Elephants in the Andaman and Nicobar Islands. Credit: Malini Shankar/IPS

By Ramy Srour
WASHINGTON, Feb 10 2014 (IPS)

A group of international organisations fighting illicit wildlife trafficking has unveiled a new website aimed at assisting whistleblowers who want to aid in the fight against wildlife crimes.

WildLeaks, the first platform of its kind, is an online portal where its creators say whistleblowers can safely and anonymously reveal information on wildlife crimes. Globally, this illegal trade is thought to be worth over 17 billion dollars a year, some of which is thought to be helping finance terrorism, particularly in Africa.“We encourage whistleblowers to use the completely anonymous process, especially if they live in oppressive regimes." -- Andrea Crosta

Officially launched on Feb. 6, WildLeaks is funded by the U.S.-based Elephant Action League (EAL) and run by a group of former law enforcement officers, journalists and environmental NGOs across five continents.

“The goal of WildLeaks is to facilitate the arrest and the prosecution of traffickers, corrupt government individuals, and anyone behind wildlife and forest crime,” Andrea Crosta, EAL’s co-founder and the central figure behind the WildLeaks initiative, told IPS.

Any individual who witnesses a wildlife crime or possesses any type of related information – documents, files, images or videos – can use the website to transmit that information to WildLeaks, using either of two routes of varying strength encryption.

The completely anonymous encryption route makes use of ‘Tor’ technology – more commonly known as the ‘Dark Net’ – and does not disclose the sender’s IP address or any other information.

“We encourage whistleblowers to use the completely anonymous process,” Crosta said, “especially if they live in oppressive regimes where communication is not free and where local governments themselves may actually be engaging in wildlife crime.”

The name of the new initiative is meant to resemble that of WikiLeaks, the group that has drawn much public attention over the last few years by disclosing secret U.S. government documents. But the WildLeaks initiative is designed to be substantially different from its namesake.

“First of all, we’re not after government or military documents,” Crosta said. “And second, while WikiLeaks tends to share everything with the media right away, for us that’s only the last option.”

Once WildLeaks receives any leaked information, the individuals and organisations behind the project will first assess its accuracy and reliability. Thereafter, WildLeaks will try to forward the findings to law enforcement agencies such as Interpol or to trusted government authorities.

However, if governments will not cooperate, the last option would be a leak to the media.

“It’s important to underscore that our goal is to work side by side with law enforcement agencies across the globe,” Crosta said. “We want to create a bridge between the public and law enforcement.”

Initial response to the new project has been positive.

“We strongly encourage anyone with information about wildlife crimes to report them to the appropriate law enforcement agency,” a spokesperson with the Humane Society of the United States (HSUS), the country’s largest animal protection organisation, told IPS when asked about the WildLeaks initiative.

Global momentum

The launch of WildLeaks comes only days before a major international anti-wildlife crime conference kicks off in London, on Feb. 11. Hosted by the British government, the conference will bring together key actors in the global wildlife community to craft a global response to the illicit killing and trading of wildlife and forests.

The movement against wildlife crimes has gathered a lot of momentum in recent months. Last week, the French government publicly crushed three tonnes of illegal ivory, the first European country to publicly destroy illegal ivory.

Last month, the Chinese government also publicly destroyed a large quantity of illegal ivory, and the U.S. government took a similar action last November.

Activists have generally welcomed the new global momentum.

Peter Knights, the executive director of WildAid, an advocacy group here, welcomed the Chinese government’s public crush.

“Every great journey starts with one small step. This is a very important first step from China and it should be encouraged,” Knights told IPS in an interview.

Today, the profits from illegal wildlife trafficking are widely believed to be larger than the trafficking of small arms, gold, diamonds and oil. The illegal trade of tiger skins and ivory tusks has led to the estimated death of over 50,000 elephants a year and to an estimated population of fewer than 3,500 wild tigers across Asia, the Environmental Investigation Agency reports.

Last month, the Washington-based Stimson Centre released a report in which it showed evidence of the strong links between wildlife poaching and the financing of international terrorism.

“There is very strong evidence today that groups in the Central African Republic, in Somalia, and in the DRC are heavily involved in poaching,” Varun Vira, an analyst with C4ADS, a security firm here, told reporters at the launch of the report last month.

Activists and analysts alike believe that one of the largest terrorist organisations on the African continent, Al Shabaab, funds much of its activity through the illegal trade of ivory.

