but mavs won it. they had heart. thank you, richelle. thanks for filling in. i'm don lemon in manchester, new hampshire. thanks for watching, everyone. don't forget to watch the debate monday night right here on cnn. and thanks to everyone at saint anselm college. it's a beautiful campus. they've been so ♪ >> holy [ bleep ]. >> the guardian from this morning. 14 pages. >> julian believes that if you overthrow secrecy in the world, you will overthrow the corrupt political establishments. >> we don't see any difference in the white house's response to the case to the other group have

exposed. >> for the internet generation, this is our challenge and this is our time. reporter: over 20 years ago, the berlin wall came down and it marked the end of a cold war between two super powers. now, there's a new battle that is waged for control of information. the front lines aren't brick and mortar walls. it's firewalls. the warriors, hackers, activists and anarchists. it's an epic struggle for state secrets between institutions and individuals. and at the center of this war is julian assange. >> my function in wikileaks is to take all the heat. >> the 38-year-old founder of wikileaks is a whistle blower.

>> the state is surveying, regimenting all of us, all the while, hiding behind cloaks of opaqueness. >> armed with volunteers, assange has taken aims at corporations and nations. >> it exposes a range of abuses. >> exposing secrets that helped fuel anger and revolt in the middle east. drawing the ire of the most powerful government in the world. and galvanizing a global following of cyber warriors ready to fight. >> we feel obligated to step out in wikileaks' defense. because if wikileaks goes down that leaves bad implications for the rest of us. >> a maverick and a game changer, he's also under attack for his own behavior.

>> he has taken aim at his foot and shot it. >> he has arrived at the courthouse. he is going to come through the gated area into the courthouse. that's my first glimpse of julian assange. this is one of the most portraits yet of julian assange? >> thanks, steven. a [ bleep ] gun pointed at me. and he is person number 21. >> rare candid moments captured by journalist mark davis who spent months traveling with the founder of wikileaks. >> he went from a hobo character f you like, to a rock star. >> you followed for him months, spending time with him. what is he like?

>> he is private. he is a charming guy when he relaxes. he has an intense computer nerd mind. but when he is off on that, he is very funny. >> my voice will get sexier and sexier as the day goes on. >> nomadic and secretive, like the hero of a spy novel. >> he is seeing it as a weird james bond kind of thriller. he believes that everyone's con constantly being tapped and followed. >> it his core, assange is a hacker. he persona has roots in a nomadic childhood. this is magnetic island a place of wild life and beauty off the coast of australia. a place julian assange once called home.

but as a boy, he was often on the move h move. assange claims he attended 36 different schools. his bohemian mother and stepfather ran a traveling theater company. >> until i was about 10, we had a mixed experience. >> a life on the move turned into a life on the run. after his mother fled a troubled relationship there were difficult years. but assange teams to relish his unconventional childhood. >> people tell me they spent all their life in one town, i think, you horrible thing. how do you survive. >> eventually, julian and his mother settled outside of melbourne. >> i had a horse. and i sold the horse and bought a computer, i was fascinated.

>> for assange, it becomes a portal into a new world. he joins a group of hangers and under the screen name mendax, he taps into a secret networks, including the pentagon. by the time he was 20, assange was a sophisticated computer hacker. >> and this was before there was public access to the internet. this was a brave thing to go out and support the world with your mind. >> you an authorities would eventually bust the young assange. in 1991, he was charged with 31 counts of hacking and related crimes. after a lengthy legal battle, he walked away with only a fine. but he caught a glimpse inside a hiding world. >> read the e-mails of the pentagon was an incredible thrill.

>> that fascination would grow into a mission to change the world. >> the times we are going through at the moment constitute a generational challenge. >> a mission that could expose some of america's most closely guarded secrets. i love that my daughter's part fish. but when she got asthma, all i could do was worry ! specialists, lots of doctors, lots of advice...

