I Ate DeWayne!

I am rather disturbed at how governments and companies are treating WikiLeaks. Apparently, the world learned nothing from Napster. Yes, what Napster did was illegal. And, maybe what WikiLeaks is doing is illegal.

But the point is this: The debate is not whether WikiLeaks is going to exist or not. It will. And it doesn’t matter what you try to do to stop it.

“The Net interprets censorship as damage and routes around it.” – John Gilmore

With this post, they are going to learn a hard lesson. Welcome to the 21st century’s first major info war.

Note: These apps are linked to their original sites, not the App Market, if they have been removed from the Market. I am NOT responsible if you brick your phone or blow up anything by following these instructions! Use at your own risk!

Root

First, you need a rooted phone, preferably a spare phone you can leave plugged in and on wifi.

To root your Droid or other phone, download z4root. Follow the instructions.

Firewall

Now you need a little firewall to remain as anonymous as you can be. Download Droid Wall – Android Firewall.

Tor

Download Orbot from the Tor website.

HTTP Server

Download PAW Server or other web server of your choice.

Setup

1. Root your phone with z4root.  This will require you to click the root option and reboot.  You may also have to enable USB Debugging. Just follow the instructions.

2. Enable firewall with Droid Wall. Make sure you enable as few apps as possible. Start by enabling Orbot on wifi only and nothing else. Slowly add more apps as necessary for the phone to function, especially if you plan on using the phone normally. For maximum anonymity, keep wifi only for Orbot, and 3g only for everything else.

3. Download an archive copy of WikiLeaks. Currently, the best way to find is a Google search as government hackers are shutting down public mirrors constantly.

4.Set up PAW Server with the minimum options and no personally identifiable information. Place the WikiLeaks mirror archive in the public folder of the PAW web server by copying them to paw html folder of your SD card (/sdcard/paw/html). Do NOT allow your web server firewall access!!!

5. Now set up Orbot. Allow it to be used as a relay and a hidden service.  Select to Torify all apps. Point the “Hidden Service Port” of Orbot to the open port on the PAW Server, which should be port 80.

6. Now fire it all up. Check to find the .Onion name of the hidden service. Enter the .Onion address in a Tor enabled browser on another computer to make sure it works.

Now Anonymously create a Twitter account (I’m sure you can figure this out on your own. If not SKIP THIS!) And post your .Onion address and the hash tags #wikileaks #tor and #mirror so that other users can find it.  They are also quite poetically available with the #ImWikiLeaks tag.  After following these instructions, you are WikiLeaks!

Now you are all done!

Extra Credit

Go around town to popular open wifi access points, connect to them, and save them.

If you want to be really sneaky, install a remote access app. That way you can leave the phone plugged in at an anonymous indoor location near a public wifi hotspot, such as in the ceiling of a utility closet of a public library. Just remember to set it to reboot regularly in case something locks up.

Conclusion

If even a percentage of users did this, there would be tens of thousands of WikiLeaks mirrors hidden around the globe. Quite simple, really. And it makes the shutting down of WikiLeaks.com seem as utterly foolish as it was.

I read this story at the New York Times about the Nexus One from Google.  It seemed like an honest article, at first.  I was a bit stunned at some of what the author wrote or alluded to.  While much of the review is positive, it was apparent that the author was searching for things to shrug off the phone. Maybe it was an attempt to appear impartial gone awry. read more »