full-disclosure - Re: WikiLeaks

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Message-ID: <4CAF2A17.7030403@kamens.us>
Date: Fri, 08 Oct 2010 10:26:31 -0400
From: Jonathan Kamens <jik@...ens.us>
To: "full-disclosure@...ts.grok.org.uk" <full-disclosure@...ts.grok.org.uk>
Subject: Re: WikiLeaks

  On 10/8/2010 9:41 AM, J. Oquendo wrote:
> Harry Behrens wrote:
>> And it is indeed a security issue - in fact of international proportions..
> ...
> "Security issue of international proportions" my ass.
If I may try to interpret what's going on here (and apologies to both 
parties if I get it wrong), I think Harry Behrens and J. Oquendo see the 
world in very different ways, and they mean two very different things by 
the term "security issue" in this context.

H. believes that Wikileaks is doing critical work to protect democracy, 
civil rights, freedom, etc. around the world. To him, for Wikileaks to 
be down is not a "security issue" in the sense of an opportunity for 
people's PC's to get rooted and turned into a zombie botnet, but rather 
a "security issue" in that the lack of a functioning site such as 
Wikileaks threatens our lives and liberties in real life.

J. is not so sanguine about the mission of Wikileaks and/or how well it 
fulfills it and/or how important it is for protecting our lives and 
liberties.  As we see from this comment:
> Life goes on,
> people go on, no government, agency, official, business nor individual
> stopped functioning, living, breathing because Wikileaks went down.
As for this comment:
> Reality is, outside of a "very small segment" of individuals, no one
> cares to be quite frank.
H. would probably respond something to the effect of, "Yes, you're 
right, most people don't care that their essential liberties are being 
taken away, and that people's very lives are being threatened by the 
kind of misdeeds on which Wikileaks shines the light of day."

It's likely that most of us on this list fall somewhere between the two 
extremes of opinion I've postulated here, and again I apologize if I'm 
mischaracterizing anyone's views.

In any case, if I'm right that this is the kind of "security issue" that 
J. was referring to, then I agree with others who have said that this 
discussion does not belong on full-disclosure, and this will be my first 
and last message on the topic.

   jik

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