The Obama administration, too, has taken some steps toward fighting illegal trafficking in wildlife products. In July 2013, the U.S. president signed the Executive Order on Combating Wildlife Trafficking, committing to assist “those governments in anti-wildlife trafficking activities when requested by foreign nations experiencing trafficking of protected wildlife.”

Obama has tasked several U.S. government agencies and departments with the enforcement of the new directive, including the Departments of Defence, Treasury, Homeland Security and the U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID).

Press freedom advocates here charge that the administration of President Barack Obama is engaged in a war on “leaks” of secret information that is without parallel in this country.

This aggressive stance is having a chilling effect on U.S. press freedoms, they say. On one hand, government officials are becoming increasingly wary of speaking with journalists. On the other, reporters fear future criminal prosecutions over leaked information.“One of the reasons behind this tense atmosphere is that the scope of national security as currently defined by the government is extremely broad." -- Steven Aftergood of FAS

On Thursday, the Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ), a non-profit organisation promoting press freedoms worldwide, released its first comprehensive report on the Obama administration’s surveillance practices and their effects on the domestic press. During the time that Obama has been in office, the number of individuals prosecuted by the Department of Justice (DOJ) for leaked information under the 1917 Espionage Act has seen a staggering increase.

“The Obama administration’s war on leaks … is in stark conflict with the president’s goal of increasing the federal government’s transparency,” Leonard Downie, Jr., the vice president at large of The Washington Post, said Thursday at the report’s Washington release.

Since 2009, a total of six government officials, plus two private contractors, have been subject to criminal prosecutions under the Espionage Act. Prior to that, only three officials had been charged in over nine decades. (Because of the government shutdown, the U.S. Department of Justice was unable to comment for this story.)

“The extremely aggressive approach by the current administration has led to an unusually high number of leak prosecutions,” Steven Aftergood, the director of the Government Secrecy Programme at the Federation of American Scientists (FAS), a security-focused non-profit organisation here, told IPS.

“This has created a polarised atmosphere where journalists are simply frightened by the prospect of future prosecution,” he said.

Broad definitions

Public outrage here exploded over another recent incident that saw the Department of Justice secretly seizing Associated Press (AP) telephone records. The secret seizures were part of a DOJ investigation over an AP story that had disclosed a covert U.S. intelligence operation in Yemen.

The DOJ informed the AP of the seizures in May, three months after it had seized the material. Following the AP incident, last month the Senate Judiciary Committee approved a new Media Shield Law, legislation that would protect journalists from being forced to reveal confidential material.

Yet critics, including many journalists, have warned that the law offers only a very narrow definition of journalists, as those individuals who are formally associated with a news media organisation.

“What is worrisome about the new shield law is that, for instance, it would restrict online bloggers and journalists who aren’t connected to a news media organisation from carrying out any journalistic act,” Jillian York, the director of the International Freedom of Expression programme at the Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF), an advocacy group, told IPS.

“Of course, that depends on your definition of a journalistic act. Although it’s not a clear definition, it should be as broad as possible so as to safeguard the free flow of information.”

Indeed, much of the current debate seems to be centred on the breadth or narrowness of definitions.

“One of the reasons behind this tense atmosphere is that the scope of national security as currently defined by the government is extremely broad,” FAS’s Aftergood says. “It includes areas that many people think ought to be subject to public debate.”

So, while the public and the media would like to see a freer environment for the flow of information, the government has so far adopted a broad view of national security that has enabled it to withhold large amounts of information from the public.

This change has come at a high price, critics say.

“What the recent leaks tell us is not just that the government is trying to restrict freedom of expression,” Larry Siems, the director of the Freedom to Write Programme at the PEN American Center, an advocacy group advancing free expression, told IPS. “They’re telling us that our government has been engaging in activities that run counter to our laws and to international humanitarian law.”

War on leaks

The most recent example of leaked information involves Edward J. Snowden, the former security contractor who was charged under the Espionage Act for leaking classified government information on phone and Internet surveillance by the U.S. and British governments. Snowden was recently granted asylum in Russia, as he faces prosecution here in the United States.

The Obama administration has also implemented a series of surveillance practices that have made it increasingly troublesome for government officials to approach the press.

The Insider Threat Programme, for instance, aims to eliminate leaks by government officials, ordering federal employees to report any suspicious behaviour by their colleagues. Forced to spy on each other, government officials are now reportedly becoming increasingly less willing to respond to calls from the media, for fear of future repercussions, according to The Washington Post’s Downey, Jr.

