Julian Assange, founder of the website WikiLeaks, has been a key figure in major leaks of classified government documents, cables and videos.
Assange was released from a British prison on June 24 and has returned to his home country Australia after his 12-year battle against extradition to the United States ended in a plea deal.
The Australian had been wanted in the US on 18 criminal charges after WikiLeaks published thousands of classified files and diplomatic cables in 2010.
Assange spent nearly seven years holed up in the Ecuadorian Embassy in London, protected by asylum status. In 2019, his asylum was rescinded by Ecuador and he was arrested by London's Metropolitan Police in connection with bail-skipping charges and an extradition warrant from the US Justice Department.
![Assange holds a copy of The Guardian newspaper in London on July 26, 2010, a day after WikiLeaks posted more than 90,000 classified documents related to the Afghanistan War.](https://media.cnn.com/api/v1/images/stellar/prod/131010131010-02-assange-1010.jpg?q=w_1576,c_fill)
![Assange attends a seminar at the Swedish Trade Union Confederation in Stockholm on August 14, 2010. Six days later, Swedish prosecutors issued a warrant for his arrest based on allegations of sexual assault from two women. Assange has always denied wrongdoing in that case, and years later Swedish prosecutors eventually dropped their investigations.](https://media.cnn.com/api/v1/images/stellar/prod/131010131205-03-assange-1010.jpg?q=w_1576,c_fill)
![Assange, in London, displays a page from WikiLeaks on October 23, 2010. The day before, WikiLeaks released approximately 400,000 classified military documents from the Iraq War.](https://media.cnn.com/api/v1/images/stellar/prod/131010131430-04-assange-1010.jpg?q=w_1576,c_fill)
![Assange and his bodyguards are seen after a news conference in Geneva, Switzerland, in November 2010. It was the month WikiLeaks began releasing diplomatic cables from US embassies.](https://media.cnn.com/api/v1/images/stellar/prod/131010131717-05-assange-1010.jpg?q=w_1576,c_fill)
![Assange sits behind the tinted window of a police vehicle in London on December 14, 2010. Assange had turned himself in to London authorities on December 7 and was released on bail and put on house arrest on December 16. In February 2011, a judge ruled in support of Assange's extradition to Sweden. Assange's lawyers filed an appeal.](https://media.cnn.com/api/v1/images/stellar/prod/131010132045-06-assange-1010.jpg?q=w_1576,c_fill)
![In October 2011, a month after WikiLeaks released more than 250,000 US diplomatic cables, Assange speaks to demonstrators from the steps of St. Paul's Cathedral in London.](https://media.cnn.com/api/v1/images/stellar/prod/180723122519-julian-assange-file-october-2011.jpg?q=w_1576,c_fill)
![Assange leaves the High Court in London in December 2011. He was taking his extradition case to the British Supreme Court.](https://media.cnn.com/api/v1/images/stellar/prod/180723122947-julian-assange-file-december-2011.jpg?q=w_1576,c_fill)
![Assange leaves the Supreme Court in February 2012. In May of that year, the court denied his appeal against extradition.](https://media.cnn.com/api/v1/images/stellar/prod/180723123204-julian-assange-file-february-2012.jpg?q=w_1576,c_fill)
![Assange addresses the media and his supporters from the balcony of the Ecuadorian Embassy in London on August 19, 2012. A few days earlier, Ecuador announced that it had granted asylum to Assange. In his public address, Assange demanded that the United States drop its "witch hunt" against WikiLeaks.](https://media.cnn.com/api/v1/images/stellar/prod/180723123657-julian-assange-file-august-2012.jpg?q=w_1576,c_fill)
![Assange speaks from a window of the Ecuadorian Embassy in December 2012.](https://media.cnn.com/api/v1/images/stellar/prod/180723123742-julian-assange-file-december-2012.jpg?q=w_1576,c_fill)
![Assange addresses the Oxford Union Society from the Ecuadorian Embassy in January 2013.](https://media.cnn.com/api/v1/images/stellar/prod/211213022034-no-black-bars-julian-assange-file-january-2013-restricted.jpg?q=w_1576,c_fill)
![Assange appears with Ecuadorian Foreign Minister Ricardo Patino on the balcony of the embassy in June 2013.](https://media.cnn.com/api/v1/images/stellar/prod/211213145439-assange-patino-2013.jpg?q=w_1576,c_fill)
![Assange speaks during a panel discussion at the South By Southwest Festival in Austin, Texas, in March 2014.](https://media.cnn.com/api/v1/images/stellar/prod/150703141036-restricted-julian-assange-07052015b.jpg?q=w_1576,c_fill)
![Assange attends a news conference inside the Ecuadorian Embassy in London in August 2014.](https://media.cnn.com/api/v1/images/stellar/prod/150703140750-julian-assange-7052015.jpg?q=w_1576,c_fill)
![Assange is seen on a video screen in March 2015, during an event on the sideline of a United Nations Human Rights Council session.](https://media.cnn.com/api/v1/images/stellar/prod/180723124509-julian-assange-file-march-2015.jpg?q=w_1576,c_fill)
