He was hailed as robin hood on the internet, 007 in the press. The mysterious website he single-handedly created exposed a huge number of political and war crimes, pushing the United States and its allies to the forefront of global public opinion again and again. The U.S. government regarded it as a thorn in its eye and a thorn in its flesh, and it searched for fifteen years around the world, spending billions of dollars to find ways to arrest it. And now this talented hacker with a mixed reputation may really be sent into the mouth of the dragon!
Recently, British Home Secretary Patel, on behalf of the British government, publicly announced that he is ready to extradite Assange, the founder of "WikiLeaks", to the United States for trial. As for what awaits him, it will be the 17 counts of espionage and 1 count of improper use of computers brought to him by the U.S. government, and if convicted, Assange can be sentenced to up to 175 years in prison. As soon as this matter came out, it quickly pushed this ghostly legend to the cusp of the storm again.
Countless countries and civilians have spoken out, saying that once Assange is extradited to the United States, it means that he has been "sentenced to death" and his fate will be very miserable. Even Mexican President López Lopez bluntly said: "If Assange is taken to the United States and dies in prison, we should remove the Statue of Liberty in the United States." Its supporting position is visible to the naked eye. So here's the question:
What did Assange do to make the U.S. government hate it so much?
And why would he risk his life to expose the government's darkest privacy practices?
Most importantly, where will Assange, who is now in the mouth of the United States, end up?
Young fame network Robin Hood
In the movie "No Thief in the World", there was a very classic line: What is the most expensive in the twenty-first century? Talent! And Assange is a talent who dares to single out the world.
On July 3, 1971, the odd man was born in Australia to a not-so-happy family. Two years later, with his parents divorced, Assange also lived a life of displacement. Every day is either moving or on the way to prepare for moving. This made him develop a free and adventurous personality at an early age.
Assange's boyhood
At the same time, the poor wandering life made Assange's reading a very troublesome thing. He transferred 37 times in elementary and secondary school alone, and later attended 6 universities, but he failed to complete his studies completely. And because of some past experiences, Assange's mother was extremely resistant to school.
In her view, going to school is subtly cultivating children to fear power. Therefore, under such intermittent school transfers and the special family environment, Assange has no way to obtain knowledge from formal education. You can only fill in the worldview by groping on your own and reading alone.
And this kind of growth experience gave Assange a "Robin Hood-style chivalrous spirit"; Distrust the powers and governments, and insist only on the resulting justice that they believe in. This also laid the groundwork for his subsequent rebellion!
At the age of 14, computers and the Internet broke into Assange's mundane life for the first time. At that time, this nascent technology was not too long and did not reach the public. And at this time, Assange, perhaps a rebellious hunter in adolescence, may really love the technology. In short, as a young man, he began to be madly obsessed with programming and decoding. He proved to be talented in this area, and in just a few years he became one of Australia's most famous hackers.
He even co-founded a group called "Transnational Disruption" with two other hackers, hacking into the system network of European and American governments. Such a brilliant record soon attracted charges from the Australian police. Although with his superb skills, Assange finally managed to get out of prison, paying only a few fines and was hasty.
But in the three-year storm of litigation, hearings, and public opinion, Assange's family was overwhelmed. Not only was the marriage torn apart, but his own son was also gone, and the grief-stricken Assange turned out to be white-headed. The incident made him even more dissatisfied with the authority of the government. Finally, on October 4, 2006, under the leadership of Assange, a website called "WikiLeaks" was quietly born on the Internet.
WikiLeaks
The dark truth that has been declassified
In fact, when it comes to WikiLeaks, many people will first think of the famous encyclopedia website, Wikipedia. But in fact, the two are not directly linked. The reason for this name is only because when He was born, Assange wanted to rub the heat of Wikipedia and advertise himself as a declassified Wikipedia.
Because the purpose of WikiLeaks at that time was: freedom of information, uncovering the truth, and creating and maintaining real history. Simply put, it is to disclose to the public some ugly government secrets that they would never normally be able to access. And this view is unprecedented in that era of extremely powerful governments. But what WikiLeaks and Assange did after that proves that they are not worthy of this name and purpose.
Two months after the site went live, WikiLeaks released its first blockbuster document. It refers directly to the coup d'état of Somali opposition leader Avis and the assassination scheme used to overthrow the Somali government and wealthy businessmen in the country. In the years that followed, WikiLeaks exposed former Kenyan President Moi for embezzling state assets, printing counterfeit money, and controlling elections. Senior Peruvian government officials colluded with wealthy domestic businessmen to control corruption in the oil industry. as well as the debt crisis and illegal transactions of Icelandic banks.
These endless revelations once made the political and financial pattern of the relevant countries unstable. And Assange, the initiator behind the scenes, has also successfully captured the attention of the world. At one time, he was crowned by the press as a hacker freedom fighter and an online war correspondent. But such achievements and praise did not satisfy Assange.
Because at that time, these so-called confidential documents involved countries, which were basically only some small countries in Africa, South America, Northern Europe and other regions. Although there is darkness behind their power, the degree of darkness and cruelty is still not worth mentioning compared to those real hegemonic countries.
However, due to his own safety, Assange has been afraid to publish the darker information. But isn't the purpose of creating WikiLeaks to decrypt, reveal, and leak? So after hesitating for a long time, Assange finally began to fire at the so-called world overlord!
In 2007, WikiLeaks first publicly exposed the "Guantanamo Prison Management Guidebook" issued by the US Department of Defense. Its contents reveal in detail the brutal details of the prison's trial of prisoners. In a short period of time, it caused a global hot discussion and sent the United States to the cusp of the storm.
