SPIEGEL Interview with Julian Assange: 'We Are Drowning in Material'

[Disir]

In an interview, Julian Assange, 44, talks about the comeback of the WikiLeaks whistleblowing platform and his desire to provide assistance to a German parliamentary committee that is investigating mass NSA spying.


SPIEGEL: Let's talk about politicians. Why have politicians -- who had to learn, thanks to WikiLeaks and Edward Snowden, that their phones are tapped and their emails are read by English-speaking spies -- reacted in such a timid, slow and lame way to these revelations?

Assange: Why are they playing it down? Angela Merkel had to look tough because she didn't want to be seen as a weak leader, but I reckon she came to the conclusion the Americans aren't going to change. All that US intelligence information is very valuable for the German foreign intelligence agency, the Bundesnachrichtendienst. Please imagine for a moment the German government complains about being spied on and the Americans just say: Okay, we will give you more stuff, which they have stolen from France. When the French complain, they get more stuff, which was stolen from Germany. The NSA spends a lot of resources obtaining information, but throwing a few crumbs to France and Germany when they start whining about being victims costs nothing, digital copies cost nothing.

SPIEGEL: If it worked like that, it would be utterly embarrassing for the German and the French governments.

Assange: It's sad. It seems like German politicians think this debate makes us look weak and creates conflict with the Americans. So we better play the surveillance issue down. If you knew as a German politician that American intelligence agencies have been collecting intensively on 125 top-level politicians and officials over decades, you would recall some of the conversations you had in all these years and you would then understand that the United States has all those conversations, and that it could take down the Merkel cabinet any time it feels like it, by simply leaking portions of those conversations to journalists.

SPIEGEL: Do you see a potential blackmail situation?

Assange: They wouldn't leak transcripts of tapped phone calls as that would draw focus to the spying itself. The way intelligence services launder intercepts is to extract the facts expressed during conversations; for example to say to their contacts in the media, "I think you should look into this connection between this politician and that person, what they did on that particular day."

SPIEGEL: Have you got a documented example in which this sort of tactic has been used?

Assange: We haven't published one yet about a German politician, but there are examples of prominent Muslims in different countries about whom it was leaked that they had been browsing porn. Blackmail or representational destruction from intercepts is part of the repertoire used.

SPIEGEL: Who uses these methods?

Assange: The British GCHQ has its own department for such methods called JTRIG. They include blackmail, fabricating videos, fabricating SMS texts in bulk, even creating fake businesses with the same names as real businesses the United Kingdom wants to marginalize in some region of the world, and encouraging people to order from the fake business and selling them inferior products, so that the business gets a bad reputation. That sounds like a lunatic conspiracy theory, but it is concretely documented in the GCHQ material allegedly provided by Edward Snowden.

SPIEGEL Interview with WikiLeaks Head Julian Assange - SPIEGEL ONLINE

It's going to get a lot more interesting.

 

[shadow355]

In an interview, Julian Assange, 44, talks about the comeback of the WikiLeaks whistleblowing platform and his desire to provide assistance to a German parliamentary committee that is investigating mass NSA spying.


SPIEGEL: Let's talk about politicians. Why have politicians -- who had to learn, thanks to WikiLeaks and Edward Snowden, that their phones are tapped and their emails are read by English-speaking spies -- reacted in such a timid, slow and lame way to these revelations?

Assange: Why are they playing it down? Angela Merkel had to look tough because she didn't want to be seen as a weak leader, but I reckon she came to the conclusion the Americans aren't going to change. All that US intelligence information is very valuable for the German foreign intelligence agency, the Bundesnachrichtendienst. Please imagine for a moment the German government complains about being spied on and the Americans just say: Okay, we will give you more stuff, which they have stolen from France. When the French complain, they get more stuff, which was stolen from Germany. The NSA spends a lot of resources obtaining information, but throwing a few crumbs to France and Germany when they start whining about being victims costs nothing, digital copies cost nothing.

