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The Federal Communications Commission officially adopted Net neutrality rules this week, but the agency's authority to enforce the controversial rules may still be in question.

With the support of Democratic FCC Chairman Julius Genachowski, as well as the two other Democratic commissioners, the agency passed the rules in a 3-to-2 vote. The new Net neutrality rules essentially create two classes of service subject to different rules: one that applies to fixed broadband networks and one for wireless networks. The FCC says this is necessary because wireless networks are technologically different from fixed broadband networks.

The first rule requires both … Read more

Hackers are increasingly hitting the Web sites of human rights and independent media groups in an attempt to silence them, says a new study released this week by Harvard University's Berkman Center for Internet & Society.

Based on a survey of 45 groups, the report "Distributed Denial of Service Attacks Against Independent Media and Human Rights Sites" found that a large percentage said they've been targeted by distributed denial-of-service (DDoS) attacks from those who disagree with their viewpoints. The Web sites typically have been knocked offline for short periods of time but in some cases have … Read more

Apple has removed a WikiLeaks app from its App Store just a few short days after its release.

Launched on December 17, the $1.99 WikiLeaks App offered access to the whistleblower site and the @wikileaks Twitter stream and was described as providing "'instant access to the world's most documented leakage of top secret memos and other confidential government documents," according to a Google cached version of the site provided by TechCrunch. The app was created by a third-party development firm called Hint Solutions, which lists Igor Barinov as its general manager.

But as of late last … Read more

There are clearly far more similarities between WikiLeaks and Facebook than might first assail the average retina.

Indeed, when Facebook's Mark Zuckerberg was asked about the two organizations, during his acceptance interview for Time magazine's Person of the Year, he replied: "Well, at a very high level some of the themes could be connected. I mean we mostly make so you can understand what's going on with the people around you because we think that that helps you connect with them more broadly."

So how could "Saturday Night Live" not examine the contrast … Read more

Bank of America has added its name to a list of several financial institutions that have refused to process payments for WikiLeaks as the site reportedly readies a document release that targets the banking giant.

"This decision is based upon our reasonable belief that WikiLeaks may be engaged in activities that are, among other things, inconsistent with our internal policies for processing payments," the bank announced late yesterday.

The announcement comes on the heels of similar moves made by MasterCard, Visa, and PayPal earlier this month, which have limited WikiLeaks' ability to raise funds to support its Web … Read more

WikiLeaks editor Julian Assange can be freed on bail following a ruling from a U.K. court today.

Prosecutors lost their effort to prevent Assange from being released on bail while his extradition to Sweden on sex crimes allegations is determined, according to BBC News.

His lawyer, Mark Stephens, believes Assange could be released as soon as today, according to the U.K.'s Guardian. A representative from Stephens' law office told CNET by phone today that Assange's release is more likely to happen tomorrow, but it could be later today.

"Our main focus is delight and joy … Read more

WikiLeaks.info, a site assisting WikiLeaks' effort to share U.S. war information and diplomatic cables, is rebutting online security organizations' warnings that its Web site could be dangerous to visit.

WikiLeaks.info provides a list of sites that mirror the original WikiLeaks content, and in recent days the main WikiLeaks.org Web site has redirected visitors to the WikiLeaks.info mirror page. WikiLeaks.info has grown in importance because of others' moves two weeks ago that made it difficult to reach WikiLeaks.org and led its operators to resurface at WikiLeaks.ch, a Swiss domain.

Spamhaus, a nonprofit volunteer … Read more

WikiLeaks editor Julian Assange was granted bail today by a London judge, but prosecutors said they will appeal the decision.

In a media-mobbed hearing today, a U.K. judge decided to release Assange on bail of 200,000 pounds, or about $317,000, on the condition that he surrender his passport, wear an electronic tracker, provide a U.K. address, and report to police daily.

U.K. prosecutors, acting on behalf of the Swedish government, told the court that they will file a formal appeal within 48 hours. This follows some confusion about whether an appeal will take place, with … Read more

An outage that took down some of Amazon's European Web sites yesterday was caused by hardware error and not hackers, according to the company.

The online retailer's shopping sites in the U.K, France, Spain, and Germany were down for about half an hour starting around 9:15 p.m. GMT, leading to initial speculation that Amazon had been hit by hackers associated with the pro-WikiLeaks group Anonymous.

But in a statement released to Reuters, Amazon attributed the cause to hardware problems.

"The brief interruption to our European retail sites earlier today was due to hardware failure … Read more