Wikileaks plugged by court order

18 February 2008

The Wikileaks website, set up to allow the anonymous posting of corporate or government documents for "public analysis", has been gagged by order of a US court, it has announced.

The wiki reports that the Swiss bank Julius Baer obtained an order on Friday, in response to the posting on Wikileaks of many confidential documents relating to its offshore operations.

The order compelled Californian web registrar Dynadot to delete the domain name records for the site's wikileaks.org address. However, it remains accessible via alternative addresses including wikileaks.be.

Wikileaks says that it was not represented in Friday's hearing as it received "only hours' notice by email". In a statement, it claims that the court's order is "unconstitutional and exceeds its jurisdiction".

BBC News reports that a spokesperson for the bank declined to comment due to "pending legal proceedings".

Category: Online journalism, Social media