One of the world’s most notorious secret-spillers is going silent.
WikiLeaks said in a statement Monday that it would stop publishing in order to focus on making money — explaining that the blockade imposed by financial companies including Visa, MasterCard, Western Union and PayPal left it with no choice.
“In order to ensure our future survival, Wikileaks is now forced to temporarily suspend its publishing operations and aggressively fund-raise in order to fight back against this blockade and its proponents,” the group said.
U.S.-based financial companies pulled the plug on WikiLeaks shortly after it began publishing some 250,000 U.S. State Department cables last year. The group says the restrictions starved it of nearly all its revenue.
The group has long shown signs of financial distress. In a recent statement about WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange’s contested book deal, the group said it did not have enough money to hire a lawyer.
At a press conference in London, Assange said WikiLeaks must “continue to fight the blockade” imposed by major U.S. banks, according to ZDnet.
“If WikiLeaks does not find a way to remove this blockade we will simply not be able to continue by the turn of the new year,” he said, according to the Associated Press. “If we don’t knock down the blockade we simply will not be able to continue.”
Assange remains under legal pressure in Europe and the United States. A decision on whether to extradite him to Sweden to face sex crime allegations is expected in the next few weeks. He also may face possible legal action in the United States.
Get the latest news alerts: Follow WRAL Tech Wire at Twitter.
