Internet activism, hacktivism, or hactivism, is the use of computer-based techniques such as hacking as a form of civil disobedience to promote a political agenda or social change. With roots in hacker culture and hacker ethics, its ends are often related to free speech, human rights, or freedom of information movements.
Cryptome is an online library and 501(c)(3) private foundation created in 1996 by John Young and Deborah Natsios closed in 2023 and reopened soon afterward. The site collected information about freedom of expression, privacy, cryptography, dual-use technologies, national security, intelligence, and government secrecy.
Kevin Lee Poulsen is an American convicted fraudster, former black-hat hacker and a contributing editor at The Daily Beast.
WikiLeaks is a non-profit media organisation and publisher of leaked documents. It is funded by donations and media partnerships. It has published classified documents and other media provided by anonymous sources. It was founded in 2006 by Julian Assange. Kristinn Hrafnsson is its editor-in-chief. Its website states that it has released more than ten million documents and associated analyses. WikiLeaks' most recent publication of original documents was in 2019 and its most recent publication was in 2021. From November 2022, numerous documents on the organisation's website became inaccessible. In 2023, Assange said that WikiLeaks is no longer able to publish due to his imprisonment and the effect that US government surveillance and WikiLeaks' funding restrictions were having on potential whistleblowers.
Jacob Appelbaum is an American independent journalist, computer security researcher, artist, hacker and teacher. Appelbaum, who earned his PhD from the Eindhoven University of Technology, first became notable for his work as a core member of the Tor Project, a free software network designed to provide online anonymity. But it was Appelbaum's work with WikiLeaks and his journalism at Der Spiegel based on the NSA documents leaked by Edward Snowden that made him famous, status accentuated by his standing-in for Julian Assange at computer security and hacker forums when Assange could no longer travel to the United States. Under the pseudonym "ioerror", Appelbaum was an active member of the Cult of the Dead Cow hacker collective from 2008 to 2016. He was the co-founder of the San Francisco hackerspace Noisebridge with Mitch Altman. He worked for Kink.com and Greenpeace and volunteered for the Ruckus Society and the Rainforest Action Network. He was on the Technical Advisory Board of the Freedom of the Press Foundation.
The Centre for Investigative Journalism (CIJ) is a British independent charity providing training to journalists, researchers, producers and students in the practice and methodology of investigative journalism. It was incorporated as a Company Limited by Guarantee in June 2005 and registered as a Charity in March 2007 by founders Gavin MacFadyen, Michael Gillard, Brian Basham and Simon Albury. Using grants from the Lorana Sullivan Foundation, the CIJ organises annual three-day summer conference and courses in data journalism and investigative techniques. It has provided training to thousands of journalists, researchers and students from over 35 countries. The CIJ is based at the School of Journalism at Goldsmiths, University of London, which has held the CIJ summer conference each year since 2014.
Julian Paul Assange is an Australian editor, publisher, and activist who founded WikiLeaks in 2006. He came to international attention in 2010 after WikiLeaks published a series of leaks from Chelsea Manning, a United States Army intelligence analyst: footage of a U.S. airstrike in Baghdad, U.S. military logs from the Afghanistan and Iraq wars, and U.S. diplomatic cables. Assange has won multiple awards for publishing and journalism.
Laura Poitras is an American director and producer of documentary films.
WikiLeaks, a whistleblowing website founded by Julian Assange, has received praise as well as criticism from the public, hacktivists, journalist organisations and government officials. The organisation has revealed human rights abuses and was the target of an alleged "cyber war". Allegations have been made that Wikileaks worked with or was exploited by the Russian government and acted in a partisan manner during the 2016 U.S. presidential election.
Tails, or "The Amnesic Incognito Live System", is a security-focused Debian-based Linux distribution aimed at preserving privacy and anonymity against surveillance. It connects to the Internet exclusively through the anonymity network Tor. The system is designed to be booted as a live DVD or live USB and never writes to the hard drive or SSD, leaving no digital footprint on the machine unless explicitly told to do so. It can also be run as a virtual machine, with some additional security risks.
GlobaLeaks is free and open source software intended to enable secure and anonymous whistleblowing initiatives.
SecureDrop is a free software platform for secure communication between journalists and sources (whistleblowers). It was originally designed and developed by Aaron Swartz and Kevin Poulsen under the name DeadDrop. James Dolan also co-created the software.
Edward Joseph Snowden is an American-Russian former NSA intelligence contractor and whistleblower who leaked classified documents revealing the existence of global surveillance programs. He became a naturalized Russian citizen in 2022.
Sarah Harrison is a British former WikiLeaks section editor. She worked with the WikiLeaks' legal defence and has been described as Julian Assange's closest adviser. Harrison accompanied National Security Agency whistleblower Edward Snowden on a high-profile flight from Hong Kong to Moscow while he was sought by the United States government.
Global surveillance and journalism is a subject covering journalism or reporting of governmental espionage, which gained worldwide attention after the Global surveillance disclosures of 2013 that resulted from Edward Snowden's leaks. Since 2013, many leaks have emerged from different government departments in the US, which confirm that the National Security Agency (NSA) spied on US citizens and foreign enemies alike. Journalists were attacked for publishing the leaks and were regarded in the same light as the whistleblowers who gave them the information. Subsequently, the US government made arrests, raising concerns about the freedom of the press.
John Napier Tye is a former official of the U.S. State Department who came forward in 2014 as a whistleblower seeking to publicize certain electronic surveillance practices of the U.S. government under Executive Order 12333. He later co-founded a legal organization, Whistleblower Aid, intended to help whistleblowers in multiple sectors forward their concerns without incurring legal liability.
Truth & Transparency Foundation was a whistleblowing organization inspired by WikiLeaks, which focused on exposing documents from the leadership of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. Founded in December 2016 and ceasing operations in April 2022, Truth & Transparency was a nonprofit newsroom dedicated to religious accountability through impact journalism.
James Ball is a British journalist and author. He has worked for The Grocer, The Guardian, WikiLeaks, BuzzFeed, The New European and The Washington Post and is the author of several books. He is the recipient of several awards for journalism and was a member of The Guardian team that won the Pulitzer Prize for investigative journalism.
James S. Dolan was an American computer security expert who, with Aaron Swartz and Kevin Poulsen, co-developed SecureDrop, a widely used secure digital platform for sources to anonymously submit materials to journalists.
