The records the Coleman campaign kept on Franken fans are scattered within a vast database of nearly 50,000 contacts. A spreadsheet created by the secretive Wikileaks organization, which made the donor database available on the Web last month, contains several hundred comments apparently left at the Coleman campaign Web site.

Unlike the smaller donor database, the contacts’ data include no financial information — only names, mailing addresses, e-mail addresses, IP addresses and sometimes phone numbers.

About 800 of the records, including some duplicate entries, have the word “Franken” listed for “signup_type.” These appear to be contacts generated after Coleman placed a full-page ad in the Star Tribune in September 2007. Titled “‘Ridiculous,’” the ad takes Franken to task for using that word to describe a U.S. Senate vote that condemned MoveOn.org’s own full-page ad, titled “General Petraeus Or General Betray Us?”

Coleman’s ad asked readers to “Send Al Franken a message to condemn these ridiculous personal attacks on our military … Log on to www.colemanforsenate.com/ridiculous to find out how.”

Judging by the leaked data, most who logged on as instructed did use the opportunity to attack Franken. But a significant proportion had only praise for Franken and venom for Coleman:

Im writing from colemanforsenate.ridiculous Thanks for not being being a venomus (sic) hypocritical turd like norm “can’t even win st paul” coleman.

Future-Senator Franken: Thank you for not having a knee-jerk reaction to MoveOn.org’s ad. It’s not a matter of whether the ad is correct; it’s a matter of free speech and not using the ad for political posturing. Feel free to contact me for campaign work on your behalf.

Good Job Al Franken! You will get my vote… Keep it up!!

GOOD FOR YOU AL FRANKEN – YOU ARE NOT AFRAID TO SPEAK THE TRUTH!!! It is RIDICULOUS that NORM COLEMAN want so to censure FREE SPEECH in this country.

Dear Al, I am so glad that the Coleman campaign has given me this opportunity to tell you that I agree with you 100% . It is amazing that the people associated with the Swift boat campaigns can be so hypocritical!!. Coleman is the slimiest weasel ever to be a Senator from Minnesota, and it is rather nice that his mean spirted (sic) lackies (sic)  would take out a full page ad of this kind. … By the way — nice picture!!

Al, you are right on. I thank you for what you said. Thank you for being honest; thank you for standing up for the constitution and our right to dissent with this government administration.

Thank you for pointing out how riduculous (sic) this whole “General Betray Us” nonsense is. With thousands of American lives at risk and millions of dollars wasted in a stupid war in Iraq “to protect our freedom”, the US Sentate (sic) votes to condemn a newspaper ad and in the process condemning free expression in our own country. “RIDICULOUS” is exactly the right word.

Please don’t let this incredibly poor effort on the part of the Coleman camp deter you. It is ridiculous and you are right on. You have my vote. ps. it will be interesting to see if Colemanites send this message

Go, Al!! You were absolutely right. The entire situation was ridiculous. The Senate voting on an ad!! I’m so embarrassed to be represented by two Senators who don’t know that issue ads by groups with a bias are part of the political scene right now, that I would vote against both of them if the election were held tomorrow. … Al was right! Ridiculous!

Thanks, Al, for continuing to stand up for this country, against idiots like Norm Coleman, who can’t even get his email list correct. I wish you every success in your fight against the Bush/Cheney kleptocracy and the Republican idiocracy. I also wish you success in exposing and halting the shameful, immoral war of choice that Bush, Cheney, and the neocons have lied us into.

Hi Al, I saw Norm’s ad in the paper attacking you and thought I’d visit his site to add my two cents. On Normie’s bandwidth. I totally agree with you. While I’m not surprised by Norm’s ridiculous vote, I was disappointed that Amy Klobuchar followed suit. … Keep up the good work and good luck in your thrashing of Norm next November.

Norm Coleman is a disgusting excuse for a representative, who has colluded with the President and lobbyists, in blatant disregard of his constiuants (sic). Please continue to stand up to him.