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reporter: as a teenager, julian assange believed he had the right to hack into any computer network that interested him. >> that needs to be thought about and then it needs to be set up. >> reporter: but his a m bigs grew from cracking codes to helping whistle-blowers devul ge inside secrets. >> when you have this information, you chose it or not. >> reporter: they can no longer hide corruption and injustice. with a network of servers,

assange launches a website for whistle-blowers. he calls it wikileaks. >> i hack people's minds. i get people within the organize gagss to release material for a just cause. >> reporter: i went to berlin to meet one of the early wikileaks insiders and a few people who worked with assange. daniel domscheit-berg became wikileaks' spokes person. >> i picked a name named after my cat. >> reporter: named after your cat? >> yes. >> reporter: assumed named and secret locations, assange himself, never in one place too long. >> when i met him, he was difficult to track down. there are not a lot of people who are around him for a long time. he moves on.

>> he is a very smart person. very intelligent. he doesn't care what other people think of him. he is his very own character. and that is appealing. >> reporter: what was it about wikileaks that appealed to you? >> i thought exposing secrets, exposing immoral stuff that people are trying to hide for the public eye, that's a genius >> reporter: armed with a global troop of explorers, assange had a hidden network of servers. he was on a hidden network to change the worlds, one network at a time. starting in kenya. after a violent dispute after a election in 2007, wikileaks exposed hundreds of killings at the hands of kenyan police. the expose put wikileaks on the map, earning them an award.

that there were leaks of sarah palin's e-mail. and then wikileaks turned to the united states. and when a document from guantanamo bay was leaked, wikileaks published it. >> the defense of freedom as a value is on the front of guantanamo bay. >> reporter: wikileaks soon found itself in the cross hairs of the u.s. army. this report leaked to wikileaks identified it as a threat and revealed ways to shut it down. assange, though, remained defiant. >> when we're attacked that is usually the worst move that someone can do. the information is not going to disappear any time soon. >> reporter: growing pressure

drove wikileaks under ground. they moved to a james bond bullet prop bunker in sweden. assange went to iceland. by 2009, iceland was a country on its knees. a banks crisis brought it to the brink of bankruptcy, banks went under. enter wikileaks. in july 2009, they posted a book from one of the largest failed banks, releases risky loans. the bank launched a counterattack. >> we got letters from the bank saying they could try to attack us and put news prison for a year. unless we removed it. and of course we said, we're not going to remove it.

>> reporter: the leak became the story across island. [ speaking foreign language ] >> reporter: but the bank won an injunction providing rutv from airing the story. >> five minutes before the news was going on the air, they were indicted. >> reporter: but the network had another card to play. directing the viewers to the wikileaks website. >> we had tens of thousands of icelanders descending on us to get the material. >> reporter: the expose made their heroes. iceland became a haven for whistle-blowers and wikileaks. in a small apartment, assange and his team became working on a

secret, the most explosive yet. >> he put the chain on and he types the pass words in his laptop and he starts playing a film. i never seen anything like it in my life. ♪ ♪ ♪ [ male announcer ] thanks to advanced natural gas turbine technology from ge, the power that will help make our nation more energy independent is right here in america. [ crickets chirping ] ♪ [ cheers and applause ] advanced gas turbine technology from ge. ♪ advanced gas turbine technology from ge. oh! let's do this. look who's early! [ dentist ] my patients want to walk into their dental check-up

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found the missile. >> roger, i'll get it. you're clear. >> i'm firing. >> reporter: iraq, 2007. u.s. military on display. an apache helicopter camera capturing voices of war. video kept hidden until someone leaked it to julian assange. in a daring move, he crossed into enemy terry washington, d.c., to release the video. >> we have a mission to promote political reforms by releasing suppressed information. >> reporter: assange placed a george orwell quote in the inning. what do you think?

>> he has an agenda to meet and he is not aware what he is taking about. >> reporter: i met with a breeg dear general to read through the video. >> it is my understanding that this unit on the ground had been engaged in combat probably for the last couple hours. >> he's got an rpg. i'm going to fire. >> reporter: this clip, i believe they identify an rpg. it turns out it was a long lens telephoto lens held by a journalist. you can see. that reuters photographer, his assistant and the men around him, were all guns down.

>> this photographer should not have been walking around with an instrument that looks like -- >> reporter: is the blame on the photographer? >> warfare is not perfect. there are mistakes that are sometimes made. he shares some of the blame here. >> reporter: i want to move to the van video. what you see is a van coming to help grab some of the wounded people on the ground. the apache crew asks for permission to engage. >> come on, let us shoot. >> again, that is an active battle field. that van could have fighters in it with weapons. those fighters could kill our soldiers who are fighting. >> come on.

