Barrett Brown

Barrett Brown is a writer and anarchist activist. His work has appeared in Vanity Fair, the Guardian, The Intercept, Huffington Post, New York Press, Skeptic, The Daily Beast, al-Jazeera, and dozens of other outlets. In 2009 he founded Project PM, a distributed think-tank, which was later re-purposed to oversee a crowd-sourced investigation into the private espionage industry and the intelligence community at large via e-mails stolen from federal contractors and other sources. In 2011 and 2012 he worked with Anonymous on campaigns involving the Tunisian revolution, government misconduct, and other issues. In mid-2012 he was arrested and later sentenced to four years in federal prison on charges stemming from his investigations and work with Anonymous. While imprisoned, he won the National Magazine Award for his column, The Barrett Brown Review of Arts and Letters and Prison. Upon his release in late 2016 he began work on the Pursuance System, a platform for mass civic engagement and coordinated opposition. His third book, a memoir/manifesto, will be released in 2018 by Farrar, Strauss, and Giroux. He may be reached at BarrettBrown@protonmail.com. He can be followed on Twitter at @BarrettBrown_.

  • What Is to Be Done?

    It is time to consider alternate systems of governance.

  • An Excerpt from Jailed Journalist Barrett Brown's New Book

    Barrett Brown is an activist-journalist awaiting federal trial in the US. In this excerpt from his latest book, Keep Rootin' for Putin, Brown tackles former Director of the Office of the National Drug Control Policy William Bennett's assertion...

  • Barrett Brown on Radio Censorship in America

    Last month, Barrett Brown's legal counsel sent us a letter from their imprisoned client, who was at the time bored out of his mind in jail. Today we received another...

  • Barrett Brown Is Bored Out of His Mind in Jail

    Earlier today, Barrett Brown's legal counsel sent us this letter on behalf of their imprisoned client, who is apparently spending his time in lockup watching telenovelas, The Bad Girls Club, and twiddling his thumbs until they bleed.

  • Reading 'Born Again' in Jail

    I’ve spent the last year or so in a federal lock-up awaiting trial on charges that have been duly analyzed elsewhere. Long story short: I’m facing decades in prison...