The administration’s mass surveillance is impacting on foreign journalists working in the United States, too.

“One of our more troublesome findings is that foreign journalists currently in the U.S. lack any legal protection U.S. reporters may now have,” CPJ’s Joel Simon told IPS. “Unfortunately, they need to operate under the assumption that their communication is not secure.”

Bradley Manning, the army private whose leaks of classified information and subsequent prosecution have been the subject of fierce international debate for over three years, was sentenced to 35 years in military prison Wednesday, but his legal team and supporters say they will fight the sentence.

Bradley Manning. Credit: public domain

“It’s tragic,” Nathan Fuller of the Bradley Manning Support Network told IPS minutes after the sentence was read. “It sends a terrible message for holding government accountable.”

Colonel Denise Lind, the sole judge in the case, read Manning’s sentence at the courthouse in Fort Meade, Maryland, near the location where he was being held during trial. She took one day to reach her decision after adjourning a three-week sentencing hearing on Tuesday morning.

In early 2010, Manning handed over a trove of classified data from U.S. Army computers to WikiLeaks, the radical pro-transparency group. The latter made the data public, causing scandals for the U.S. and some of its allies.

Manning’s supporters argue that he released the information believing he would better society, and they protest that he was unfairly held for an extended time prior to being tried.

Manning was arrested in May 2010 and has been detained since. Lind announced that this time will be subtracted from his sentence, effectively reducing it by nearly 1,300 days.

The judge convicted him on Jul. 30 of six violations of the federal Espionage Act, as well as 14 other charges of theft and fraud. The maximum sentence Manning faced would have been 90 years.

Kevin Gosztola, a blogger for firedoglake.com who supports Manning and covered his trial, told IPS that the possibility remains open that the 25-year-old soldier could be freed before he turns 40. By regulation, he is eligible for parole after serving 10 years of his sentence, minus the discounted pre-trial confinement days.

“I think this shows that the judge was responsive to the defence’s plea to allow [Manning] a life after prison,” Gosztola says.

Manning’s attorney, David Coomb, questions the severity of the sentence. Speaking with reporters after the sentence was handed down, he noted that he has seen lighter punishments for military clients he has defended who have murdered people or molested children.

Fuller says the next step for those who oppose Manning’s imprisonment will be to lobby Major General Jeffrey Buchanan, the military commander in charge of the district, to reduce the sentence. According to Fuller, Buchanan has “full latitude” in his ability to soften the sentence, if he chooses.

If the effort to sway Buchanan fails, Manning’s legal team will pursue the military appeals process and take advantage of available yearly sentencing reviews by a military parole and clemency board.

His support network will also try to convince U.S. President Barack Obama to commute the sentence.

A demonstration outside the White House is planned for Wednesday evening.

“There are several battles left to fight,” Fuller told IPS. “People will be angry.”

Leaks

The data Manning leaked included 470,000 battlefield reports from the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, along with 250,000 State Department diplomatic cables.

Perhaps most notorious of the data released was a video titled “Collateral Murder”, which contained footage taken by a U.S. Army helicopter crew as it gunned down a group of Iraqis standing on a Baghdad street and continued firing as passers-by attempted to rescue them. In the video, U.S. soldiers engaged in the killing can be heard laughing.

Manning’s actions divided popular opinion in the U.S., as some praised him as a hero and others excoriated him as a traitor.

“He was really hoping to change the world for the better,” Deborah Van Poolen, an artist who attended Manning’s trial and claims to have been “inspired” by his actions, told IPS.

Others disagree.

“He is not a whistleblower or a hero. [His leaks] tarnished the image of the U.S. at a sensitive time,” Steven Bucci, director of the Foreign Policy Center at the Heritage Foundation, a right-wing think tank here, told IPS, adding that Manning should be considered the “biggest spy [the U.S. has] ever had”.

Sympathy for Manning was more widespread outside the U.S., coming especially from those critical of U.S. policy, and over the past three years movements around the world have advocated for his release.

A campaign has even been started promoting Manning as a candidate for the Nobel Peace Prize, and last week a U.S. human rights group delivered a petition with 100,000 signatures to the Norwegian Nobel Committee, which decides the winner.

Defence attorneys for Manning did not attempt to argue that their client acted as a hero, however, portraying him instead as naïve and telling the court that he was a “young man capable of being redeemed”.

