Julian Assange tells Forbes 50% of Leaked Documents Relate to Private Sector

[sabrina 1]

This may be the real reason why there is such an effort to silence Wikileaks.

Last month, Julian Assange was interviewed by Andy Greenberg from Forbes Magazine. During this interview, Assange revealed that some of the information they have received will expose Corporate corruption in the Banking Industry.

Wikileaks had turned off its submissions page temporarily because they could not keep up with the information they were receiving Assange told Greenberg:



Interviewing Julian Assange, London, Nov. 11, 2010. Photo: Jillian Edelstein For Forbes

An Interview With WikiLeaks’ Julian Assange

Andy Greenberg: And this gap between your publishing resources and your submissions is why the site’s submission function has been down since October?

Julian Assange: We have too much.

AG: Before you turned off submissions, how many leaks were you getting a day?

JA: As I said, it was increasing exponentially. When we get lots of press, we can get a spike of hundreds or thousands. The quality is sometimes not as high. If the front page of the Pirate Bay links to us, as they have done on occasion, we can get a lot of submissions, but the quality is not as high.

AG: How much of this trove of documents that you’re sitting on is related to the private sector?

JA: About fifty percent.

AG: You’ve been focused on the U.S. military mostly in the last year. Does that mean you have private sector-focused leaks in the works?

JA: Yes. If you think about it, we have a publishing pipeline that’s increasing linearly, and an exponential number of leaks, so we’re in a position where we have to prioritize our resources so that the biggest impact stuff gets released first.

AG: So do you have very high impact corporate stuff to release then?

JA: Yes, but maybe not as high impact…I mean, it could take down a bank or two.

AG: That sounds like high impact.

JA: But not as big an impact as the history of a whole war. But it depends on how you measure these things.

Greenberg pressed him for more information on what Wikileaks has in its possession regarding the Private Sector:

AG: These megaleaks, as you call them, we haven’t seen any of those from the private sector.

JA: No, not at the same scale as for the military.

AG: Will we?

JA: Yes. We have one related to a bank coming up, that’s a megaleak. It’s not as big a scale as the Iraq material, but it’s either tens or hundreds of thousands of documents depending on how you define it.

AG: Is it a U.S. bank?

JA: Yes, it’s a U.S. bank.

AG: One that still exists?

JA: Yes, a big U.S. bank.

AG: The biggest U.S. bank?

JA: No comment.

AG: When will it happen?

JA: Early next year. I won’t say more.

AG: What do you want to be the result of this release?

JA: I’m not sure.

It will give a true and representative insight into how banks behave at the executive level in a way that will stimulate investigations and reforms, I presume.

Usually when you get leaks at this level, it’s about one particular case or one particular violation. For this, there’s only one similar example. It’s like the Enron emails. Why were these so valuable? When Enron collapsed, through court processes, thousands and thousands of emails came out that were internal, and it provided a window into how the whole company was managed. It was all the little decisions that supported the flagrant violations.

This will be like that. Yes, there will be some flagrant violations, unethical practices that will be revealed, but it will also be all the supporting decision-making structures and the internal executive ethos that cames out, and that’s tremendously valuable. Like the Iraq War Logs, yes there were mass casualty incidents that were very newsworthy, but the great value is seeing the full spectrum of the war.

You could call it the ecosystem of corruption. But it’s also all the regular decision making that turns a blind eye to and supports unethical practices: the oversight that’s not done, the priorities of executives, how they think they’re fulfilling their own self-interest. The way they talk about it.

It looks like someone in the Banking Industry has been leaking information.

Since Wikileaks always makes good on its promises, there are probably many people who are very nervous right now and would do anything to stop this from happening.

In 2009, Wikileaks released documents exposing corruption in Iceland's Kaupthing Bank. The Bank threatened Wilileaks with legal action, claiming to be represented by U.S. lawyers. They demanded that Wikileaks take down the incriminating documents:

Icelandic bank Kaupthing threat to WikiLeaks over confidential large exposure report, 31 Jul 2009

> Having regard to the abovementioned the bank hereby respectfully
> requests that the content on the abovementoined link is removed
> immediately !
>
> If the operators of Wikileaks fail to do so Kaupthing bank will
> take all applicable and appropriate measures according to law. We
> have already obtained US legal council to follow this matter.
>
> Your attention is furthermore drown to the fact that individual
> parties affected by the publication might take legal action and
> demand damages against you for infringement of their right to
> privacy.

Wikileaks responded:

No. We will not assist the remains of Kaupthing, or its clients, to hide its dirty laundry from the global community. Attempts by Kaupthing or its agents to discover the source of the document in question may be a criminal violation of both Belgium source protection laws and the Swedish constitution. Who is your US counsel?

Jay Lim.

