WikiLeaks' Next Target to Be A Major Bank, Assange Tells Forbes

In a two-hour interview, WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange, who began releasing 250,000 classified U.S. State Department cables on Sunday, told Forbes writer Andy Greenberg that about half of the leaks he has in store for future release relate to the private sector, and that early next year WikiLeaks will have a "megaleak" that will expose "tens or hundreds of thousands of documents" from a "big U.S. bank." He said he hopes "it will give a true and representative insight into how banks behave at the executive level in a way that will stimulate investigations and reforms.

Flagrant violations and unethical practices will be revealed, Assange said, "but it will also be all the supporting decision-making structures and the internal executive ethos that comes out, and that's tremendously valuable....You could call it the ecosystem of corruption." WikiLeaks is investigating whether or not some of the behavior is criminal, he said.

WikiLeaks is completely dependent on its sources and does not solicit material, Assange told Forbes. This is all good news for document management, record management and email management software vendors, who will have a good case for why banks should use their technology to keep track of who is viewing and downloading sensitive documents and emails.