WikiLeaks Launches Site To Expose Domestic Spying

The documents published on The Spyfiles site, unveiled Thursday, included brochures, catalogues, contract manuals, newsletters, papers, presentations and pricelists. WikiLeaks worked with media organizations from six countries, including The Washington Post in the U.S., in building the site, which WikiLeaks co-founder Julian Assange called a "whistleblowing, source-protection platform."

Assange told a news conference that the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks on the World Trade Center in New York gave European countries, the U.S., Australia, South Africa and other nations a license to develop spying systems. The WikiLeaks front man went on to ask attendees whether they use an Apple iPhone, BlackBerry from Research In Motion, or Google's Gmail.

"Well, you're all screwed," Assange said in a video snippet from the briefing posted on The Guardian web site. "The reality is intelligence contractors are selling right now to countries across the world mass surveillance systems for all those products."

The Spyfiles debuted with 287 documents and the promise of releasing more files this week and into next year. The releases are meant to bring to public view the inner workings of what WikiLeaks says is a secret, multi-billion-dollar industry that has boomed since 9/11.

International surveillance companies are based in technologically advanced countries and sell their wares to every nation. The technology and services sold are capable of secretly intercepting calls and taking over computers, WikiLeaks said on The Spyfiles site. "In the last 10 years, systems for indiscriminate, mass surveillance have become the norm."

WikiLeaks rose to fame by leaking internal government documents on the web. Among its more notorious disclosures was a package of almost 400,000 documents on the Iraq War. The papers were released in October 2010 in coordination with major commercial media organizations. The nonprofit organization has heightened awareness in the private sector of the need to secure internal documents.