Julian Paul Assange was born on the 3rd July 1971, in Townsville, Queensland Australia and is a computer programmer, publisher, journalist and internet activist, most famous as the founder and editor-in-chief of WikiLeaks, the organization that publishes “secret” information and news leaks, which launched in 2006.
Have you ever wondered how much wealth this versatile Australian has accumulated? How rich Julian Assange is? According to sources, it is estimated that Julian Assange’s net worth as of early 2016, is $300,000, which has been achieved largely through his engagement within WikiLeaks.
Julian Assange Net Worth $300,000
Julian had a unusual childhood – his father, an anti war activist and builder, John Shipton and his mother Christine Ann Hawkins, a visual artist, separated before Julian was born. At the age of only one, Julian’s mother married Richard Brett Assange, but they divorced in 1979. From Christine’s third marriage with Leif Hamilton, the member of The Family, Australian New Age group, Julian has a half-brother. By the time he was a teenager, he had lived in more than 30 cities around Australia, before settling in Melbourne, Victoria.
Among many schools he attended, Goolmangar Primary and Townsville State High School stand out. Julian enrolled at Central Queensland University in 1994, where he studied mathematics, physics and programming, and later at the University of Melbourne in 2003. However, he did not graduate from either.
Julian Assange showed an interest in computer science at a young age, and in 1987 began hacking under the name “Madox”. Alongside “Trax” and “Prime Suspect”, he formed the hacking group – International Subversives. The group, led by Assange, managed to hack Pentagon and other US Department of Defense facilities, MILNET, NASA, U.S. Navy, Motorola, Panasonic, Xerox, Australia’s Overseas Telecommunications Commission as well as the Australian National University, La Trobe University and Stanford University’s SRI International. After blowing his cover in 1991, police raided his home and in 1994 he was found guilty of 25 of 31 charges for hacking and related crimes. After paying A$2,100 and on a good behavior, Julian was released.
Julian Assange had begun his programming career in 1994, and he take credits for starting one of the first internet service providers in Australia, as well as for co-authoring the Transmission Control Protocol. Prior to WikiLeaks, he ran Best of Security, a website with over 5,000 subscribers, on which he gave advice on computer security. These provided the basis for his net worth.
In 2006, Julian Assange found WikiLeaks; the organization stationed in Sweden, focused on collecting and publishing secret and classified data and exposing confidential information, among which including extrajudicial killings in Kenya, procedures at Guantanamo Bay detention center, toxic waste dumping in Cote d’Ivore as well as emails from vice-presidential candidate at that time, Sarah Palin. These activities certainly increased Julian Assange’s net worth and have been the main source of his wealth.
In 2010, Julian Assange was faced with sexual assault charges in Sweden. After turning himself in to the London police, and after series of hearings throughout 2011 seeking to avoid extradition to Sweden, Julian Assange was granted political asylum by the Ecuadorean government in 2012. It protects him from arrest by British police, but only on Ecuadorean territory, making him unable to leave the Ecuadorean Embassy in London.
So far, Julian Assange published four books and several other short pieces, including “When Google Met WikiLeaks”, “The Hidden Curse of Thomas Paine” and “Cyberpunks”. Apart from those mentioned, Julian also took part in producing movies such as “Collateral Murder” (2010) and “Mediastan” (2013).
In his professional engagement so far, he Has been honored with numerous rewards including 2010 TIME Person of the Year, 2011 Martha Gellhorn Prize for Journalism and 2013 Global Exchange Human Rights Award, among several others.
When it comes to his personal life, Julian Assange was married to Teresa when he was 18 years old, and they have a son.
As of mid-2016, Julian Assange still resides in the Embassy of Ecuador in London, UK.
If Assanges net worth is only 300,000 then he needs a new agent to negotiate the fee for his interviews. I see figures anywhere up to 13 million, i don’t think anyone really knows.