“Perhaps his biggest crime was that he cared about the loss of life that he was seeing and couldn’t ignore it,” defence attorney David Coombs, who will remain as Manning’s attorney, told the judge during the sentencing hearing.

In his own testimony, Manning said he regretted his actions.

“I’m sorry that my actions hurt people,” he told the judge. “I’m sorry that they hurt the United States.”

“In retrospect I should have worked more aggressively inside the system, as we discussed during the … statement, I had options and I should have used these options.”

The prosecution argued that Manning’s leaks strengthened enemies of the United States and put at risk the lives of U.S. soldiers and diplomats living abroad.

“There may not be a soldier in the history of the army who displayed such an extreme disregard [for his duty],” prosecutor Capt. Joe Morrow argued.

Before the conviction was handed down, the prosecution had argued that Manning was guilty of “aiding the enemy”, a crime which could have resulted in a life sentence for the young soldier, and, many feared, an extreme precedent for punishing information leaks.

The judge did not convict Manning of “aiding the enemy”, but still some believe Manning’s case is intended to serve as a warning to future whistleblowers.

“Manning’s treatment has been intended to send a signal to people of conscience in the U.S. government who might seek to bring wrongdoing to light,” Julian Assange, a founder of WikiLeaks, said in a statement.

“[T]he Obama administration is demonstrating that there is no place in its system for people of conscience and principle.”

By Johan Galtung
ALFAZ, Spain, Aug 13 2013 (IPS)

THESIS ONE: The leaks are not about “whistle-blowing”, but about a nonviolent, civil disobedient fight against huge social evils.

Whistle-blowing presupposes that somebody can be warned, in fact wants to be warned, and is in a position to do something.

Obviously those who can do something about U.S. foreign policy, who have the power – legislative, the Congress, particularly the Senate; executive, State Department-Pentagon-White House; judiciary, the Supreme Court; economically, the giant banks; culturally, the mainstream media – know perfectly well what is going on: these are all efforts to hang on to imperial economic, military, political and cultural power.

Johan Galtung, rector of the TRANSCEND Peace University. Credit: IPS

But they do not want change. And those who want a change – a major part of the
U.S. population, allied populations and most of the rest of the world – have been warned, but are to a large extent powerless. So they believe; but see thesis five.

THESIS TWO: The basic thing is not the media-political focus on Julian Assange–Bradley Manning-Edward Snowden, but on what they revealed.

Manning revealed the video of a helicopter attack in Iraq on mostly unarmed non-combatants, including two Reuters journalists.

Result: the Iraqi parliament said No to the George W. Bush administration’s wish to keep a base in the country (the U.S. military withdrew Dec. 31, 2011).

Manning revealed the full extent of the corruption of Tunisian dictator Ben Ali, adding fuel to the youth revolt.

Manning revealed that Yemen dictator Ali Abdullah Saleh acquiesced to the U.S. drone attacks in Yemen, a factor in his removal from power.

Manning revealed that then Secretary of State Hillary Clinton ordered United Nations diplomats to spy on their U.N. counterparts, wanting detailed intelligence on the U.N. leadership, with passwords and encryption keys.

Manning revealed that John Kerry pressed Israel to be open to the return of the Golan Heights to Syria as part of peace negotiations.

Manning revealed Afghan government corruption was “overwhelming”.

Manning revealed the authoritarian, corrupt nature of Hosni Mubarak’s regime in Egypt.

Manning revealed that U.S. Defence Secretary Robert Gates was against striking Iran’s nuclear facilities, arguing it would be counterproductive.

Manning revealed the Israeli policy “to keep the Gazan economy functioning at the lowest level possible consistent with avoiding a humanitarian crisis”.

Manning revealed that Syria’s Bashar Assad and wife bought jewelry and had a gilded style of life in Europe while his artillery killed in Homs.

Take Snowden as another example: his revelations, the U.S. spying as much on their allies as on Afghanistan, threaten U.S. plans for the two big Trans-Atlantic and Trans-Pacific trade blocs to exclude BRICS (Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa).

Should that happen, then this is world history indeed – with the U.S. now bidding for time.

THESIS THREE: Diplomacy in general was revealed, not only U.S.

When Assange’s first WikiLeaks were published, I wrote:

“The emperor unclothed. But not only the U.S. emperor, also the Diplomacy emperor. What kind of ridiculous discourse is this, so focused on the negative, on actors, usually elite persons, in elite countries? Gossip, puerile characterisations, the kind of “analysis” of power typical of immaturity. Where is the analysis of culture and structure, light years more important than actors who come and go?

