US seeks Wikileaks Twitter account info

Jan 09, 2011 |

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WikiLeaks

Jan. 8: Wikileaks’ Twitter account details have been subpoenaed by US officials, the secret-spilling site announced on Saturday, adding that it suspected other American Internet companies were also being asked to hand over information about its activities.

In an e-mail statement, Wikileaks said that US investigators had gone to the San Francisco-based Twitter Inc to demand the private messages, contact information, and other personal details of its founder, Mr Julian Assange and three people associated with the secret-spilling website.

Wikileaks blasted the court order, saying it amounted to harassment. “If the Iranian government was to attempt to coercively obtain this information from journalists and activists of foreign nations, human rights groups around the world would speak out,” Mr Assange said in a statement.

A copy of the court order, dated December 14 and posted to Salon.com, said that the information sought was “relevant to an ongoing criminal investigation” and ordered Twitter not to disclose its existence to Mr Assange or any of the others targeted.

The order was unsealed “thanks to legal action by Twitter,” Wikileaks said in its statement. Twitter has declined comment, saying only that its policy is to notify its users, where possible, of government requests for information.

US officials have been examining possible charges against Wikileaks and its staff following a series of leaks which have embarrassed officials.

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