>> we can see that the young pilots in the helicopter have become debased in their character. >> yeah, look at that, right through the windshield. >> they are playing video games with real human lives and looking for excuses to kill people. >> reporter: it turned out, there were children inside the van. >> it's their fault for brings kids to the battle. >> reporter: i with experience in naval ware fare. soldier to soldier, should they have exercised more restraint? >> i don't think so. they have followed the proper procedures. >> reporter: if they did everything by the book, is there something wrong with the book? >> i don't think so. >> reporter: secret u.s. military video. a stunning wikileaks exclusive. who is responsible for leaking

and it and why? they point to bradley manning, who has since been arrested. but manning would never come to his their tension if not for this man. we are on the way to meet adrian lamo, who turned him into authorities. and lamo, he is screens all his phone calls. he changes e-mails. he doesn't respond to e-mails. he had one condition for his interview today. and his location had to remean completely amons now. what is with all the cloak and dagger stuff? >> there are people in opposition to my corporation with the government in this case. and i want to be able to sleep at night. >> reporter: bradley manning

sends him an e-mail. >> he said he was an intelligence analyst in iraq just outside of baghdad. >> reporter: they began chatting online. lamo said he provided the chat logs to wired.com who published about a quarter of the transcripts. in one of the chats, manning asked f huh access to met quorks 14 hours a day for, seven days a week for eight months what would do you? alarmed, lamo contacts u.s. officials. he said he took action because his belief in government transparency is not without limits. >> when i draw the line is when it comes to the point that it can cause harm.

>> reporter: we tried to get in contact with mannings attorney but he never returned the calls. now a government informant. he said that he copies the information on a cd that he labeled lady gaga. no one suspected a thing. he mentioned yulean assange. i'm a high profile source and i developed a relationship with assange. but assange denies knowing manning. manning is in ft. levinton, kansas. he is accused of leaking hundreds of thousands of u.s. secrets.

secrets he allegedly gave to julian assange. soon, the press would pick it up. >> i ran around going this is the biggest story on the planet. we have to get ahold of this information.

i'm richelle carey. here is a look at the top stories.

take a look at this.

>> reporter: julian assange's collateral murderer video did not spark the outrage that he hoped for. and now his alleged source, bradley manning, was in custody. >> he was paranoid. i'm not surprised he was in a state of high anxiety and security conscious. >> reporter: security conscious

because assange had another weapon in his arsenal. a secret data base of government documents from the u.s. war in afghanistan. assange was focused on what he saw as abuses in the u.s. government. now he believed he had evidence of actual war crimes. does he operate as if he is constantly being followed, constantly being watched in. >> yeah, because he probably is. this information was known and people, important people knew he had this. more surveillance around him than anyone in the world. >> reporter: one is nick dave cies, from the "guardian" newspaper in london. he searched for a big story. you started looking for julian assange? >> he was laying very low.

it took me four or five days. >> reporter: in a cafe in brussels, davies came face to face with assange. >> i wanted to get with the guardian and get serious impact. and he rapidly locked on to that idea. >> reporter: straight out of a spy novel, dave is headed back to london. and one day later, he had a data base. assange invited "the new york times" and der spiegel to join him. they began to sift through the thousands of documents.

i have come here to london to the "guardian" newspaper and to meet with the people who met with assange to sift through the documents to be known as the iraq and the afghanistan war logs. this is the famous bunker? >> yeah. >> reporter: david lee is another journalist with "the guardian." >> these are the war logs. >> reporter: what were your impressions of the julian assange? >> he didn't behave like earthlings. he could tap away on the laptop and button up and go to sleep where he lay. >> he started to come across information about the pakistani service and the pentagon.

this was rich stuff. >> you want to see it on the map -- >> reporter: but there was growing tension with assange. >> all of us came across material which was clearly likely to lead to the death of innocent civilians. all of us brought it to his attention. and were told if an afghan civilian brought the hope they deserve to die. >> reporter: does assange realize they are flesh and blood consequences to releases the documents? >> he has to have it explained to him. he is not a person with empathy to humans. and finally, he got it. and he made a rather crude attempt to make the material which he was publishing on the website the safe, by withholding 15,000 documents.