“Where are positive ideas? Where are ideas about how to convert the challenges from climate change into cooperation for mutual and equal benefit? Like water distillation projects at Israel’s borders with Lebanon and Palestine, fuelled by parabolic mirrors? Like positive U.S.-Iran cooperation on alternative energy?

“Democracy dies behind closed doors. WikiLeaks opens those doors; an enormous service to democracy.”

What Manning and Snowden revealed are the death throes of the U.S. empire; what Assange et al. revealed are the death throes of the state system as we know it. Both processes will take time, the former less than the latter. But make no mistake: the three made history.

Three names that will be remembered after some U.S. presidents recede into an oblivion so well deserved. Who knows the top English in India, like viceroys and their crimes – roys of vices? Mahatma Gandhi looms larger. Who knows the names of the English who tried to keep the “Atlantic Seaboard” colonies? George Washington, Thomas Jefferson, Benjamin Franklin overshadow them all.

They may even contribute to the reduction of standing armies and, if the U.S. changes, to understanding among nations. A shared Nobel Peace Prize to all three? (Not very likely, from Norway, a U.S. client country.)

THESIS FOUR: U.S. allies comply out of fear, not out of agreement. Quite concretely: they comply to avoid that one day the U.S. Air Force will land on the many bases at its disposal “as the government is unable to protect its own population”.

The Americans are coming, not the Russians, not the Muslims. And the more likely it becomes, the further the U.S. slides down the well-greased totalitarianism incline: next step, probably FEMA (Federal Emergency Management Agency) camps for suspects -for categories, metadata! – like the Japanese during World War II.

THESIS FIVE: Everybody, and the media, can speed up the processes. Rotten apples should fall from the tree; a little shake will help.

The key star media, with Anglo-America’s The Guardian and The Washington Post playing major roles, deserve our praise. Then, let millions surround foreign ministries and embassies, demanding an end to spying, changing their servers away from the Big Traitors in the U.S., suspending further cooperation, degrading diplomatic relations. Till credible dis-spying – the equivalent of dis-armament – takes place.

(END/COPYRIGHT IPS)

Excerpt:

A Russian court has handed down a guilty verdict for whistleblower lawyer Sergei Magnitsky, whose death in detention led to one of the biggest Washington-Moscow rows in years.

The court on Thursday also found Magnitsky’s onetime client, the U.S.-born British investor William Browder, guilty of evading about 17 million dollars in taxes.

Al Jazeera’s Peter Sharp, reporting from Moscow, said that this was the first time a Russian or Soviet court had brought about a prosecution against a dead man.

Browder’s sentence is expected to be announced later but the case against Magnitsky ends with his verdict as the authorities cannot take a case against a dead man any further.

The tax evasion case against Magnitsky, who died in pre-trial detention after accusing interior ministry officials of corruption, has been slammed by legal experts and Western governments.

Magnitsky died in custody in 2009 at the age of 37 after attempting to reveal massive tax fraud against the British Investment Fund Hermitage Capital, to which he was an adviser before, and the Russian state.

He had accused interior ministry officials of organising a 235 million dollar tax scam, but was then charged with the very crimes he claimed to have uncovered.

Torture allegations

He was placed under pre-trial detention in 2008 and died of untreated illnesses less than a year later, just days before the expiry of the one-year limit that he could be held without trial.

Human rights groups claim he was beaten in prison. According to his diary entries, Magnitsky was abused, tortured and held in squalid conditions.

Browder, who is now based in London, insists Magnitsky was tortured to death with beatings and the refusal of proper medical care.

The Kremlin’s own human rights council admitted he had not received the proper medical treatment.

Prison doctor Dimitri Kratov, who is also the deputy head of the jail, was accused of denying Sergei urgently needed medical aid, leading to his death.

But in May, state prosecutors dropped all charges against Kratov and he was allowed to walk free.

The United States earlier this year passed the “Sergei Magnitsky Act” which imposed a visa ban and froze the assets of 18 officials implicated in the lawyer’s death.

The legislation infuriated Moscow, which in retaliation passed legislation prohibiting Americans from adopting Russian children.

*Published under an agreement with Al Jazeera.

