Government should be transparent by default, secret by necessity. Of course, it is not. Too much of government is secret. Why? Because those who hold secrets hold power.
Now WikiLeaks has punctured that power. Whether or not it ever reveals another document -- and we can be certain that it will -- Wikileaks has made us all aware that no secret is safe. If something is known by one person, it can be known by the world.
But that has always been the case. The internet did not kill secrecy. It only makes copying and spreading information easier and faster. It weakens secrecy. Or as a friend of mine says, the internet democratizes leaking. It used to be, only the powerful could hold and uncover knowledge. Now many can.
Of course, we need secrets in society. In issues of security and criminal investigation as well as the privacy of citizens and some matters of operating the state -- such as diplomacy -- sunlight can damage. If government limited secrecy to that standard -- necessity -- there would be nothing for WikiLeaks to leak.
But as we can see from what has been leaked, there is much we should know -- actions taken in our name -- that government holds from us. We also know that the revelation of these secrets has not been devastating. America's and Germany's relationship has not collapsed because one undiplomatic diplomat called Angela Merkel uncreative. WikiLeaks head Julian Assange told the Guardian that in four years, "there has been no credible allegation, even by organizations like the Pentagon, that even a single person has come to harm as a result of our activities."
So perhaps the lesson of WikiLeaks should be that the open air is less fearsome than we'd thought. That should lead to less secrecy. After all, the only sure defense against leaks is transparency.
But that is not what's happening. In the U.S., the White House announced a new security initiative to clamp down on information. The White House even warned government workers not to look at WikiLeaks documents online because they were still officially secret, which betrays a fundamental misunderstanding of the definition of secret as something people do not know. I fear that one legacy of WikiLeaks' work will be that officials will communicate less in writing and more by phone, diminishing the written record for journalism and history.
I have become an advocate of openness in government, business, and even our personal lives and relationships. The internet has taught me the benefits of sharing and connecting information.
This is why I have urged caution in not going overboard with the privacy mania sweeping much of modern society and especially Germany. Beware the precedents we set, defaulting to closed and secret, whether in pixelating public views in Google Street View, or in disabling the advertising targeting that makes online marketing more valuable and will pay for much of the web's free content.
I fear that a pixel fog may overcome us, blurring what should be becoming clearer. I had hoped instead that we would pull back the curtain on society, letting the sunlight in. That is our choice.
In researching my book on the benefits of publicnness (to be published as Public Parts in the U.S. and Das Deutsche Paraoxon in Germany), I have found that new technology often leads to fears about exposure of privacy. The invention of the Gutenberg press, the camera, the mass press, the miniature microphone, and now the internet have all sparked such worry.
Now, in WikiLeaks, we see a new concern: that secrecy dies. It does not; secrecy lives. But it is wounded. And it should be. Let us use this episode to examine as citizens just how secret and how transparent our governments should be. For today, in the internet age, power shifts from those who hold secrets to those who create openness. That is our emerging reality.
Business, be warned: You are next.
NOTE: Welt am Sontag in Germany asked me for this op-ed on Wikileaks. Hier ist es, auf Deutsch.
MORE: This Economist post thinks likewise.
With or without WikiLeaks, the technology exists to allow whistleblowers to leak data and documents while maintaining anonymity. With or without WikiLeaks, the personel, technical know-how, and ideological will exists to enable anonymous leaking and to make this information available to the public. Jailing Thomas Edison in 1890 would not have darkened the night.
AND: Jay Rosen is concerned that Julian Assange ducked the question of how diplomacy can operate without assurances of secure communication.
SEE ALSO: Matthew Ingram's excellent post at Gigaom reminding us all that if government can restrict Wikileaks' speech, it can restrict us all. Like it or not, Wikileaks is the press. So why isn't the press defending its rights?
PLUS: Here is a discussion on Howard Kurtz' CNN Reliable Sources Sunday morning with me, Time editor Rick Stengel, and the New York Times' Mark Mazetti:
Follow Jeff Jarvis on Twitter: www.twitter.com/jeffjarvis
Larry Womack: WikiLeaks Rips the Blogger-Reporter Ethics Gap Wide Open
Alec Baldwin: Hang One, Hang 'Em All
Andy Borowitz: WikiLeaks Attempts to Expose Palin's Thoughts, Finds Nothing
We, the people, bear the brunt of the criticism for the actions of our government. Politicians retire or are voted out of office, going to lobbying jobs or big corporations, while we get the criticism and condemnation for past, present and future actions - not even knowing beforehand what those actions will be and many times not knowing for years what deals brought about the actions!
Now our government has decided that Assange is "guilty until proven innocent" before any charges have been brought against him by the Attorney General of our Department of Justice! "Rule of law"? How yesterday is that?
but you cannot lie to the whole world all the time.
