Assange critiques Facebook “spy machine” in interview

In an interview with Russia Today, Assange specifically stated he did not think the services were created to spy on citizens, rather that sites like Facebook were exceedingly good at compiling information for intelligence agencies. In part, Assange said:

“Everyone should understand that when they add their friends to Facebook, they are doing free work for United States intelligence agencies, and building this database for them… Now, is the case that Facebook is run by U.S. intelligence? No, it’s not like that. It’s simply that U.S. intelligence is able to bring to bear legal and political pressure to them,” he said.

Assange also discussed the content of the Wikileaks cables that have already been released, saying that the information so far has been of little consequence:

“We only released secret, classified, confidential material. We didn’t have any top secret cables. The really embarrassing stuff, the really serious stuff wasn’t in our collection to release. But it is still out there.”

Assange assailed an ineffectual media for not covering corrupt governments thoroughly, and questioned their usefulness overall:

“It really is my opinion that the media, in general, are so bad, we have to question whether the world would be better off without them altogether.”

You can watch Assange’s interview in its entirety over at Mashable.