SPIEGEL: If it worked like that, it would be utterly embarrassing for the German and the French governments.

Assange: It's sad. It seems like German politicians think this debate makes us look weak and creates conflict with the Americans. So we better play the surveillance issue down. If you knew as a German politician that American intelligence agencies have been collecting intensively on 125 top-level politicians and officials over decades, you would recall some of the conversations you had in all these years and you would then understand that the United States has all those conversations, and that it could take down the Merkel cabinet any time it feels like it, by simply leaking portions of those conversations to journalists.

SPIEGEL: Do you see a potential blackmail situation?

Assange: They wouldn't leak transcripts of tapped phone calls as that would draw focus to the spying itself. The way intelligence services launder intercepts is to extract the facts expressed during conversations; for example to say to their contacts in the media, "I think you should look into this connection between this politician and that person, what they did on that particular day."

SPIEGEL: Have you got a documented example in which this sort of tactic has been used?

Assange: We haven't published one yet about a German politician, but there are examples of prominent Muslims in different countries about whom it was leaked that they had been browsing porn. Blackmail or representational destruction from intercepts is part of the repertoire used.

SPIEGEL: Who uses these methods?

Assange: The British GCHQ has its own department for such methods called JTRIG. They include blackmail, fabricating videos, fabricating SMS texts in bulk, even creating fake businesses with the same names as real businesses the United Kingdom wants to marginalize in some region of the world, and encouraging people to order from the fake business and selling them inferior products, so that the business gets a bad reputation. That sounds like a lunatic conspiracy theory, but it is concretely documented in the GCHQ material allegedly provided by Edward Snowden.

SPIEGEL Interview with WikiLeaks Head Julian Assange - SPIEGEL ONLINE

It's going to get a lot more interesting.

I have overtime, ON MY long break. I will miss church. I picked a shift, rather than get forced to a shift I will not have to work.

Some people get their "long break' each month, and overtime...sometimes is picked only when it is convenient for others. I get seven days off each month, and if I am correct, I have only gotten the long break for April and May off. I am scheduled to work ( depending on the calendar ) 15 to 17 days a month, with a 7 day break. Some people get their seven day break, and some do not...they are forced to work.

Some of the co-workers in my department get their long break in the summer, and days they want off...then come the late fall they sign up for overtime for days at a time....as to have Thanksgiving and Christmas money. Signing up for overtime, leaving some people in my department without. For some people in my department, overtime is not about pulling your fair share, or working when you are supposed to...it is about working overtime when it is only convenient, and it has been going on for the past 14 1/2 years I have been here. The first shift.......the shift that WAS led by another foreman when I first started here, his dad was a Fire Chief - some of his people only worked overtime.....when they wanted. When they needed money for vacation, a trip to the beach, Thanksgiving, or Christmas....then they worked overtime. In the summer, it was to the pool with the kids, or take the boat out on the river, AND SOME of the shift supervisors went along with it, FORCING others to work over....when they were not due to be forced on the rotary board. If some people did take overtime.....it was the shift right after their normal shift, or the shift right before they cam back from break.....not in the middle of their time off...so they got "X" amount of days off......straight in a row.

I like to camp, I like to visit my niece in another state, and I have things to do. But if one of my co-workers says..."I can't work overtime..I have to do this and that, then they are not forced to work overtime."

Some of the shift supervisors in my department - current and prior supervisors, are not fair when it comes to overtime and forcing people to work over.

Manipulated and fabricated overtime scheduling ....as I believe, to inconvenience some of the other personnel in the department, some people still get off more than the 40 hours we are only allowed. Rules for some people in my department apply, and some the rules do not.


Shadow 355

 

[Disir]

Fabrication is an interesting choice of words.

 

[Bleipriester]

Counterintelligence of European countries is a joke. The term counterintelligence has not even been mentioned in context with the spy affair. In 2008, Germany rejected a NSA plan, but this plan has been implemented anyhow. And the NSA has a dirty little helper, the BND, that is spying on his own people by proxy. What a mess.