On Friday, December 21st, WikiLeaks released a collection of “shopping lists” from American embassies around the world. The release was accompanied by stories from their media partners documenting things like “https://archive.fo/nXbqw“>an embassy worried a dam might break, and tried to be ready.” WikiLeaks’ media partners said that WikiLeaks had “revealed” this information, and that it was an “exclusive” for Repubblica and Der Spiegel (see update below).
However, WikiLeaks didn’t reveal the information, and none of it was an exclusive.
The 16,000 documents, as WikiLeaks admits in their press release, were publicly released by the U.S. government in real time. As WikiLeaks also concedes, the documents “can be searched via both the search function on the embassy’s website and third-party search engines,” even after the links were no longer advertised. The “exclusive” information “revealed” by WikiLeaks had not only long been published, it was already indexed by Google, in some instances more thoroughly than WikiLeaks’ database. Like more than 1/3 of WikiLeaks’ publications, this data was already public after being officially released.
The new #WikiLeaks release isn't a leak, or a hack. Like more than 1/3 of their publications, it's public information that the government released, and WL made a bit more searchable. Useful, but overblown and sure to be distorted by lazy journalists. https://t.co/YNTcGd5hmQ
— Emma Best (U//FOUO) 🏳️🌈 (@NatSecGeek) December 21, 2018
In some cases a simple google search would reveal the same exact documents that WikiLeaks’ “exclusive” database revealed.
I'm not exaggerating: a basic Google query finds literally the exact same documents, published publicly by the government..
All of them.
Every one.
How do you think #WikiLeaks found them? pic.twitter.com/aKvLIACsZ9
— Emma Best (U//FOUO) 🏳️🌈 (@NatSecGeek) December 21, 2018
In other instances, WikiLeaks’ database appears to include less than what can be found with a simple google search.
That's not even all of it… Google easily finds relevant documents #WikiLeaks doesn't list.
[slow clap] pic.twitter.com/pbn3TSvmGO— Emma Best (U//FOUO) 🏳️🌈 (@NatSecGeek) December 21, 2018
While any release of government information is valuable, and archiving the documents is always an endeavor to be cheered, the misrepresentation of the information does a disservice to everyone involved. Over-hyping the releases, describing already public information was “WikiLeaks reveals” and referring to the information as something that is “exclusive” distorts and misframes the information. The information is welcome, but the distortion of it is inexcusable. There was nothing “exclusive” about the information and no one “reveals” anything by pointing to already public but overlooked information.
Update: After publication, Stefania Maurizi responded on Twitter to clarify the intended meaning in referring to the information as exclusive: neither the information nor the access was exclusive, however early access to WikiLeaks’ database was.
3. .@NatSecGeek thanks to this process, it was possible to write a story in the public interest and challenge the “official” press releases which are always positive and reassuring. Exclusivity refers to the fact that #WikiLeaks shared the database with 2 partners, that’s all
— stefania maurizi (@SMaurizi) December 21, 2018
Stefania Maurizi also challenged the accessibility of the information cited in her article. The document, however, could be readily found through a google search – the inaccessibility arose from people not knowing to search those types of documents.
I know exactly how difficult it is: you can find it with Google. https://t.co/Cku61XFGlS
— Emma Best (U//FOUO) 🏳️🌈 (@NatSecGeek) December 21, 2018
Her tweet in English also repeated the language describing it as an “exclusive” that was ‘revealed’ by WikiLeaks. This post is meant to criticize this framing and the associated editorial decisions, not the underlying facts or value of the information.