>> reporter: on the eve of the launch date, names of afghan civilians were still in the documents. >> we go at 10:00 p.m. london time tomorrow. >> reporter: on july 25th, 2010, wikileaks released over 70,000 documents on the afghan war. >> the material exposes an extraordinary range of abuses. >> reporter: and all three newspapers published stories on the war logs. >> they were finding material on the wikileaks website which was clearly dangerous. and that meant the damage was done. his moral authority was released. he made a terrible mistake. >> reporter: the release set off a firestorm in washington. >> the battle field consequences of the documents are dangerous

for the troops, allies and afghan partners. >> secret files exposes true afghan war. >> there are a dozen camera tracks outside. surprising? >> no. i knew if we did our work right, it would have this effect. i knew the material was serious. >> you said that this is the most comprehensive history of the war. >> are there circumstances you wouldn't print information? >> reporter: he finally had the world's attention. >> i think twitter has gone off the roof. >> he went from a hobo character to a rock star. it's like having a hit movie over night and everyone want fos

see you. >> reporter: but that could come with a price. the press began to drill him. >> where will it lead? how far will his group go? locations of weapons? >> thanks, steve, every [ bleep ] gun pointed at me. >> reporter: still, assange seemed confident he was beyond the reach of governments. >> i'm untouchable now in this country. >> reporter: untouchable for now. but his star was able to be tarnished. this time, the leaks would be about him.

reporter: by the summer of 2010, julian assange's war on secrecy is in high gear. >> the course of the war needs to change. this is "the guardian". >> reporter: the afghan war logs are makes headlines around the world. and making assange famous. >> i'm a combative person. i like crushing bastards. >> reporter: but now, he is at the center of a scandal. the swedish government had requested extradition to

question him about sexual assault. two swedish women have come forward with sexual advances, which under swedish law can constitute rape. to day, no charges have come across assange. undistracted by what he calls a smear compaign, he works around the clock on what he calls his biggest leak yet. in october 2010, wikileaks releases the mother lode, nearly 400,000 secret u.s. documents on the u.s. iraq war. >> it involved series lies that were repeated and amplified. >> reporter: it has numerous

reports of torture and abuse of iraqi soldiers and cases where u.s. troops kill civilians. this time, he sensors the documents. >> we have cleared things by hand. and that left blank inch all over the material. >> reporter: but that doesn't ease the fear of many, including general kimmitt. julian assange says that nobody has been attacked or killed because of the wikileaks. do you agree with that? >> i believe a lot of the soldiers have been put in harm's way. we want to protect. we don't want to give an advantage to our enemy that can be used against our soldiers in combat. >> reporter: the steady leak of secrets doesn't end there. one week later, they public

more. the u.s. government fires back. hillary clinton is on the warpath. >> we are taking aggressive steps to hold responsible those who stole this information. >> reporter: what is the government's kounts attack. the cia has the wikileaks task force known as the ktf. and there is a rumor to be marshaling an investigation to lead to the arrest of assange. and then a series of blows. amazon.com kicks wikileaks all their home. and sweden issues an arrest warrant. on december 7th, 2010, assange is put in jail.

an ironic twist, a leak of the sexual allegations against assange. >> by a sheer fluke, someone i dealt with in the past said, i have the police file to the swedish investigation to the assaults. you are interested? >> reporter: nick davies who worked with assange on the war logs was given a copy of the report. >> we put it in the paper. what are you going to do? >> reporter: what was julian's reaction? >> he was mad. he felt we owed it to him to repress him. >> reporter: cnn made several requests for an interview with assange and got no response.

"the guardian" maintains that he was given several days to respond. he is a proponent of transparency but he doesn't seem to walk that walk. is that true? >> yes that is true. >> reporter: darnl domscheit-berg, then a wikileaks insider, said assange kept him and others in the dark. >> he said it's not your business and next question. and that is one of the major reasons why i and a few others left the project. >> reporter: leak of lack, assange's platform grows. but his relationships are fraying. domscheit-berg and others leave. >> you can see a pattern. he alienates the people that he works with.

