SAN FRANCISCO (AP) - A federal judge who shuttered the renegade Web site
Wikileaks.org reversed the decision Friday and allowed the site to reopen in the
United States.
In mid-February, U.S. District Court Judge Jeffrey White issued an
injunction against Wikileaks after the Zurich-based Bank Julius Baer accused the
site of posting sensitive account information stolen by a disgruntled former
employee.
White set off storms of protest among free-speech advocates and news media
organizations when he ordered the disabling of the entire site rather than
issuing a narrowly tailored order to remove the bank's documents.
On Friday, the judge dropped the injunction that took the site off-line,
citing First Amendment concerns and questions about legal jurisdiction.
At a court hearing in San Francisco, White said he had "serious questions"
about whether the legal measures sought by the bank "would be constitutionally
appropriate" and whether they constituted prior restraint by the government. He
also cited "possible violations of the First Amendment."
In addition, White said he questioned the "effectiveness" of blocking the
site, an apparent reference to the fact that other Web sites quickly obtained
and disseminated the information about the bank.
The judge recognized that "the genie is out of the bottle," said Matt
Zimmerman, senior staff attorney at the Electronic Frontier Foundation, one of
several organizations that filed briefs on the case. The Associated Press and
the ACLU were also among them.
"The reality of the Internet makes it difficult for him to issue an order
that will have any impact, given the fact that all the material is already out
there," Zimmerman said.
The bank sued Wikileaks and the San Mateo company Dynadot, which provided
the Web site's U.S. domain name after client information was posted.
Dynadot agreed to shut down the Web site in exchange for the bank removing
it from the lawsuit.
The Wikileaks site claims to have posted 1.2 million leaked government and
corporate documents that it says expose unethical behavior, including a 2003
operation manual for the U.S. prison at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba.
It wasn't clear whether the site would resume its operations. Hours after
the judge ruled, Wikileaks.org was still not working.
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