Stratfor Archives - Kit O'Connell: Approximately 8,000 Words

WikiLeaks’ Assange Enters Year 5 Of Confinement, War On Whistleblowers To Continue Indefinitely

Julian Assange in the Ecuadorian Embassy in London on Aug. 18, 2014. (Wikimedia Commons / Cancillería del Ecuador)

June 23, 2016

WikiLeaks’ Assange Enters Year 5 Of Confinement, War On Whistleblowers To Continue Indefinitely

Posted in Archive, Journalism, and MintPress News

On Sunday, WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange marked the fourth anniversary of the day he entered the Ecuadorean Embassy in London on asylum.

Many, including fashion designer Vivienne Westwood and philosopher and political analyst Noam Chomsky, voiced their support for Assange and their hopes for his eventual freedom. But Assange is just one of many victims of the U.S. war on whistleblowers, an unprecedented crackdown on government transparency that’s unlikely to end any time soon.

Assange entered the embassy on June 19, 2012 under threat of extradition to Sweden for questioning over allegations of improper sexual behavior toward two women. Swedish officials have refused to guarantee that Assange will not be extradited to a third country, and until recently, they’ve also refused invitations to question him at the embassy. Though the case against him has weakened over time, Assange still fears he could face decades in prison, or even the death penalty, if he were extradited from Sweden to the U.S., where a secretive, federal grand jury could indict him for hosting classified, leaked information on WikiLeaks.

How I Met Vermin Supreme At SXSW 2012

Vermin Supreme, wearing his trademark boot on his head (as well as a cape and two neckties) celebrates his "victory" at the New Hampshire Primaries on January 30, 2016. (Flickr / Marc Nozell)

March 7, 2016

Kit

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How I Met Vermin Supreme At SXSW 2012

Posted in Austin, Creative Commons, Occupy Wall Street, and SXSW

I didn’t officially attend SXSW 2012, but it was the first year I got into the convention center.

I had been invited to share my experiences with Anonymous at a panel about the documentary “We Are Legion” which played at the film festival. I had plenty to share — most notably, Anonymous helped us identify Austin Police officer Jason Mistric after he threatened me with pepper spray on the night Occupy Austin got evicted from its encampment in 2012.

Of course, the city had likely evicted our camp in order to make sure we weren’t cluttering up the city hall steps when Southby came to town, so what came next felt somewhat appropriate. After the panel, I gathered with two other occupiers that had found their way into the convention center and Mic Checked a speech by George Friedman, the CEO of Strategic Forecasting, a corporate intelligence agency which had helped infiltrate and spy on Occupy along with other activists groups, and helped send political prisoner Jeremy Hammond to prison.

Of course, security soon got involved.

‘Bring Your Cat To Stratfor Day’ Spreads Awareness Of Anonymous Hacktivist Jeremy Hammond’s Birthday

Jeremy Hammond, hacktivist and political prisoner, was behind the now famous Stratfor email hacks.

January 13, 2016

Kit

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‘Bring Your Cat To Stratfor Day’ Spreads Awareness Of Anonymous Hacktivist Jeremy Hammond’s Birthday

Posted in Austin, Journalism, MintPress News, and Occupy Wall Street

In what’s become an annual tradition, activists gathered in downtown Austin on Friday to celebrate the birthday of a political prisoner and hacktivist nearly forgotten and ignored by the mainstream media: Jeremy Hammond.

In 2012, Hammond, along with other members of the Anonymous-associated group Lulzsec, hacked millions of emails from the servers of the Strategic Forecasting, also known as Stratfor, a private intelligence corporation located in the city, and leaked them to WikiLeaks, where they became known as the “Global Intelligence Files.” Among other revelations contained in the emails, the files showed that Stratfor had been spying on activists on behalf of corporations like Dow Chemical and working with the Texas State Troopers to infiltrate Occupy Austin.

For Leah Burris, an organizer from Prison Abolition and Prison Support (PAPS), an Austin-based group which organized the protest on Hammond’s birthday, the worst thing about Stratfor is that they are supported by our tax dollars in addition to their corporate clients. “What I wish people know most about them is that basically our government is giving Stratfor money that we give them to spy on us.”

Why The Media Ignores Jeremy Hammond While Praising Edward Snowden

Jeremy Hammond, hacktivist and political prisoner, was behind the famous Stratfor email hacks.

May 11, 2015

Kit

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Why The Media Ignores Jeremy Hammond While Praising Edward Snowden

Posted in Journalism, MintPress News, and Occupy Wall Street

The mainstream media has devoted hundreds of articles to NSA whistleblower Edward Snowden, the subject of the Oscar-winning documentary “Citizenfour,” but it’s not devoted the same level of attention to many other whistleblowers and political prisoners, like Jeremy Hammond, no matter how sensational the facts they revealed.

In November 2013, a federal court sentenced Hammond to 10 years in prison for his part in the hack of Strategic Forecasting, an Austin, Texas-based corporate intelligence agency, also known as Stratfor. Working on behalf of Lulzsec, an infamous subgroup of Anonymous, Hammond leaked 5 million private emails taken from Stratfor to the whistleblowing website WikiLeaks, a release that came to be known as the Global Intelligence Files, or GI Files.

The emails revealed that Stratfor gathers intelligence on behalf of private corporations while also sharing sensitive information with local and federal law enforcement. For example, the company spied on The Yes Men for Dow Chemical, after the activists publicly humiliated Dow on behalf of survivors of the 1984 Bhopal, India, disaster that killed thousands. At the same time, Stratfor collaborated with the Texas State Troopers to infiltrate Occupy Austin during the first months after the group’s formation in October 2011.

Protesting George Friedman, CEO Of Stratfor, In Austin & San Francisco

In this Feb 2. 2015 photograph, George Friedman, CEO of Strategic Forecasting, speaks at a podium while Kit O'Connell stands nearby with a banner reading "Justice for Bhopal," at BookPeople in Austin, Texas. (YouTube screenshot)

February 13, 2015

Kit

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Protesting George Friedman, CEO Of Stratfor, In Austin & San Francisco

Posted in Austin, Journalism, MintPress News, and Occupy Wall Street

On January 22, journalist and political prisoner Barrett Brown was convicted in a Texas court of controversial charges. In addition to a 63-month sentence, Brown is expected to pay $890,250 in restitution to the private spy agency, Strategic Forecasting (a.k.a. “Stratfor”).

This monumental fine, which turns a theoretically free citizen into an indentured servant of a corporation, is meant to hold Brown responsible for a hack by the Anonymous group LulzSec — even though the government admitted it didn’t have any concrete evidence to show he’d taken any material part in the hack.

Jeremy Hammond, a member of LulzSec, pled guilty in May of 2013 and was sentenced to ten years in prison. The hack, carried out under the instruction of the FBI’s agent saboteur and snitch Sabu, revealed millions of emails that showed the complex interrelationship between the private intelligence firm, multinational corporations, and the surveillance state. The emails also revealed how Stratfor had infiltrated activist groups from Texas to India.

On February 2, 2015, George Friedman, Stratfor’s CEO, was scheduled to sign his book “Flashpoints: The Emerging Crisis in Europe,” at Book People, an independent bookstore in Austin, Texas. It would be Hammond’s 1,065th day in prison; Brown had been incarcerated for 874.

George Friedman, you should have expected us.