Then, in April 2010, WikiLeaks posted a video on its website titled "Incidental Murder." The content of the video clearly records the whole process of how the US military in Iraq drove the Apache military helicopter to massacre civilians during the Iraq War. However, this is not the end, just three months later, WikiLeaks through the German "Der Spiegel" and the United States "New York Times", published 92,000 U.S. military secret documents on the war in Afghanistan, exposing hundreds of cases of NATO forces indiscriminately killing and manslaughtering civilians.
At the same time, WikiLeaks also posted documents such as CIA counterterrorism and the Iraq War Log to the Internet. Such an impactful act also succeeded in making the United States angry and began to target Assange, the founder behind WikiLeaks.
A tragic global vagrant escape
Interestingly, however, WikiLeaks at the time was only a public Internet platform in nature and did not have any obligation of confidentiality. As long as the U.S. government has no evidence to directly prove that he has hacked secret documents from the United States. Then Assange and WikiLeaks are just indirect communicators, and there is no violation of the law. So the U.S. government, which had no choice but to entrust Australia with close surveillance of Assange.
But this kind of all-round surveillance is naturally unacceptable to Assange, who hates government power. So the middle-aged Assange had no choice but to pick up his briefcase and laptop and start wandering around the world. But this gave the U.S. government, which hated Assange to the bone, an opportunity to take advantage of it.
Whether by chance or by deliberate design, when Assange came to Sweden, an accusation against him fell from the sky. Swedish prosecutors said Assange was suspected of sexually assaulting two women during his stay in Sweden. However, such a suspicious rape case quickly fermented. In just a few months, Interpol was alarmed, and Assange was even saddled with a red notice!
In order to prove his innocence, Assange voluntarily surrendered himself to the police. And raised up to £240,000 in exchange for a bail appeal! However, even so, Assange's desire to regain his freedom is still a fantasy, so a road to self-help begins!
In 2012, under the pressure of Western countries such as britain and the United States, Assange could only begin to seek political asylum. But in the face of power, there are not many countries that dare to shield them from the wind and rain. Finally, under the mediation of many parties, the embassy in the United Kingdom of Ecuador, a small South American country, accepted him. However, the so-called acceptance can only give him a place to live.
Due to the limited size of the embassy, Assange had to curl up in a hut converted from a toilet for a long time, with a total area of only 18 square meters. Because of the british police outside the embassy, Assange did not have the opportunity to go out, and even the press conference interview could only be carried out through a small floor-to-ceiling window.
Long-term exposure to dark environments and isolation has even led to Assange suffering from physical diseases such as high blood pressure and heart disease. In this way, the originally personable Assange gradually became a "Santa Claus" with a big belly. However, although the captive life destroyed his appearance and body, it did not erase the yearning for freedom and secrets in his bones.
Assange's place to stay
Free Tinder Fights Hegemony Hypocrisy
So in 2013, after the Prism Gate incident in the United States, WikiLeaks not only took the lead in publishing multiple encrypted documents on the Internet to expose the inside story of the event. Later, he repeatedly used his global network to help another cyber fighter, Snowden, flee to Russia to seek political asylum.
Then, during the 2016 U.S. election, WikiLeaks published more than 19,000 top-secret emails in one go. The Democrats at that time manipulated public opinion, forged black materials, attacked political opponents, assassinated journalists, and even colluded with terrorists. Eventually, the democratic leader and presidential candidate hillary clinton at the time collapsed in an instant. Indirectly, Trump successfully picked peaches and became the president of the United States as he wished.
However, such an assist did not make Wang Nian good, and after taking office, he still spared no effort to hunt him down. Finally, after seven years of grounding, along with the rotation of Erdogua's political arena and the pressure of Western countries, the last umbrella above Assange's head was also destroyed by the storm. In April 2019, British police dragged Assange out of the Ecuadorian embassy in the UK and escorted him into a police car. In May of the same year, he was sentenced to 50 weeks in prison and held in Belmarsh Prison in London. Immediately after that, the US government submitted an extradition application to the United Kingdom!
Fortunately, by this time, Assange's actions had given him a huge number of followers around the world. The Pakistani people took to the streets to show their support by burning the British and American flags; Mexicans print posters and create plaques to pay tribute to him; In their hometown of Australia, tens of thousands of people blocked government buildings and petitioned the government to rescue their compatriots. Even the economically blocked WikiLeaks website has received large amounts of money from all over the world.
As a result, in this globally consistent wind of public opinion, britain and the United States have never reached an agreement on the issue of extradition. Assange also went on to survive in British prisons for three years! However, this year, with the turmoil of the international situation, the United Kingdom, which was completely pulled into the US chariot, finally chose to compromise under pressure and agreed to the US application for Assange's extradition. At that time, this hacker genius who has been on the run for 15 years under the eyes of the United States will finally fall into the hands of the United States!
However, if we look back at Assange's experience, we will find that it has never harmed any American citizen, nor has it ever stolen or destroyed any American property. All he did was put what the United States had done under the sun. Yet that was it that Assange became what they called a wanted man, the most dangerous terrorist in the world.
Such a cybercrawler who has been pursuing freedom of speech and justice all his life will eventually be crusaded by the world's most liberal and righteous country, and may even be deprived of his life. Just because they tell the truth, they become the public enemy of democracy and the traitor to human rights. Perhaps such a magical but reasonable scene is the biggest secret that Assange has revealed in his life!