![Assange, on the balcony of the Ecuadorian Embassy, holds up a United Nations report in February 2016. The United Nations Working Group on Arbitrary Detention said that Assange was being arbitrarily detained by the governments of Sweden and the United Kingdom.](https://media.cnn.com/api/v1/images/stellar/prod/180723125514-julian-assange-file-february-2016.jpg?q=w_1576,c_fill)
![Assange speaks to the media in May 2017, after Swedish prosecutors had dropped their investigation of rape allegations against Assange. But Assange acknowledged he was unlikely to walk out of the embassy any time soon. "The UK has said it will arrest me regardless," he said. "The US CIA Director (Mike) Pompeo and the US attorney general have said that I and other WikiLeaks staff have no ... First Amendment rights, that my arrest and the arrest (of) my other staff is a priority. That is not acceptable."](https://media.cnn.com/api/v1/images/stellar/prod/180723125809-julian-assange-file-may-2017.jpg?q=w_1576,c_fill)
![Assange was seen for the first time in months during a hearing via teleconference in Quito, Ecuador, in October 2018. The hearing was then postponed due to translation difficulties.](https://media.cnn.com/api/v1/images/stellar/prod/181030165602-01-julian-assange-hearing-ecuador-1025.jpg?q=w_1576,c_fill)
![A van displays images of Assange and Chelsea Manning, the former Army intelligence analyst who supplied thousands of classified documents to WikiLeaks, outside the Ecuadorian Embassy in London in April 2019. A senior Ecuadorian official at the time said no decision had been made to expel Assange from the embassy. According to WikiLeaks tweets, sources had told the organization that Assange could be kicked out of the embassy within "hours to days."](https://media.cnn.com/api/v1/images/stellar/prod/190408101121-01-julian-assange-signage-london-0405.jpg?q=w_1576,c_fill)
![A screen grab from video footage shows the dramatic moment when Assange was <a href="https://edition.cnn.com/2019/04/11/uk/julian-assange-arrested-gbr-intl/index.html" target="_blank">hauled out of the Ecuadorian Embassy by police</a> in April 2019. Assange was arrested for "failing to surrender to the court" over a warrant issued in 2012. Officers made the initial move to detain Arrange after Ecuador withdrew his asylum and invited authorities into the embassy, citing his bad behavior.](https://media.cnn.com/api/v1/images/stellar/prod/190411062550-04-assange-arrest-0411.jpg?q=w_1576,c_fill)
![Assange gestures from a police vehicle after arriving at the Westminster Magistrates' Court in London in April 2019.](https://media.cnn.com/api/v1/images/stellar/prod/190411133601-08-assange-arrest-0411.jpg?q=w_1576,c_fill)
![Assange is seen through the window of a prison van as he is driven into the Southwark Crown Court in London in May 2019. He was sentenced to 50 weeks in prison for breaching his bail conditions in 2012.](https://media.cnn.com/api/v1/images/stellar/prod/210104091600-julian-assange-05012019.jpg?q=w_1576,c_fill)
![A sketch depicts Assange appearing at the Old Bailey courthouse in London for a ruling in his extradition case in January 2021. A judge <a href="https://edition.cnn.com/2021/01/04/uk/julian-assange-extradition-wikileaks-us-gbr-intl/index.html" target="_blank">rejected a US request to extradite Assange,</a> saying that such a move would be "oppressive" by reason of his mental health. <a href="https://www.cnn.com/2021/12/10/europe/julian-assange-extradition-appeal-ruling-intl/index.html" target="_blank">That ruling was overturned</a> in December by two senior judges.](https://media.cnn.com/api/v1/images/stellar/prod/210104121438-04-assange-decision-0104.jpg?q=w_1576,c_fill)
![Assange boards a plane at a location given as London, in this still image from video released on June 25 by WikiLeaks via X.](https://media.cnn.com/api/v1/images/stellar/prod/240625073110-01-julian-assange-release-062524.jpg?q=w_1576,c_fill)
![WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange leaves the United States District Court in Saipan, Northern Mariana Islands, US, following a hearing on June 26. Assange pled guilty to a single count of conspiracy to obtain and disseminate national defence information and left for his native Australia as a free man.](https://media.cnn.com/api/v1/images/stellar/prod/240626010438-01-assange-departs-saipan-062624.jpg?q=w_1576,c_fill)
![WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange waves as he arrives in Australia on June 26.](https://media.cnn.com/api/v1/images/stellar/prod/240626114438-03b-julian-assange-australia-arrival-062624.jpg?q=w_1576,c_fill)
![Assange kisses his wife Stella Assange as he arrives in Canberra on June 26.](https://media.cnn.com/api/v1/images/stellar/prod/240626130557-04b-julian-assange-australia-arrival-062624.jpg?q=w_1576,c_fill)