Julian Assange was pulled from the Ecuadorian embassy in London nearly five years ago, when the United Kingdom arrested the WikiLeaks founder on espionage charges imposed by the United States.
He spent six and a half years holed up in the embassy, with a limited space of just 330 square feet. Since then, Assange has been detained in a high-security prison in southeast London, awaiting his possible trial in the United States.
In 2012, Assange requested asylum after a British district court ruled that he should be extradited to Sweden due to a false rape investigation. Swedish prosecutors later dropped the case after Assange was arrested in 2019.
Assange must now wait until at least next month to find out whether he can fight extradition to the United States over separate espionage charges. Combined, the charges carry a maximum penalty of 175 years in prison.
A British judge initially blocked his extradition to the United States due to concerns about Assange's deteriorating mental health, but the request was eventually approved in 2022.
WikiLeaks is considered by many to be a journalistic operation, responsible for some of the largest revelations in history. But the US Department of Justice alleges that Assange's work with whistleblower Chelsea Manning – which culminated in the publication of a trove of secret government files in 2010 – went beyond journalism into espionage.
The authorities say that the files published by WikiLeaks contain sensitive information that puts people's lives in danger. Among the Cablegate files is a 39-minute video clip of Apache helicopters during the Iraq War shooting and killing a number of civilians, as well as two journalists working for Reuters.
In the days following the video's publication, in December 2010, WikiLeaks suffered what it described as a “banking blockade.” PayPal, Mastercard, Visa, Western Union, and Bank of America suddenly cut off all access to WikiLeaks' bank accounts, “destroying 95% of… [its] he won.”
“This decision is based on our reasonable belief that WikiLeaks may be engaged in activities inconsistent with, among other things, our internal payment processing policies,” Bank of America said at the time. Companies and other organizations that maintain the WikiLeaks website have faced political pressure to stop working with the group.
WikiLeaks said the blockade forced it to rely on cash reserves alone, and about six months later, the group announced it would accept donations in Bitcoin for the first time ever.
Bitcoin creator Satoshi Nakamoto, who was still active at the time, responded to a PCWorld article detailing the potential for Bitcoin as a solution to WikiLeaks' banking problems with a post on BitcoinTalk:
“It would be nice to get this attention in any other context. WikiLeaks has kicked the hornet's nest, and the swarm is heading towards us.”
Nakamoto left his last ever message the next day and has not been heard from since.
WikiLeaks' endorsement of Bitcoin represents one of the most concrete justifications for the currency's value proposition to date. Bitcoin had been around for less than two years at that point and was trading for less than $10.
About 3,050 bitcoins flowed into WikiLeaks' wallet over the next 13 months leading up to Assange's arrival at the Ecuadorian embassy. The value of these donations was approximately $18,000 at the time they were sent. Today, they will generate over $157 million, thanks to the massive growth in Bitcoin prices.
Another 990 bitcoins flowed to WikiLeaks in the years Assange spent in asylum, worth $478,000 in individual donation times. These bitcoins would be worth $51 million right now.
The largest individual flows to date are a 16.99 BTC transaction sent in May 2021 (worth $850.00 at the time and roughly the same amount today) and a 12.23 BTC transfer in February 2022 ($543.00 at the time, $630,000 now).
WikiLeaks eventually regained access to traditional funding methods, including PayPal and credit cards, through the Wau Holland Foundation, which still manages the group's finances.
But it is clear that Bitcoin users have not forgotten the formative relationship between WikiLeaks and Bitcoin.
More than 35 bitcoins have been deposited into a WikiLeaks donation wallet since Assange was robbed from the Ecuadorian embassy in April 2019, with a cumulative value of $1.13 million ($1.8 million today).
About 2.45 bitcoins ($66,100 then, $126,300 now) were sent over the past year, including two individual deposits last June worth almost a full bitcoin each. Smaller donations are being received every few days, until Wednesday.
WikiLeaks wallets now contain only 3,265 BTC ($168,000 USD) compared to a total inflow of 4,079 BTC. Overall, Bitcoin users appear to have donated $1.62 million worth of Bitcoin to WikiLeaks since it opened donations 13 years ago. If held today, Bitcoin would be worth $210 million.
As for what WikiLeaks is doing with its cryptocurrency donations, the group has previously said the money will pay for “WikiLeaks projects, staff, servers, and protective infrastructure.” Last week, WikiLeaks made its first transaction in two years when it transferred 10,459 Ethereum ($31,200) to another address.
However, WikiLeaks has remained quiet since dropping its “Intolerance Network” in 2021, a trove of documents spanning 16 years detailing the formation of influential right-wing campaign organizations outside Spain.
Assange later said it was not possible for WikiLeaks to continue publishing while he was in prison, partly because of the potential for government retaliation felt by whistleblowers.
In any case, Bitcoin users appear poised to continue praising WikiLeaks while Assange awaits his next legal ruling.
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