WikiLeaks threw open the doors Friday to its archive of more than a quarter million secret U.S. diplomatic cables, unfiltered and unedited, exposing and possibly endangering confidential diplomatic sources.The website made the controversial decision after losing control of the documents in a series of blunders.
WikiLeaks supporters posted the entire encrypted archive on the internet late last year. Separately, David Leigh, the investigative editor of the Guardian newspaper, formerly one of Wikileaks media partners, published the password to unlock the archive in his book "Inside WikiLeaks: Julian Assange's War on Secrecy".
Together, both pieces of information, unlocked the full trove of U.S. diplomatic cables, accessible to anyone on the web.
But WikiLeaks' decision to open its archive is likely to bring the cables to a much wider audience, and has already sparked criticism that it will put people at risk.
A brief search through the cables shows that documents have not been redacted in any way. The names and other details of confidential diplomatic sources are on full display, despite being labelled with the instruction "strictly protect", including cables classified as "secret" or "confidential."
The Guardian, the New York Times, Der Spiegel and El Pais, four of WikiLeaks' former media partners, condemned the release.
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