Full Name Year & Place of Birth Nationality Vocation Acknowledged as Website Accolades

: Julian Paul Assange : 1971, Queensland, Australia : Australian : Journalist, Spokesperson and Internet activist : Editor-in-chief of Wiki-Leaks : www.wikileaks.org : Economist Index of Censorship Award ('08), Amnesty International UK Media Awards ('09), Sam Adams Award ('10)

Dynamic, rebel and born in an artistic family on 3rd of July 1971, Julian Paul Assange is an upbeat personality known for his out-of-the-box thinking and provocative style. An extraordinary person, he is an Australian journalist, publisher, and Internet activist. A triumphant in computer programming, the man is a genius in physics apart from being an intelligent hacker. The founder, spokesperson and editor in chief of WikiLeaks a whistleblower website which has lately brought him into considerable limelight Julians lifestyle involves constant travelling around the globe which has made the airport almost like his second home!

Born in not-so-rich family in Townville, Julian inherited his surname from his stepfather who ran a touring theater company. Remembered by his father for his sharp memory when as a kid, Julian always stood up for the underdog. An ardent explorer himself, Julian has spent maximum time of his growing period in traveling from one city to anotherone school to another. Besides Australia , countries like Kenya, Tanzania can also be said to be as his home where he has spent golden days of his youth. Life became a roller-coaster ride for him when he began hacking at the age of 16 under the name Mendax, a name originally derived from a phrase of Horace. The Australian Federal Police raided his Melbourne home in 1991 on the charges of accessing computer belonging of an Australian university, Nortel (Canadian Telecommunication Company) and other organizations via modem. Although in 1992, the Australian Government paying heed to his guilty pleas released Julian after fining him AU $2100 and on the bond for good conduct.

Achievements
Julian always had a pioneering spirit which was reflected in his every endeavor. Forever confident about his venture, he began his first public internet service in 1993 in Australia and later developed free software in 1995. He wrote Strobe, the first free and open source

port scanner. Julian is also known for his contributions in writing the book Underground: Tales of Hacking, Madness and Obsession on the Electronic Frontier ('97) , which established him as a credible researcher. He has also authored and co-authored free software's like NNTPCache and Surfraw, a command-line interface for web-based search engines. Twitter. In 1999, the man Julian registered the domain leaks.org. Besides this, he is also a devoted follower of social networking sites like Facebook and

WikiLeaks:

Turning

Point

The most controversial WikiLeaks was founded by Julian in 2006. The website gained widespread public attention for its documentation of United States illegal involvement in the wars against Afghanistan and Iraq. This brought him extensive criticisms from the judicial bodies as well as the activist groups. His inherent belief in transparency and scientific approach to journalism is quite apparent through his statement, "You can't publish a paper on physics without the full experimental data and results; that should be the standard in journalism." This became the chief reason for the establishment of the website.

What exactly became the real source of controversy was a video titled Collateral Murder. It established WikiLeaks as a portal for unauthorized accounts with documents and videos that became an overnight sensation. In July 2010, WikiLeaks released Afghan War Diary, which was not available previously and eventually enraged the US Government, thereby, forcing Barack Obama and his officials widely condemning the WikiLeaks disclosures. Julian Assange has won innumerable journalism awards and has made several public appearances concentrating on freedom of the press, censorship and investigative reporting. Despite so many events that garnered criticism, Hollywood producers Barry Josephson and Michelle Krumm have grabbed film rights to The Most Dangerous Man In The World, a biography of Julian Assange written by award-winning Australian reporter Andrew Fowler. The acclaimed book features his years of experiences and WikiLeaks which help a reader get a clearer insight in the life and curious case of Julian Assange.

With so many controversies associated with his personal and professional life, Julian Assange was still voted the esteemed Person of the Year award by Times magazine. He was also elected Rockstar of the Year by Rolling Stone Italia, the Italian edition of US music magazine, Rolling Stone, which further compared the Australian hacker to British pop star David Bowie.