Kaupthing Bank

By 9 October 2008, Kaupthing Bank HF was forced into government receivership - only days after a crisis at Landsbanki placed it into government control.<9> Due to the crisis throughout the Icelandic financial system, all trading in the country's equity markets was suspended on 13 October 2008. On 29 July 2009 Wikileaks exposed a confidential 210 page document listing Kaupthing's exposure to loans ranging from 45 million to 1.25 billion Euros.<10> The leaked presentation revealed the bank had loaned billions of euros to its major shareholders, including a total of €1.43 billion to Exista and subsidiaries which own 23% of the bank.<11>

On 9 December 2009, Daniel Thordarsson, former asset manager and Stefnir Ingi Agnarsson, former stock broker, both of Kaupthing Hf, were sentenced to an eight month prison term by the Reykjavik District Court.

The pair was charged with putting in offers to buy Exista shares six times in January and February last year shortly before the close of business, so that the offers would affect the end-of-day value of Exista shares. The charges were of submitting false purchase enquiries and of share price manipulation.

Prosecutions and convictions resulting from the exposure of corruption that led to the collapse of Iceland's economy. This is what a real news media does.

Iceland was the first European country to collapse economically, but it is now on the road to recovery. The only way to recover is to find the culprits, prosecute them as they are doing in Iceland, try to retrieve some of the money taken and in Iceland's case, they are prosecuting government officials who facilitated the corruption.

It's easy to see why Wikileaks has so many enemies. And why they have won awards for their work.

[Autumn]

1. So I wonder if this is what the Government and

our leaders are really trying to hide? And if what one poster said is true the Military is charging Manning for all the leaks. WHY?

[sabrina 1]

3. 'charging Manning with all the leaks'.

I doubt very much if the material on the Banks came from Manning. I don't see how he would have had access to this. It seems they are internal memos from the bank in question so I think there are other leakers.

Our news media is responsible for the many assumptions being made regarding what Manning leaked and for giving the impression that there is only one leaker.

I think there are more leakers than Manning ~

[jwirr]

2. One of our banks that is too big to fail?

[sabrina 1]

4. All of our big banks with friends in Congress, are too big to fail.

But then, the public never saw what goes on behind the scenes. It will be very hard to claim 'too big to fail', if there is clear evidence of corruption in these documents.

Many people think it is the Bank of America. I kind of hope it's Goldman Sachs which is where I think a lot of the corruption can be found.

[truth2power]

17. Goldman Sachs would be my choice. In Matt Taibbi's, "Griftopia",

the last chapter is an updated version of his article, "The Great American Bubble Machine" which first appeared in Rolling Stone .

From Taibbi's preface to that chapter. Does not appear in the original article:

"During the winter of 2008-9, when I was first feeling my way through the first story I was writing for Rolling Stone about the financial crisis, I started to notice something amusing. One of the keys to talking to sources about any subject is clicking with their sense of humor, and I was noticing that with a lot of the financial people I was calling, I was missing laugh cues whenever anyone mentioned the investment bank Goldman Sachs. No one ever just referenced 'Goldman'; they would say, 'those motherfuckers' or those 'cocksuckers' or 'those motherfucking cocksucking assholes at Goldman Sachs.' It was a name spoken with such contempt that you could almost hear people holding the phone away from their faces as they talked, the way you do with the baggie you have to pick up curbing your dog on the streets of New York."

<snip>

"....Goldman is not a company of geniuses, it's a company of criminals. And far from being the best fruit of a democratic, capitalist society, it's the apotheosis of the Grifter Era, a parasitic enterprise that has attached itself to the American government and taxpayer and shamelessly engorged itself on us all."

Yes, I so hope it's Goldman.

[sabrina 1]

23. If only it is Goldman Sachs.

This is a perfect description of that corrupt institution ~

"....Goldman is not a company of geniuses, it's a company of criminals. And far from being the best fruit of a democratic, capitalist society, it's the apotheosis of the Grifter Era, a parasitic enterprise that has attached itself to the American government and taxpayer and shamelessly engorged itself on us all."

I don't think there is much hope for this country until all of these corrupt organizations are brought down. As of now, it would appear that they ARE the U.S. government. It seems we've had a coup going on over the past number of decades and it seems to be complete.

[postulater]

5. It would be interesting to see docs on insurance companies and senators.

[sabrina 1]

10. We might see some. He says that Wikileaks has hundreds of

thousands of documents from the corporate world.

I would love to see some investigations and prosecutions finally, of those who crashed this economy.

I feel certain that there are whistle-blowers in the corporate world who would appreciate a news organization like Wikileaks.

Insurance Corps making payments to which Senators, discussing who was the most likely to be bought off. That would be interesting.

