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by DANmode 1182 days ago
> random people at GHCQ
1 comments

Not sure what your point is. It’s clear from what’s quoted in the emails that some GHCQ employees are simply speculating based on the timing of the rape allegations. That’s something that a bunch of people outside GHCQ were also doing at the time.

The emails were handed over because they weren’t considered to be classified information. So it’s quite unlikely that they reveal discussions among people who had any inside knowledge about the Assange case.

> The records were revealed by Assange himself in a Sunday night interview with Spanish television programme Salvados in which he explained that an official request for information gave him access to instant messages that remained unclassified by GCHQ.

https://amp.theguardian.com/media/2013/may/20/julian-assange...

I don’t know anything about the internal workings of GCHQ, but one would hope that information is shared on a need to know basis. Assuming this to be the case, the vast majority of GHCQ employees would know no more about Assange than you or me.

Your point (appears to be?) that GCHQ staff are on par with other Monday morning armchair quarterbacks; seems weak.
Information inside agencies like GCHQ is strictly compartmentalised, with only the most senior staff having broad cross-programme understanding and access.

In fact, people can be even more cut off from information if they're at a low enough level inside an agency like that because they're forbidden from viewing leaked information to avoid jeopardising their clearances.

A GHCQ staffer working on, say, satellite signals intelligence for one of the regional desks is almost certainly not going to have any useful inside information on the case of someone like Assange.

It’s clearly the case in instances where they have the same information as everyone else.