By Doug Pinkham
Public Affairs Council President

December 1, 2010

WikiLeaks' recent posting of 250,000 confidential, diplomatic cables has been called traitorous, treasonous and despicable - but could it also be prophetic?

"Information wants to be free," said author Stewart Brand at the first Hackers' Conference back in 1984, "because the cost of getting it out is getting lower and lower all the time."

The growth of global computer networks and the creation of massive databases have led to the collapse of the information-price bubble, which makes it easier for hackers, activists and just about anyone else to become a WikiLeaks source.

This trend has coincided with rising distrust of government and corporations. Distrust provides motivation. The result is a market for secrets that will certainly grow much faster than anyone's ability to control it.

While much of the outrage about WikiLeaks and its founder, Julian Assange, has centered on the legal and national security implications of the releases, the real question is whether the movement toward forced transparency can be stopped.

For the most part, the answer is "no."

In a rare interview this week, Assange tells Forbes' Andy Greenberg that his website is receiving more confidential information than he can find time and resources to publish. Last month, WikiLeaks had to temporarily close down its document-submission system because of the onslaught of data. "Our pipeline of leaks has been increasing exponentially as our profile rises," he says.

Andrew Sullivan of The Daily Dish observes that the U.S. government (and all governments, for that matter) face a difficult dilemma:

Trying to crack down on the organization would only give it more publicity, which would allow it to attract more leaks. Going after Assange directly - an idea various congressmen are toying with - would backfire spectacularly. Even if WikiLeaks were brought down, its death would launch a thousand imitators. Remember what happened when Napster was shuttered?

The U.S. government is certainly not sitting still. As Greenberg notes, many of the top minds in the field of cybersecurity (including former hackers) now work for the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency, which created the Internet. The agency's tactics include network forensics, the process of monitoring every "fingerprint" on a server to track the actions of data trespassers. While this approach won't seal the floodgates, it may deter the next leaker.

Corporations, however, confront a larger predicament. Unlike governments, most of the time they can't claim they need to keep information private for national security reasons. And business scandals, ranging from Enron to Wall Street, have made the public believe that corporations are too secretive.

As Greenberg points out, financial reform has already expanded whistleblower incentives to reward corporate employees who report illegalities. But WikiLeaks adds an extra inducement:

It offers the conscience-stricken and vindictive alike a chance to publish documents largely unfiltered, without censors or personal repercussions, thanks to privacy and encryption technologies that make anonymity easier than ever before.

Here's another reason why companies should worry. Assange announced in the Forbes interview that one of his next targets will be a major American bank, for which he has "either tens or hundreds of thousands of documents" implicating the company in wrongdoing. While he says it's too early to suggest criminality, the data dump will reveal an "ecosystem of corruption."

He also claims to have the goods on other financial services companies as well as firms in the pharmaceutical and energy sectors. "Like informational IEDs," notes Greenberg, "These damaging revelations can be detonated at will."

What's a corporate CEO to do? In Assange's world, the choice is simple - either run an honest business or risk painful, massive leaks of information. "In the struggle between open and honest companies and dishonest and closed companies," he says, "we're creating a tremendous reputational tax on the unethical companies."

The obvious problem here, as Greenberg observes, is that Assange alone decides who the target is, whether the information is accurate and when the alleged culprit should be exposed.

Investigative reporters, on the other hand, have editors, and those editors have executive editors. Many sets of eyes read a corporate expose from The New York Times or The Wall Street Journal before it is printed and posted. If the newspaper gets the story wrong, a company can complain - it might even be able to sue. But WikiLeaks so far has been unaccountable and untouchable.

As we've noted in past posts about transparency, companies need to assume that any communication they produce will become public. And that means they not only must operate honestly, they must explain clearly to employees and other stakeholders why they are doing anything that could be considered controversial. This includes legislative positions and campaign contributions that some people might find objectionable.

The goal isn't to keep everyone happy (lest they call WikiLeaks), but to spend the extra time necessary to explain the context of business decisions, be open to other opinions and make sure that opposing points of view are handled with respect.

Most people don't become whistleblowers when they simply object to a management strategy. They go public when they feel they've been treated badly, or when they believe someone is violating the law.

If a company has behaved unethically or is guilty of malfeasance, WikiLeaks certainly gives it something new to worry about. For the rest of us, says Sullivan, it's time to come to terms with a new reality:

We live increasingly in a world with no curtains or even veils. . . The era of secrecy is over. What we need to do is adjust, not simply regret or attack.

WikiLeaks and Assange may have committed illegal or even traitorous acts by releasing confidential cables, but clamping down on them won't solve the problem. When the cost of leaking information is low and leakers are motivated, it's clear that the business of publishing secrets is entering a boom market.

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