[Voice for Peace]

6. good interview - should be read by his detractors on DU & elsewhere

[sabrina 1]

7. Yes it is a good interview. What stands out is how he views

issues, and what his priorities are. When he states that the Corporate/Banking leaks are not as important as the 'War Logs'. Clearly he considers the slaughter and torture of human beings to be of much more importance than corruption in the Banking system.

Kudos to him for that, but to the U.S. Government, there is nothing more important than protecting Wall St. This might be why he didn't expect the deranged reaction he's been getting. They didn't respond nearly so badly to the War Logs. But it was not long after this interview that they really started going after him.

Money is everything here. Far more important than human lives. He is a humanitarian and it shows in this interview.

[suffragette]

8. You have a great point here

It does look like the increase in pressure occurred after Assange started discussing the forthcoming banking revelations, especially the way they corralled him from traveling to other countries and intervened to keep him from moving to Switzerland.

K&R to this post as well as to the OP.

[sabrina 1]

9. Yes, I'm not sure when it was first revealed that Wikileaks had

these Corporate documents. But the real attacks from this government began after after this interview. And it was after this interview that he was arrested. Someone is desperate to get him custody.

Nice to see you as always, Suffragette :hi:

[suffragette]

13. Yes, and the actions like U.S. ambassador "warning" the Swiss

not to allow him to move there took place after that as well:
http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=102x4644621#4644718

Great to see you as well. Holiday hug to you: :hug:

[sabrina 1]

21. Thanks for that link. I remember that.

It's not that much of a surprise to see the influence of the U.S. over the Swiss. But didn't the Swiss keep an account for Pinochet open, I don't recall the details, but do remember some controversy over that a while ago?

I will have to look it up again.

I wish Wikileaks would reveal what they have sooner than planned, the efforts to silence them are pretty scary at this point.

Holiday :hug: to you also :-)

[truth2power]

16. Yes, as you said, "Money is everything here". And, as I'm sure you're aware,

it's all interconnected, the money and the wars, that is. So, to the extent that the financial criminals can be taken down, the whole war-machine is at risk, too.

Thus, the reason those in govt. are peeing themselves right now. Money is the foundation. Start hacking away at that and they're all screwed.

edit> clarity

[sabrina 1]

18. Yes, I wish I could find it now, but a few months ago Assange

made a comment about that, about how it was the financial industry that was the most important.

[Oilwellian]

11. I'm rubbing my hands with great anticipation

and hoping this arrogant fuck is involved. :D

[HEyHEY]

12. He shoulda released that shit first.

[sabrina 1]

20. In the interview he explains how they choose what to release

and how they want the maximum political impact of what they publish. Whistle-blowers take great risks to get the material to them, so they do owe them the maximum exposure, once they verify the authenticity of the leaks.

Also, I think because, as he says, they have so many Corporate documents, (tens, maybe hundreds of thousands of them) they had a lot of work to do to determine what to publish, what was the most important etc. As someone said previously, it sometimes takes months after receiving material, to be able to publish it. Eg, they must be sure it is authentic and that they are not being set up for a lawsuit or anything.

I am assuming they have given this material to the major news organization they chose for the Diplomatic Cables also. That is a smart thing to do as it helps them verify everything.

So, I think, while they've had the material for a while, they were not ready to publish it.

Assange did recently warn people to take their money out of BOA although he would not confirm that they are the bank exposed in the leaks.

[IScreamSundays]

14. I have been supportive of the leaks of wiki but...

I have to say if there is a bank they are going to give up; then there is a real possibility of the demise of the bank being staged.
I say this after months and months of reading about fraudclosure. There are several banks that are involved. It is a criminal conspiracy beyond comprehension.
If BOA goes down, it is because it will be the scapegoat. They are the ones that assimilated Country Wide where a lot of the fraud transpired.
Someone is gonna have to take the hit. There is too much bad paper that the banks are refusing to buy back. They are contractually obligated to do so.
They sold a lot their junk to Fannie and Freddie. So you and I are holding the bag.....as always. That is why the Bernanke is burning up the presses 24-7 to recapitalize the banks and keep the fraud from the public.
They can only keep the charade up for so long. Something will have to give.
So they will offer up a sacrificial lamb. My guess is that it is BOA.
But don't be fooled, it that is the case, you can rest assured Wiki is an intelligence operation, or operating with one.

[glinda]

15. Great interview.

[russspeakeasy]

19. If you had a friend in congress, you wouldn't have any problems either

[xchrom]

22. very interesting. -- can't wait for it to get out. nt

[defendandprotect]

24. k/r -- back later to actually read it all --!!

[sabrina 1]

25. Thank you. I hope they release this information as soon as

possible. We need to know what caused the collapse of the world's economy and there needs to be some accountability finally.

[Kaleko]

26. 'nother fine post. Thanks!

[democracy1st]

27. thanks great post