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This article was published on June 5, 2014

The Guardian adopts Aaron Swartz’s WikiLeaks-style SecureDrop system for whistleblowers


The Guardian adopts Aaron Swartz’s WikiLeaks-style SecureDrop system for whistleblowers
Paul Sawers
Story by

Paul Sawers

Paul Sawers was a reporter with The Next Web in various roles from May 2011 to November 2014. Follow Paul on Twitter: @psawers or check h Paul Sawers was a reporter with The Next Web in various roles from May 2011 to November 2014. Follow Paul on Twitter: @psawers or check him out on Google+.

One year after NSA whistleblower Edward Snowden first gave the Guardian newspaper a series of surveillance scoops, the UK-based publication has announced it’s opening a new conduit to help would-be whistleblowers share files online.

The SecureDrop platform promises that sources can submit documents and data entirely anonymously, sidestepping the “most common forms of online tracking,” using the Tor network and the Tails operating system.

securedrop_gnm_url
The Guardian’s SecureDrop

The open-source platform was developed initially by activist Aaron Swartz who committed suicide in 2013. The platform was completed posthumously, and it’s now maintained by the not-for-profit Freedom of the Press Foundation.

Though it’s already being used by the likes of ProPublica, Pierre Omidyar-backed startup The Intercept (where Glenn Greenwald now plies his trade), and The New Yorker, it’s interesting to see the Guardian adopt SecureDrop, a year to the day after it published the first NSA documents.

SecureDrop Server | The Guardian

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