guantanamo

Guantanamo legal files mysteriously disappear from PCs

In an institution already cloaked in mystery, puzzling happenings seem to be afoot at Guantanamo Bay prison.

Not only have many legal files suddenly disappeared from the defense team's computers, but also hundreds of thousands their documents have landed on the prosecution's computers, according to Reuters. This debacle has caused several pretrial hearings in the prison's military tribunals to be delayed.

It's not clear how the files vanished or if there was any illegal action behind the disappearance. It could have been a simple computer blip, IT issues, a security breach, hackers, or one of the … Read more

I'm wearing a 'terrorist' watch, and I bought it for $20 at Duane Reade

Turns out the government's concerned about the threat possibilities of a low-tech piece of equipment--one that I just discovered on my own wrist.

Around the time I started working at CNET, I bought a Casio watch from my local Duane Reade pharmacy. My other watch broke, I just had a kid, and having a watch made things easier: no fishing for my iPhone while holding the baby, plus it had a stopwatch for timing feedings.

Who knew my watch would become this infamous?

According to training document on Wikileaks, the Casio F91W watch was worn on the wrist of a large number of Guantanamo Bay detainees, and has been linked to the manufacture of explosive devices. As I read this story, I glanced down at my very similar-looking watch, then checked the model number. It was different.

Of course, then I read that the document includes the metal-banded A159W, too. Mine is technically the A158W. Still, it's essentially the same watch. … Read more

WikiLeaks releases secret Guantanamo prison files

A new classified data dump from WikiLeaks shines new light on the evidence, allegedly sometimes lacking, against the people that the U.S. government has held and is holding at the Guantanamo prison in Cuba.

The documents, provided in advance to news outlets including The New York Times, NPR, The Washington Post, and the U.K. Guardian newspaper, are classified at the "secret" level and include dossiers on individual prisoners, including their risk "assessment" by military evaluators. They were written between 2002 and 2008.

As of Sunday night, only a few dozen of the individual files … Read more