Jacob Appelbaum

Jacob Appelbaum
Picture of Jacob Appelbaum
Appelbaum in 2013
Born (1983-04-01) April 1, 1983 (age 41)
CitizenshipAmerican
Known for
Awards2014 Henri Nannen Prize
Scientific career
FieldsComputer security, Cryptography
InstitutionsUniversity of Washington,[1]
Eindhoven University of Technology,[2]
Noisebridge,[3]
WikiLeaks

Jacob Appelbaum (born April 1, 1983)[5] is an American independent journalist, computer security researcher, artist, hacker and teacher.

Appelbaum, who earned his PhD from the Eindhoven University of Technology, first became notable for his work as a core member of the Tor Project, a free software network designed to provide online anonymity.

But it was Appelbaum's work with WikiLeaks and his journalism at Der Spiegel based on the NSA documents leaked by Edward Snowden that made him famous, status accentuated by his standing-in for Julian Assange at computer security and hacker forums when Assange could no longer travel to the United States. Under the pseudonym "ioerror", Appelbaum was an active member of the Cult of the Dead Cow hacker collective from 2008[6] to 2016.[7] He was the co-founder of the San Francisco hackerspace Noisebridge with Mitch Altman. He worked for Kink.com[8] and Greenpeace[9] and volunteered for the Ruckus Society and the Rainforest Action Network.[4] He was on the Technical Advisory Board of the Freedom of the Press Foundation.

In 2013, Appelbaum was one of a small group of journalists who had direct access to the NSA documents leaked by Edward Snowden, he was then part of publication of the stories in Der Spiegel on U.S. spying on German Chancellor Angela Merkel, on United Nations diplomats, and other stories. In 2014, Appelbaum was awarded the Henri Nannen Prize, the equivalent of the Pulitzer Prize in Germany, for his work on the U.S-Merkel-spying story. Later that year, he accepted awards on-behalf of Snowden, who was marooned in Russia as an asylee.

In 2016 he was the object of allegations of sexual misconduct, and alleged assault.[10][6][11] No formal charges were filed. Within a short-period around June 2016, Appelbaum withdrew or was asked to step down from many of the organizations for which he was well-known as a key member, as well as his employer Tor.[12] [7][13][14][15][16][17] Tor performed an external investigation the results of which supported the accusers.[18][19]

Appelbaum denied the allegations.[20] German press outlet Die Zeit defended Appelbaum (who is a resident of Germany), citing the lack of formal charges by accusers, also inconsistencies and contradictions in the allegations.[21]

Appelbaum was defended by a group of female lawyers, activists and journalists with whom he had worked closely.[22] These women launched an online appeal for support to contest the allegations, voicing concerns about due process, trial by social media, and questioning the claims[23][24]

In 2024, a documentary about Appelbaum, "No One Wants to Talk about Jacob Appelbaum"[25] directed and produced by Jamie Kastner, which addressed the allegations and accusers, and Appelbaum's position on events, became available on AppleTV. Appelbaum's life in Berlin was shown, including challenges faced due to pressure from the United States Department of Justice to testify against the imprisoned Julian Assange, interviews with WikiLeaks lawyer Margaret Ratner Kunstler also Appelbaum's personal experiences with U.S. surveillance.

