since the Taliban retaliated against the foreign nationals who corroborated with the United States.

References

http://video.pbs.org/video/1946795242 WikiSecrets. (n.d.). Retrieved August 10, 2017, from http://www.pbs.org/video/frontline-wikisecrets/