NFT auction raises more than $50 million for WikiLeaks' Julian Assange

A group supporting WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange raised more than $50 million in ether cryptocurrency by selling an NFT of a clock to a blockchain-based activist collective set up to support his legal bills.

The non-fungible token, titled "Clock," is a joint creation by Assange and digital artist Pak. It displays a digital counter of the days Assange has spent behind bars at London's Belmarsh Prison, where he's being held awaiting extradition to the US.

Assange plans to appeal a UK court decision to extradite him to the US to face multiple espionage charges stemming from WikiLeaks' publication of confidential files on the Afghanistan and Iraq wars. If found guilty, he could face up to 175 years in jail. Pak has said the proceeds from the NFT clock sale to the activist collective, called AssangeDAO, will go to the Hamburg-based Wau Holland foundation, a nonprofit that accepts donations for Assange's legal defense.

The WikiLeaks founder is the latest controversial figure to benefit from a decentralized autonomous organization (DAO) set up to support his cause, bypassing traditional fundraising sites, as well as the scrutiny that goes with them.

Assange supporters argue that the Australian national isn't a criminal, but a journalist and defender of free speech. Jennifer Robinson, Assange's lawyer, previously said that it set a "dangerous precedent" if journalists face charges from U.S. authorities for publishing "truthful information" about the U.S.

Now, in just one week, AssangeDAO has raised $53 million, or 17,422 of the cryptocurrency Ether, from over 10,000 contributors through fundraising platform Juicebox. Notable contributors include Ethereum founder Vitalik Buterin, who donated 10 Ether, or approximately $32,000.

Founded in 2006 by Assange, WikiLeaks publishes news leaks and classified documents. During 2010, the site released 500,000 classified and secret U.S. military files and reports relating to the Iraq and Afghanistan wars—and broadcasted a confidential video showing an American helicopter on an air strike that killed civilians and journalists in Baghdad. The U.S. government is trying to prosecute Assange for releasing the confidential files, which it says endangered U.S. national security. Before Assange was jailed in the U.K., he sought refuge in the Ecuadorean embassy in London from 2012 to 2019.