The Future of Government Secrecy
WikiLeaks, the Swedish website that publishes sensitive government and corporate information while preserving the anonymity of its sources, has come under serious criticism in recent days. Last week, authorities arrested Bradley Manning, a former Army intelligence analyst suspected of supplying WikiLeaks with 260,000 secret cables between U.S. diplomats and their contacts around the world. In addition, Mr. Manning is suspected of leaking footage of a U.S. helicopter gunning down a crowd of men in Iraq that included two journalists from Reuters. Most commentators find that WikiLeaks will drastically alter the government's ability to protect classified information. Whether or not that is a good thing is a more divisive question.