Payment
companies representing more than 97% of the global market have shut off
the funding taps between WikiLeaks and those who would donate to it.
Unlike many of the country’s leading corporations, WikiLeaks has neither
been charged with, nor convicted of, any crime at either state,
federal, or international level.

When the Department of Justice mounted a lawsuit against
Microsoft in 1998, the idea that payment companies might cut it off due
to state disapproval would rightly have been seen as ludicrous and
illiberal. Yet when payment companies do exactly this to WikiLeaks, who
have never appeared in court opposite the US state, many tacitly accept
the action.

Visa, Mastercard and Paypal are none-too-choosy about who
they provide payment services for. Want to use your credit card to
donate to the Ku Klux Klan? Go right ahead. Prefer to support the
English Defence League? Paypal will happily sort you out. Prefer to give
cash to Americans for Truth about Homosexuality, who oppose the
“radical homosexual agenda”? Feel free to use your Visa, Mastercard or
Paypal.

Visa and Mastercard are already inescapable. As the world
becomes ever-more digital, and cash continues its journey to
obsolescence, they will become still more pervasive. If they are allowed
to cut off payment to lawful organisations with whom they disagree, the
US’s first amendment, the European convention on human rights’ article
10, and all other legal free speech protections become irrelevant.