This all originates from a news conference in which WikiLeaks founder, Julian Assange, announces that WikiLeaks intends to cooperate with tech firms, giving them the CIA’s software code and “some exclusive access to the additional technical details we have so that fixes can be developed and pushed out, so that people can be secured.” Additionally, Assange says that, once tech companies have managed to patch the insecurities highlighted by CIA exploits, WikiLeaks will proceed with the public release of more materials.
These CIA files detail how the agency turns Samsung TVs into audio-visual surveillance nodes as well as how they take remote control of iPhones and Google’s Android phones. Adam Klein, a senior fellow at the Center for a New American Security, is skeptical about WikiLeaks’s motive, however. Klein’s an expert on national security and digital surveillance, and he points out, “If WikiLeaks were really concerned about user security, they could’ve handed these vulnerabilities over to vendors immediately upon receiving this archive, but we know they’ve had it for some time and haven’t done so.”
