Political leaks are nothing new; they may have spread more quickly in the modern era with the development of the Internet and social networks due to the simplicity with which these networks can be downloaded, stored, and distributed, but leaks have always been a political tool used as a pressure card when required.
For instance, in 1971, a number of Pentagon papers regarding the Vietnam War were published in batches by the American newspaper "The New York Times," not online, despite being classified as "top secret."
The leaks are "for an inside source to give secret material to a journalist for various reasons," and this source might be "a governmental, financial, or other figure," according to Political Dictionary.
President Benjamin Franklin received letters from an anonymous source 200 years ago, which makes them possibly the earliest political leaks of the modern period. Franklin, who was then the Director-General of Britain's Rail in the American Colonies, had received letters from Massachusetts Governor Thomas Hutchinson pleading with the British government to provide additional troops to quell the Boston rebellion.
Franklin publicized the letters in eminent circles before publishing them in the Boston Gazette in 1773, which led to a significant controversy that made Hutchinson leave the country. Franklin was fired from his position as Postmaster General and issued a formal censure by Parliament after admitting his involvement in the letter leak.
10 - The fifth estate
The film tells the story of the rise of "WikiLeaks", the platform that was known as one of the most prominent experiments in the world of leaks, after its owner Julian Assange managed to publish many secret documents related to a large number of countries in the world.
The first message released by WikiLeaks was from a Somali rebel leader, tasking armed mercenaries with the assassination of government officials. The letter was published by WikiLeaks in December 2006, without ever verifying the authenticity of the document.
Up to Julian Assange's arrest in 2019, WikiLeaks' founder continued to release large quantities of classified information.
In addition to concentrating on Assange's companion (Daniel Dumchett), the movie explains all these things and more in a riveting dramatic manner while also demonstrating how they did not travel the road together; At the conclusion of the movie, in addition to concentrating on Assange's work philosophy and the purpose he hoped to accomplish with "WikiLeaks," this is what is revealed. He reviews the outcome of the event at the location that lit the planet on fire at the conclusion.
9 - CitizenFour
The movie is based on the life of Edward Snowden, who joined the US National Security Agency in 2009. While working for the organization, Snowden gathered information about a number of top-secret NSA operations, most notably the covert surveillance program that is thought to be used on a global scale.
After revealing information about covert surveillance programs to the British newspapers "The Guardian" and "Washington Post," Snowden requested a medical leave of absence from the organization in May 2013 under the pretext that he was receiving treatment for "epilepsy" and then traveled to Hong Kong. He later returned to Moscow.
In 2014, significant information made public by Edward Snowden, a former NSA contractor, showed that the US government has spied on personnel for well-known human rights groups including Human Rights Watch and Amnesty International.
One of the NSA secrets disclosed by Snowden was a court order requiring Verizon, a telecommunications corporation with millions of users, to provide up information, such as the numbers phoned and the duration of calls.
The NSA, the FBI, and GCHQ, the British equivalent of the US National Security Agency, allegedly had "direct access" to the servers of internet behemoths like Google, Facebook, Microsoft, and Apple thanks to the data mining program PRISM, which was also made public by Snowden.
8 - Panama Papers Documentary
This documentary tells the tale of one of the largest leaks that had an impact on a variety of global personalities, including prominent icons like actors, sports players, and singers as well as the most well-known drug traffickers.
Without disclosing the identity of the whistleblowers, the "Panama Papers" leak from 2016 exposed more than 11,000 documents, including the creation of numerous offshore bank accounts for the purpose of tax evasion for a number of individuals, who then used those accounts to launder money and fund armed groups all over the world.
These disclosures served as the catalyst for a number of serious investigative journalistic studies, the effects of which continue to be seen today.
7 - The Padora papers documentary
The "largest journalistic partnership in history" on the financial secrets of 35 current and former world leaders, more than 330 politicians and public officials in 91 countries and territories, as well as a global group of artists, killers, and others, was exposed by the International Federation of Investigative Journalists in 2021. The Pandora Papers are made up of millions of leaked documents.
This documentary describes how such top-secret records exposed the overseas activities of individuals including the King of Jordan, the Presidents of Kenya, Ecuador, the Czech Republic, and Ukraine, as well as former British Prime Minister Tony Blair.
Additionally, the financial activities of more than 130 billionaires from Russia, the United States, Turkey, and other nations are included in these files, as well as those of the Minister of Propaganda for Russian President Vladimir Putin.
