Michael Savage tells Newsmax TV he is deeply worried about WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange's offer to share classified computer codes from stolen CIA documents with Apple, Google and other tech giants.
This week, WikiLeaks made public some 8,000 CIA documents showing how the agency spied by tapping into smart phones and internet-wired TV sets, and Assange said some CIA material it possesses could aid the Silicon Valley powerhouses in fixing flaws in their software programs.
"I'm very concerned about WikiLeaks joining the tech giants and I'll tell you why," the conservative radio host said Friday to Steve Malzberg on "America Talks Live."
"Remember last year or so, the slaughter by Muslims of their coworkers at San Bernardino. Remember they killed people in cold blood?" Savage said, referring to the 2015 massacre in which 14 people were shot dead by husband-and-wife jihadists Syed Rizwan Farook and Tashfeen Malik.
"Then they caught one of them, they found her phone or his phone and the FBI [chief James] Comey begged Apple [CEO] Tim Cook, to give them the encryption codes to get into the terrorist's phone and Tim Cook said, no we're not doing it.
"To me, that was treason, they should've arrested Tim Cook, but they didn't. You know why? Because Apple, Google, those companies, they're bigger than U.S. Steel was at their peak. They are monopolies, they're bigger than the government. They have more power than any government does on this planet."
Savage, author of the new book "Trump's War: His Battle for America," said that makes him suspicious of how such shared information would really be used.
"When you see a man [Cook] defy the FBI like this, you have to ask yourself, is he really doing it for our privacy? Or is he doing it to sell more iPhones? Think about that, nobody wants the government tapping into our own iPhone, we give that. But it's this whole terrible question of security vs. privacy," Savage said.
"We go back to [Founding Father] Ben Franklin, we know all of that stuff … But we're not living with Ben Franklin … we're living with fanatical Islamists amongst us who are plotting to destroy us as I speak.
"I want my intelligence agencies, when they're caught, to be able to break into their iPhones. I don't care what the hell Tim Cook says."
The New York Times reported that the tech companies have reacted "cautiously" to the WikiLeaks offer, saying there may be legal peril in accepting classified information stolen from the government. And a federal probe of WikiLeaks' dumping of the CIA documents has been launched.
A collaboration between WikiLeaks and "the Tim Cooks, the Googles, the Microsofts, the Facebooks -- this is not good for us. This is frightening," Savage said.
"If I have to draw a line in the sand, and someone says to me, who do you trust more, the CIA or Julian Assange of WikiLeaks? I go with the CIA … and do you know why? As rogue as we think the CIA is, there are checks and balances over that agency. There are no checks and balances over Julian Assange.
"Who does he report to? Moreover, who is he? Where did he come from? What are his ties to foreign governments? There's something more to this picture than meets the eye … Something's wrong with that picture."
Assange, who is under investigation over allegations of sexual assault and rape — charges he denies — has been living in the Embassy of Ecuador in London after being granted asylum by the South America country in 2012.
Savage is heard by 10 million listeners a week on "The Michael Savage Show," which is syndicated across the U.S. in more than 300 markets. He is the author of 25 books, including four New York Times best-sellers.
"Trump's War: His Battle for America," out next week, is published by Center Street, an imprint of the Hachette Book Group.
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