Assange says leaks show CIA's 'devastating incompetence'
Assange says leaks show CIA's 'devastating incompetence'
By Dario THUBURN March 9, 2017
London (AFP) - WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange on Thursday
accused the CIA of "devastating incompetence" for failing to protect
its hacking secrets and said he would work with tech companies to develop fixes
for them.
"This is a historic act of devastating incompetence,
to have created such an arsenal and then stored it all in one place,"
Assange said.
"It is impossible to keep effective control of cyber
weapons... If you build them, eventually you will lose them," Assange
said.
Assange was speaking in a press conference streamed live
from Ecuador's embassy in London, where he has been living as a fugitive from
justice since 2012.
He said his anti-secrecy website had "a lot more
information" about the Central Intelligence Agency's hacking operation but
would hold off on publishing it until WikiLeaks had spoken to tech
manufacturers.
"We have decided to work with them to give them some
exclusive access to the additional technical details we have so fixes can be
developed and then pushed out.
"Once this material is effectively disarmed by us we
will publish additional details about what has been occurring," he added.
- CIA questions Assange 'integrity' -
On Tuesday, WikiLeaks published nearly 9,000 documents it
said were part of a huge trove leaked from the CIA, describing it as the
largest ever publication of secret intelligence materials.
"This extraordinary collection, which amounts to
more than several hundred million lines of code, gives its possessor the entire
hacking capacity of the CIA," it said.
In Washington, the CIA, hit hard by the apparent leak of
much of its cyber-spying arsenal, defended itself while criticizing the
WikiLeaks founder.
"As we've said previously, Julian Assange is not
exactly a bastion of truth and integrity," said spokeswoman Heather Fritz
Horniak.
"Despite the efforts of Assange and his ilk, CIA
continues to aggressively collect foreign intelligence overseas to protect
America from terrorists, hostile nation states and other adversaries."
- Assange: CIA was 'careless' -
The documents showed that CIA hackers can turn a TV into
a listening device, bypass popular encryption apps, and possibly control one's
car.
Most experts believe the materials to be genuine, and US
media said Wednesday that the Federal Bureau of Investigation is opening a
criminal probe into the leak.
The investigation could focus on whether the CIA was
sloppy in its controls, or, as The Washington Post reported, it could be
"a major mole hunt" for a malicious leaker or turncoat inside the
agency.
WikiLeaks itself said the documents, hacking tools and
code came from an archive that had circulated among US government hackers and
private contractors.
"The CIA has been so careless to produce this
material. So do various cyber mafia already have it? Do foreign intelligence
agencies already have it? It's quite possible numerous people already might
have it," Assange said.
WikiLeaks has stunned the US government with a series of
publications of top secret political, diplomatic and intelligence materials in
recent years.
The CIA on Wednesday accused the group of endangering
Americans, helping US rivals and hampering the fight against terror threats
through its leaks.
"The American public should be deeply troubled by
any WikiLeaks disclosure designed to damage the intelligence community's
ability to protect America against terrorists and other adversaries."
"Such disclosures not only jeopardise US personnel
and operations, but also equip our adversaries with tools and information to do
us harm," Horniak said.
While refusing to confirm the authenticity of the
documents WikiLeaks published, Horniak stressed that hacking is a normal part
of its mission "to be innovative, cutting-edge, and the first line of
defence in protecting this country from enemies abroad."
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