In Praise of Leaks.
National Security has been a bit of a theme in this week's news. First of all there was the Russian researcher in the House of Commons who now appears to be a spy. And then there was Wikileaks.
Someone, somewhere, is getting very worried that their secrets will come out.
When it comes to national security, there seems to be three kinds of state secret, only one of which really needs to be kept secret. It would be stupid to tell the world (a world which unfortunately includes terrorists, criminals and the occasional unstable head of state) what security services are going to do, where they are going to do it, and how they will do it. But, when the leaks come out, how often does what has been concealed fall into this category? Isn't the cloak of secrecy not more often there to hide the mistakes of our governing bodies, or. even worse, to ensure they can keep their discreditable activities to themselves?
It doesn't seem to me that we should tolerate our politicians hiding things from us to protect themselves. But we have only too often seen that this is what they will do if we let them. The UK Parliamentary expenses scandal is just one recent example.
So overall, I don't have much support for the governments who are loudly condemning Wikileaks and its founder. I worry about their motives.
Whistle-blowers rule OK in my book!
Someone, somewhere, is getting very worried that their secrets will come out.
When it comes to national security, there seems to be three kinds of state secret, only one of which really needs to be kept secret. It would be stupid to tell the world (a world which unfortunately includes terrorists, criminals and the occasional unstable head of state) what security services are going to do, where they are going to do it, and how they will do it. But, when the leaks come out, how often does what has been concealed fall into this category? Isn't the cloak of secrecy not more often there to hide the mistakes of our governing bodies, or. even worse, to ensure they can keep their discreditable activities to themselves?
It doesn't seem to me that we should tolerate our politicians hiding things from us to protect themselves. But we have only too often seen that this is what they will do if we let them. The UK Parliamentary expenses scandal is just one recent example.
So overall, I don't have much support for the governments who are loudly condemning Wikileaks and its founder. I worry about their motives.
Whistle-blowers rule OK in my book!
The author of this article gives full permission for it to be copied and published anywhere in the world.
