Bitcoin whale donates 8 BTC to Julian Assange

A Bitcoiner helps Assange return to Australia. The donation of 8 BTC worth $492,000 covers the cost of the whistleblower's private jet.

An anonymous Bitcoin whalve apparently donated 8 BTC to WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange after his release from prison, as Alistair Milne reports in an X-post.

The founder of the Altana Digital Currency Fund explains: "Assange will arrive in Australia debt-free, thanks largely to the generosity of a single Bitcoiner."

Julian Assange is considered one of the first Bitcoiners, calling the cryptocurrency a "revolutionary technology." You can read how deeply his history is intertwined with Bitcoin in this article.

At the time of writing, the Bitcoin donation is worth nearly half a million dollars and covers the cost of Assange's flight. In addition, the WikiLeaks founder received about $380,000 in fiat donations. Julian Assange spent five years in British prison Belmarsh. The reason for his surprise release was a deal with U.S. prosecutors, which did require him to plead guilty to an indictment.

A private jet first took him from Britain to Saipan, in the Northern Mariana Islands. In this U.S. overseas territory, Assange signed the agreement with U.S. authorities.

His wife Stella had asked for donations on X: "Julian's journey to freedom involves high costs [...] He was not allowed to fly on commercial airlines."

Through WikiLeaks, Assange and Chelsea Manning published thousands of secret U.S. documents about the war in Afghanistan and Iraq. Critics say they endangered informants; proponents say they helped reveal U.S. war crimes.