  1. ^ a b "Tor Project: Core People". Tor. Archived from the original on 22 July 2012. Retrieved 13 April 2015.
  2. ^ Appelbaum, Jacob (Sep 1, 2015). "Today is my first day as a PhD student with @hyperelliptic and @hashbreaker at @tue_mcs. #pqc". Archived from the original on December 21, 2020. Retrieved Sep 5, 2019.
  3. ^ "Noisebridge user page". Noisebridge. Archived from the original on 27 February 2012. Retrieved 11 October 2011.
  4. ^ a b Rich, Nathaniel (1 December 2010). "The American Wikileaks Hacker". Rolling Stone. Archived from the original on 17 March 2015. Retrieved 3 July 2014. An anarchist street kid raised by a heroin- addict father, he dropped out of high school, taught himself the intricacies of code and developed a healthy paranoia along the way.
  5. ^ "Ai Weiwei Teams Up With WikiLeaks Activist Jacob Appelbaum For Collaboration". Artlyst.com. 2015-04-28. Archived from the original on 2023-01-02. Retrieved 2023-01-02.
  6. ^ a b Farivar, Cyrus (5 June 2016). "Tor developer Jacob Appelbaum quits after "sexual mistreatment" allegations". Ars Technica. Conde Nast. Archived from the original on 7 June 2016. Retrieved 5 June 2016.
  7. ^ a b "CULT OF THE DEAD COW Statement on Jacob Appelbaum / ioerror" (Press release). Cult of the Dead Cow. 6 June 2016. Archived from the original on 24 June 2016. Retrieved 2016-06-08.
  8. ^ Hartwell, Lane (10 June 2007). "So Who Wants to F**k a Robot?". Wired.com. Archived from the original on 31 March 2014. Retrieved 9 August 2013.
  9. ^ Appelbaum, Jacob (22 June 2004). "Geeks Love Trees, Too". Greenpeace – Weblog. Archived from the original on 3 August 2004. Retrieved 26 January 2011.
  10. ^ "Jacob Appelbaum leaves the Tor Project". Tor Project. 2 June 2016. Archived from the original on 10 July 2022. Retrieved 10 July 2022.
  11. ^ Abbelbaum, Jacob (6 June 2016). "Twitlonger - When you talk too much for Twitter". Archived from the original on 10 July 2022. Retrieved 10 July 2022.
  12. ^ Peterson, Andrea (2016-07-28). "Jacob Appelbaum was an online privacy hero. Then a sex misconduct scandal exploded". The Washington Post. Archived from the original on 2021-01-30. Retrieved 2016-07-30.
  13. ^ Trevor, Timm (8 June 2016). "Statement on Jacob Appelbaum". Freedom of the Press Foundation. Archived from the original on 8 June 2016. Retrieved 8 June 2016.
  14. ^ Cite error: The named reference 'Sam' and 'Forest' Reveal Identities was invoked but never defined (see the help page).
  15. ^ "Noisebridge Statement on Jacob Appelbaum". Noisebridge Blog. Archived from the original on 14 June 2016. Retrieved 16 June 2016.
  16. ^ Turton, William (2016-06-17). "Jacob Appelbaum Banned From Prominent Hacker Conference Following Sexual Assault Allegations". Gizmodo. Archived from the original on 2016-06-17. Retrieved 18 June 2016.
  17. ^ "Security expert Appelbaum no longer part of Debian". ITWire. 18 June 2016. Archived from the original on 23 June 2016. Retrieved 2 July 2016.
  18. ^ Cite error: The named reference :0 was invoked but never defined (see the help page).
  19. ^ "Investigation confirms Jacob Appelbaum sexual misconduct at Tor Project". The Daily Dot. 2016-07-28. Archived from the original on 2022-03-29. Retrieved 2022-07-22.
  20. ^ Yadron, Danny (6 June 2016). "Digital privacy activist Jacob Appelbaum denies colleagues' assault allegations". the Guardian. Retrieved 12 July 2016.
  21. ^ Fuchs, Christian; Weisbrod, Lars; Mondial, Sebastian (13 August 2016). "Jacob Appelbaum: What Has This Man Done?". Die Zeit. zeit.de. Number 34. Archived from the original on 13 August 2016. Retrieved 13 August 2016.
  22. ^ "In solidarity with Jacob Applebaum and on the side of justice for all". Jun 8, 2017. Archived from the original on 2017-06-08. Retrieved Sep 5, 2019.
  23. ^ Alphonso, Don (13 June 2016). "Aktivistinnen rufen zum Ende der Hetzjagd gegen Appelbaum auf" [Women activists call for an end to the witch-hunt against Jacob Appelbaum]. Faz.net (in German). Archived from the original on 16 June 2016. Retrieved 17 June 2016.
  24. ^ Riegel, Tobias (13 June 2016). "Die Presse und der Pranger" [The press and the pillory]. neues deutschland (in German). Archived from the original on 14 June 2016. Retrieved 17 June 2016.
  25. ^ "Nobody Wants to Talk About Jacob Appelbaum". IMDb.