The Associated Whistle-blowing Press (AWP) seeks to provide impartial news based on wikileaks' raw data. Credit: Bradley Manning Support Network/CC-BY-SA-2.0

By Lowana Veal
REYKJAVIK, Sep 24 2012 (IPS)

With the imprisonment of Bradley Manning and detainment of Julian Assange, WikiLeaks is effectively on hold. But that does not mean that leaks and whistleblowing activities have stopped.

GlobaLeaks lists a large number of leak sites, which are active to different degrees. Soon The Associated Whistleblowing Press (AWP) will be added to the list.

“One of the main motivations for the AWP is to unite journalists around the world and bring stories to light,” says Brazilian journalist Pedro Noel, one of the main people behind the initiative. “WikiLeaks used to analyse and report on the files they released, but they don’t do that any more.”

Noel perceived a gap in the whistleblowing community, between raw data – documents that conclude wrongdoing – and newsmaking in an impartial way, free of political and economic agendas. He decided that a new platform was needed.

“If the data does not get explained and treated in a way that people can understand, there’s no point in releasing it.”

Noel is currently based in Reykjavik, where he is setting up an office, and building links worldwide. He and his colleagues intend to launch the new whistleblowing site in the last week of September.

Noel was once a volunteer with WikiLeaks, so he knows how the system there works. He says there a number of differences between the AWP and WikiLeaks.

“First, there are structural differences. We’ll have a decentralised framework. With AWP, editors and staff will swap positions: we don’t want to have an ‘icon’. We’ll work with journalists and activists in different centres, and all the working groups will have their own platforms to receive documents and the like,” he tells IPS.

On the other hand, “WikiLeaks all goes through one website, which is in English only. Also, WikiLeaks publishes files of global interest, especially those related to the U.S. AWP wants to correct wrongdoings on a local basis and thus help local communities.”

Noel says it is important to have teams working in different countries and in different languages. “We want to emphasise the local scale as well as the international.

“Another important difference is that WikiLeaks gives exclusivity on the files it discloses, such as to the British newspaper The Guardian and others in the release of Cablegate.” Cablegate refers to the release of U.S. diplomatic cables that had been sent from its consulates and embassies around the world.

“AWP is building a team of researchers and analysts who will themselves publish stories, using local websites.” The main website will have links to the local websites, which will come online when the site is launched.

Anonymity is ensured as AWP uses open-source GlobaLeaks technology, which is specifically designed for whistleblowing, and is accessed with the TOR browser –that builds in anonymity. This means that AWP will not be able to trace the sender of the files. In addition, AWP encourages encryption of email.

AWP will keep a leaked document offline until they have determined it is genuine. Although the sender cannot be traced, Noel is optimistic that this should not be a problem.

“Electronic information tells a lot about the source. A photo gives certain electronic information, and the same goes for a scanned document. It is also possible to see whether a scanned document is genuine or whether it is composed of several different documents,” Noel says.

Iceland may seem a strange place to house a whistleblowing service, but Noel says one of the main reasons for the decision is the Iceland Modern Media Initiative (IMMI) parliamentary resolution that was passed unanimously in 2010 by the Icelandic Althingi (parliament) with the aim of giving safe space to whistleblowers and investigative journalists.

The resolution also wants the Althingi to introduce a new legislative regime to protect and strengthen freedom of expression, allowing Iceland to become an international transparency haven.

Initiated by activist and parliamentarian Birgitta Jonsdottir, the IMMI resolution pulls together the best sections of transparency legislation from all over the world. To become law, it now has to be put through the legislative process. This has suffered some setbacks, but is progressing slowly.

Various drawbacks have come to light. One is that various specialists have pointed out that Internet security is substantially inadequate in Iceland. Will this have an effect on AWP?

Smari McCarthy is the director of IMMI and sits on the steering committee that has been set up to investigate issues that need to be looked into in greater depth concerning the implementation of IMMI. He says that the security considerations are real but are being dealt with.

“This year, a Computer Emergency Response Team (CERT) was established in Iceland to serve as a coordination and incident management centre for Icelandic network security issues. In addition, the foreign ministry of Iceland has appointed a national security committee, consisting of members of parliament, to whom I testified a month ago on issues regarding network and information security in Iceland.”

At the moment, McCarthy says “it cannot be said that the situation in Iceland is markedly worse than in most European countries.”

The existence of IMMI is instrumental in the setting up of AWP in Iceland, Noel says, “but we have the same relationship with them as with any other individual or media initiative based in Iceland.”