It's a distinction that Wikileaks didn't make, in this case of the cables being shared with the public, and that's why I've been critical of their choice to procure and unleash those documents. I don't think that the internal workings of the US State Department are really something that the public benefits of by knowing, and it's certainly something that is harmful, in small or insidious ways, to the interests of the nation. Therefore, I don't really believe that they released those documents to somehow advance the cause of human rights or civil liberties.
It's a shame really, that Wikileaks had to leak the cables at all. I wish they had made the decision to stick to revealing things that actually were pertinent to the concerns of citizens around the globe--the BOA executive file, which Mr. Assange claimed he was going to leak, is an example of something that I think would be an important leak which would benefit people instead of endangering them.
That has been my belief from the begining!
But it seems like it's taken a Mighty Long Time, to get to where WE are Today!!
There are many Bold & Brave (Wo)Men out there, like the Defiant Assange or that Patriot Bradley. The very least that WE the People/Sheeple should do, is to Give & Show people like them, our Un-Fettered Support............
Peace,love & Respect.
Amen. If you prefer viewing to reading, check out "Sneakers" with Robert Redford. Great movie about secrets.
We don't need so many secrets.
Even genuine tactical secrets are secret for an operational timeline (short); doctrine for a period of years; and very rarely a technology comes along you can keep exclusive for an indefinite but still limited time.
And 50- or 75- year secrets? I'm sorry, but those are only to protect the guilty people involved (guilty but successful) and those around them.
Are these really so shocking?
When they leak the bank information it will be helpful to everyone in my opinion because what they will finally admit there was no money in these banks to cover there dept. These banks were insolvent.
Why is this important is because we paid for a scan and it would have continued again in a couple of years because Wall Street wants all the laws relaxed again so they can bury us with their creative ponzi schemes that can get away with?
I am never in favor of anything that would place our brave troops in harms way including some of these leaks.
(1) Several times, in a document that emphasizes clarity and openness, they expressly provided for "secrecy," and gave the Congress complete discretion to "chuse" when that should be.
(2) At the same time, the First Amendment gave powerful and protected prerogatives to The Press ... even without defining exactly what the term should mean.
"The need for secrecy" and "the desire for it" are two entirely different things. "Secrecy" can become, not only the "Room of Requirement" from Harry Potter (in which everything that anyone wants to keep secret is hidden, because everyone imagines that no one else but themselves knows where it is ...), but also a gag-order for any one of the (several million...) people who are "let in on the secret."
I don't know who gave this material to an Army Private so that he could "leak" it. But this is not highly-classified material. Nevertheless, for being what it IS, it's a peek into a dustbin that a lot of folks intended should be forever closed. And it's the first real example in a very long time of "journalism," as it was always intended to be.
The Wallenbergs are one Sweden's richest families. Jacob Wallenberg is currently the Chairman of the Board of Coca-Cola, of which Warren Buffett's Berkshire Hathaway is the single largest stakeholder.
I can visualize Hillary Clinton picking up the phone and saying "Hi Warren, would you talk to your cohort Jake at the Coke company and see if there's someway we can shut this kid up."
Splitting hairs between transparency in business and in government are good for all. Transparency of a persons life is an evisceration of somebody's soul.
Out of the hundreds of thousands of documents released how do you know that some of them could not oh have not already caused the death of anyone? I am sure there are terrorists right now reading all of the documents trying to get an edge on the military or homeland security? How do you know a plan is not being made at this moment that a few years from now will result in another 9-11 or worse? Would you feel the same about Assange if a family member of yours was killed because of what he leaked?
The release of personal habits of international leaders not a big deal the way the military and government fights terrorism a big deal when human lives are put at risk. 100% transparency is a lofty goal, realistically in the age of terrorism and identity theft, suicidal.
The problem with Wikileaks is it doesn't make a distinction. ANY secret is published without any concern as to the consequences or who might be harmed by such information.
For example, Wikileak's most recent disclosure involves the State Department's list of vulnerable US sites around the world. Some of the things are obvious and widely known--nuclear power plants, weapon facilities, and dams--but other items--manufacturers of vaccines, the locations of undersea telecommunications cables, etc.--are not widely known and publishing them makes them MORE vulnerable.
Publishing that kind of information for the world to see is extremely irresponsible. It puts many lives at risk and doesn't serve any clear public need.
100% tranparency is an idea that sounds good in the ivory towers of the blogosphere. But in the real world its not really possible or even a good idea.
We live in an age of unprecedented information gathering; it's a multi-billion dollar industry, and the internet is its main medium. I can go to a site and look up a person's name and find their telephone number, address, the names of their siblings and some of their relatives, their average income level, etc. and all it would take is a few dollars.
On the other extreme, the resulting paranoia that comes from this digital age could lead to the extinction of written records, as this article suggests. So we definitely need to address soon, legally, where exactly the line between privacy and publicity needs to stand with regards to how our businesses and how our governments operate.