6 - Operation Varsity Blues Documentary
Operation Varsity Blues, a Netflix documentary, describes in detail the ridiculous methods used by Americans to get access to the best American institutions by deceptive means. It shines light on the nasty side of university admissions rivalry in the United States
The film follows the career of William Singer, a California-based independent college admissions consultant who helped affluent families enroll their children in high school. Singer had previously run The Key, a non-profit company he founded as a philanthropic organization.
Families from all around the nation paid Singer $25 million between 2011 and 2019 to guarantee their kids' admission to prestigious colleges and universities including Stanford University, Yale University, University of Southern California, and Georgetown University.
5 - Official Secrets
As the Blair administration drove Britain into war in an effort to get UN support for the upcoming US-led invasion of Iraq in 2003, Catherine Gan was serving as a Chinese translator for the British intelligence service.
Jan forwarded a top-secret communication from the US National Security Agency to the British Secret Intelligence Service in January of that year. This document was a top-secret request to eavesdrop on UN members' personal conversations in an effort to find material that may "give the United States an edge" in stoking public support for the invasion of Iraq.
The movie describes how Catherine Gunn released the letter to The Observer in the hopes that disclosing her intended surveillance and extortion strategies would be sufficient to put an end to the Iraq War. However, the course of events changed, and this is what the movie follows along with some facts from Catherine's life, who was put under a lot of strain following the leak.
4 - The Post
The world-shaking Pentagon Papers leak is the subject of the renowned movie. The New York Times started releasing a series of stolen Pentagon papers on June 13, 1971. These papers were labeled "top secret" by the federal government.
The US Department of Justice obtained a temporary restraining order against further publication of classified material after the third daily installment appeared in The Times. They claimed that further public disclosure of these Vietnam War papers would result in "immediate irreparable harm" to the US.
The Times fought the restraining order against it through the courts over the course of the following 15 days, during which time the publication of the publication was suspended, and the Washington Post joined it after its leakers turned to it when the decision was made to forbid the Times from publishing. documents.
The US Supreme Court declared on June 30, 1971, that newspapers would challenge the publishing of the secret files because the government had "failed to justify the limitation of publication," in one of the greatest disputes that had ever rocked US courts.
This movie, starring Meryl Streep and Tom Hanks and produced by the legendary Steven Spielberg, follows the controversy that erupted at the time between American journalists and the government.
3 - Mark Felt
In an interview with Vanity Fair in 2005, Mark Felt—who served as the FBI's assistant director in the early 1970s—confessed that he was the "deep throat," the informant who blew up the Watergate affair and forced US President Richard Nixon to resign.
A lawyer who joined the FBI in 1942, Felt (a whistleblower who remained anonymous for decades) was in command of the bureau's daily operations by 1971. The US president abruptly picked another director from outside the agency although he was still a contender to lead the office.
Shortly after, Felt started working covertly with journalist Bob Woodward on a Washington Post investigation into presidential power abuses as a result of the Watergate building's assault during the 1972 US presidential election campaign.
All of this, as well as how Felt's intelligence was judged valuable, implicating the White House and the president's departure, are the subjects of the Liam Neeson-led movie.
2 - All The President’s men
In addition to focusing on how the "Washington Post" newspaper handled the circumstances of the most well-known scandal, the movie also tells the tale of President Nixon's resignation against the backdrop of the "Watergate" scandal. It is regarded as one of the first movies to present the opposing viewpoint.
The movie, starring Robert Redford and Dustin Hoffman, is based on the book of the same name, authored by Bob Woodward and Carl Bernstein, which gathers a number of investigative inquiries into the controversy.
1 -The Great Hack
The movie discusses the Cambridge Analytica incident, which revealed how Facebook was utilized to help Britain exit the European Union and unseat Donald Trump.
If you were unaware of the controversy, this film will inform you of all the details and serve as a reminder of how our data has been exploited to affect some of the most significant choices in our lives.
Since whistleblower Christopher Wiley revealed in the Observer and the New York Times how Cambridge Analytica obtained the personal data of tens of millions of Facebook users and exploited it in political campaigns, the leaks have created a "media storm that has not been extinguished," according to the "Guardian."
The leaks created a huge controversy, and via this documentary, which was broadcast on Netflix, you will get the chance to learn all about it in a straightforward yet captivating manner.
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