When I woke up this weekend, there was a very odd story making its way across the Internet. Julian Assange, founder of Wikileaks, had been accused of rape in Sweden. And then, just a couple of hours later, the charges were dropped.

WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange in web furore over Swedish rape claim

The founder of WikiLeaks, Julian Assange, was himself the subject of a rapidly spreading online story when news cascaded across the internet for several hours at the weekend mistakenly saying he was being sought in Sweden on rape charges.

Before Stockholm’s chief prosecutor made clear on Saturday afternoon that Assange was in fact neither charged with rape nor due to be arrested, the story had spread, generating more than 1,200 articles, available through internet news search, that received more than 1m hits.

Clearly Assange is making waves. He runs a site that exposes secrets kept by powerful people, and he is unlikely to stop exposing those secrets. This secret, for example, got tremendous attention around the world:

You pick the title – How war works, How collateral damage works, How mistakes work, How coverups work, or something else

WikiLeaks has released a classified US military video depicting the indiscriminate slaying of over a dozen people in the Iraqi suburb of New Baghdad — including two Reuters news staff.

The powerful people being exposed include many in the United States government and military. Apparently they are unable to stop his actions legally. And Assange is taking steps to protect his freedom of speech at the international level:

Iceland Becomes “New Media Haven”

The accusations seen this weekend could be part of a smear campaign, which would indicate an escalation in tactics:

Assange claims ‘smear campaign’

Assange told Al Jazeera on Sunday that while he had been forewarned by Australian intelligence on August 11 to expect a campaign against him, it was unclear who was behind it.

“It is clearly a smear campaign … the only question is who was involved.

“We can have some suspicions about who would benefit, but without direct evidence I would not be willing to make a direct allegation.”

Assange said that the accusations were completely untrue and expected all charges to be dropped on Monday, adding that his lawyers were in the process of arranging a meeting with the prosecutors.

He also said that this was just one of many attempts to discredit him.

What is the next logical step in a chain of escalation? In cases like this, where a person is doing something that powerful people do not like, the next step can be assassination. It is the ultimate way to silence someone. There is no judge or jury, and there is no way to reverse it.

What steps can be taken to protect Julian Assange?

The ultimate way to protect him would be easy – Make Wikileaks irrelevant with complete government transparency. See this article for details:

This is 2009 and the age of the Internet – Why do we have to resort to this kind of idiocy? -or- A Transparency Manifesto

See also: How WikiLeaks Works: A Primer

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