>> reporter: coming up, in prison but not alone. cyber warriors in support of assange go on the attack. >> we have the whole project of assange. we feel obligated to do something about it. reach out to other people and tell them this is their fight as well. [ telephone rings ] oh! let's do this. look who's early! [ dentist ] my patients want to walk into their dental check-up prepared to ace it. that's why i tell them to use new crest pro-health invigorating clean rinse. its invigorating action lets you know it's working to fight plaque and gingivitis and it provides all these other benefits. crest pro-health invigorating clean rinse. clean, protect, and invigorate your way to better dental check-ups. life opens up when you do.

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julian assange emerges into a crush of supporters and media. >> well, it's great to smell fresh air of london again. >> reporter: vowing to continue the leaks and fight the sexual assault allegations against him. >> i hope to continue my work and continue to protest my innocence in this matter. >> reporter: by now, wikileaks is radioactive. paypal, visa have cut their financeable lifeline. but a global force of cyber activists launch a counterattack. they call themselves anonymous.

so we have been trying to get an interview with a member of anonymous for weeks. and we tracked down a member that is willing to talk to us. they are committed to the cause of wikileaks. we are skyping now with base and chris, two members of anonymous. base what is anonymous? >> it's an internet sub culture. it's the freedom of thought, the freedom of speech and the freedom of information taken to a logical extreme. >> reporter: why do you have to remain anonymous? >> you have the government agencies after us. you have other people that don't appreciate what we are doing after us. so it would not be very good if our identities were exposed. >> reporter: why are you such supporters of wikileaks? >> they expose secrets, transparency, freedom of speech, freedom of information on the internet.

and that resonates with you. >> corrupt governments of the world, we are anonymous. >> reporter: in december 2010, anonymous launched operation pay back. >> we went after papal, visa, mastercard and amazon. they were the ones that publicly withdrew funding and support for wikileaks. especially papal which actually held funds. >> reporter: amons now unleashed a cyber attack. >> the deny vefsher attack. it shuts down. >> reporter: temporarily, brings down some of the websites. do you think the government can stop groups like you or wikileaks? >> they are not going to stop wikileaks, if they take down wikileaks, they would be be martyring wikileaks.

the only thing they can do is turn the internet off. and that didn't stop the people in egypt. >> reporter: in some sense, it's unstoppable. part of a reality where whistle-blowers can make a government quake. and governments will fight back. the u.s. justice department has assange in its sight. rumor has it, building a case for conspiracy. >> if i'm a conspirator, then all the other media organizations are also conspirators conspirators. >> reporter: for now, assange remains in the uk under house arrest. in february, i traveled there for his first hearing.

we are 45 minutes out of central london to the wool rich crown court. like everywhere assange goes, he seems to draw a huge media crowd. there are representatives from every media source in the world. assange actually just arrived. he is going to come through this gated area in the courthouse. >> a black box has been applied to my life. on the outside of that black box has been written the word rape. >> reporter: he's at the center of attention. but still, very much alone. >> he is alone and he has become an island. the circle has become small. he no longer trusts anybody.

he has been betrayed by people who have come in the circle. >> reporter: to some, he is good and evil. >> julian assange has this self-proclaimed mantle that he put around himself of what governments can and can't do. >> reporter: some have taken aim. newt gingrich calls assange a terrorist. >> information warfare is warfare. and julian assange has engaged in terrorism. >> reporter: hero or villain, julian assange has created a powerful platform. >> the more people get to read what really goes on in the world, the more chance they have on educating themselves on

realities. and that is what we need. >> reporter: even some of assange's critics are following in his footsteps. daniel domscheit-berg has opened up a new website, open leaks. what is the future of wikileaks? >> it cannot be stopped anymore. and it carries the debate what is secrecy? what must be secret. and in the living rooms of people who have never heard about it before and never thought about it before. >> reporter: julian assange, the self-appointed champion of free speech, hayes dared to reveal the secrets of dictators and democracies. he dropped a nuclear war head of information on the world stage. the final chapter of the wikileaks saga has yet to be written. its fate is linked