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Twitter Ordered to Turn Over WikiLeaks Data

Includes the contacts, records of activity, e-mail addresses, banking and credit card information associated with them
By Maureen O'Gara
Article Rating:
March 21, 2011 07:00 AM EDT
Reads:
 6,278

The Justice Department got a federal magistrate judge in Virginia last Friday to uphold her previous order telling Twitter to give federal prosecutors access to the accounts maintained by people close to WikiLeaks.

That includes the contacts, records of activity, e-mail addresses, banking and credit card information associated with them.

The government, which hasn't asked for content, is looking for evidence that WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange and his associates broke US law. It would like to tie Assange to Pfc. Bradley Manning, the US soldier believed to have sent WikiLeaks a treasure trove of classified documents.

The American Civil Liberties Union, the Electronic Frontier Foundation and lawyers representing the account holders, including WikiLeaks volunteer Birgitta Jónsdóttir, now a member of Iceland's parliament, opposed the move on First and Fourth Amendment grounds.

The 20-page decision, which said they had no reasonable expectation of privacy, is likely to be appealed.

The judge had previously allowed Twitter to disclose the original order to the WikiLeakers.

Published March 21, 2011 – Reads 6,278
Copyright © 2011 SYS-CON Media, Inc. — All Rights Reserved.
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More Stories By Maureen O'Gara

Maureen O'Gara the most read technology reporter for the past 20 years, is the Cloud Computing and Virtualization News Desk editor of SYS-CON Media. She is the publisher of famous "Billygrams" and the editor-in-chief of "Client/Server News" for more than a decade. One of the most respected technology reporters in the business, Maureen can be reached by email at maureen(at)sys-con.com or paperboy(at)g2news.com, and by phone at 516 759-7025. Twitter: @MaureenOGara

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