On Thursday July 5, WikiLeaks started publishing the Syria Files. The Syria Files consist of over two million emails from Syrian political figures, ministries and associated companies from August of 2006 to March of 2012. The set of data derives from over 680 Syria-related domain names or entities, which includes Foreign Affairs, Ministries of Presidential Affairs, Information, Finance, Culture and Transport.
Ground-breaking stories will be published over a span of two months from the files on WikiLeaks (global), Al Akhbar (Lebanon), Al Masry Al Youm (Egypt), ARD (Germany), Associated Press (US), L’Espresso (Italy), Owni (France) and Publico.es (Spain). As stories get closer to their publishing dates, the publications will announce their plans.
Julian Assange, the founder of WikiLeaks, said:
“The material is embarrassing to Syria, but it is also embarrassing to Syria’s opponents. It helps us not merely to criticise one group or another, but to understand their interests, actions and thoughts. It is only through understanding this conflict that we can hope to resolve it.”
Anywhere from 6,000 to 15,000 people have been killed in Syria over the past 18 months as the country struggles with a violent internal conflict. WikiLeaks said that the Syria Files show the inner workings of the government in Syria and its economy. The files also show how the West and Western companies say they are going to do something and they do something else. The information in the Syria Files ranges from correspondence of senior Baath party officials to financial transfers from Syrian ministries to other countries.
From the 680 domains there are over 2,434,899 emails from 678,752 email addresses that have sent emails and 1,082,447 email addresses that have received emails. In the data there are multiple languages. There are 400,000 emails written in Arabic and 68,000 emails written in Russian. When compared to other documents, the data in the Syria Files is eight times the size of the documents found in ‘Cablegate.’ It is also 100 times the size when it comes to data. Close to 42,000 emails in the Syria Files were found to be infected with Trojans or viruses.
“The Syria Files shine a light on the inner workings of the Syrian government and economy, but they also reveal how the West and Western companies say one thing and do another,” Sarah Harrison said. Harrison is a project analyst. Harrison did not provide information as to how the emails were obtained by WikiLeaks. Assange was not in attendance for the unveiling of the Syria Files in London. Assange is at the Ecuadorian embassy trying to fight extradition to Sweden.