Thanks Al for your principles. I’m going to your website now to send you money.

Dear Al: Thanks for all you do. I think it’s great to use Mr. Coleman’s weblink to say hi. The photo of you here looks as if you’re saying (appropriately) “Hey Norm! Pull my finger!”

Thank you Al for doing the right thing. I am a Republican who will vote for you in next year’s election because it is time we have a Senator who doesn’t folow (sic)President Bush and his corruption.

Among the dozen or so Franken supporters contacted by the Independent, not all recalled the “Ridiculous” ad, while others said they did, but only vaguely. A few said they suspected instead that they had landed in Coleman’s files via e-mails they had sent or comments they had submitted on other occasions. None seemed upset about their personal data being exposed, in part because Coleman’s online donors had suffered much more seriously from the breach.

“I believe we contacted Coleman via his SENATE web site asking him to vote against drilling in ANWR,” said John Pususta in an e-mail co-signed by Janine Holter. “We … were contacted by Wikileaks via email [about the breach] … We received no information from the Coleman office. … It distresses us that donor information was compromised. Lucky for us we did not donate to Mr. Coleman.”

Another Franken backer identified as A. Tagento said: “I have heard much about the leak, but did not realize that common constituents’ info was leaked in addition to that of donors to his campaign. I have not been contacted by Sen. Coleman or his people in regard to this leak.”

David Wunderlin said: “I had signed up for campaign news from Coleman during the election. Just to see what misinformation Coleman was spreading against the Democrats.”

Critics and data security experts have suggested that the Coleman campaign erred when it failed to disclose an alleged breach of donor’s credit card information in late January.

Coleman authored the “Federal Agency Data Breach Protection Act,” which was introduced in the U.S. House in July 2007 and would have required “timely notice to be provided to those individuals whose sensitive personal information could be compromised as a result of such breach.” The bill didn’t get a hearing.

The bill reads:

Establishing policies, procedures, and standards for agencies to follow in the event of a breach of data security involving the disclosure of sensitive personal information and for which harm to an individual could reasonably be expected to result, specifically including —

(A) a requirement for timely notice to be provided to those individuals whose sensitive personal information could be compromised as a result of such breach, except no notice shall be required if the breach does not create a reasonable risk of identity theft, fraud, or other unlawful conduct regarding such individual;

Coleman’s Peachtree State supporter, Andrew Dempsey, says he gave twice. The first donation landed him on the database that the campaign left in a publicly accessible place on its Web site in January. His question for Coleman: Is his second donation, made in February with a different credit card, also cause for concern?

But all he gets at the number Coleman offered for worried donors to call with questions is a recorded message. (Other donors have expressed the same gripe to MnIndy.) So he called me to ask my opinion of his situation, since I was the one from whom he learned about the database breach on Wednesday.

In fact Dempsey still hasn’t received notification about it from Coleman, he says. He read Coleman’s donor message at the MnIndy Web site. It’s a failing that could yet get the Coleman campaign into hot water. State law requires organizations to notify anyone whose private information they hold whenever such data leaks are disclosed, but the campaign didn’t tell its donors after the January breach.

MnIndy continues getting return e-mails and calls after contacting  around 600 people listed on the database made public by Wikileaks.org this week. Many say our e-mail was the first they’ve heard of the data leak. We posted a sampling of reactions on Wednesday that we got by phone and e-mail — ranging from “I owe you” to “Go pound sand.”

Now Wikileaks is getting into the supporter-reaction business. Here’s an e-mail from Wikileaks.org received today by a person on Coleman’s database of supporters (as opposed to donors, a list that likewise leaked from the campaign site):

From: Wikileaks Press Office
Date: Fri, Mar 13, 2009 at 2:15 PM
Subject: Media inquiry, re: Senator Coleman leak
To: undisclosed-recipients

Dear Coleman subscriber. The national media would like your feedback in relation to the Senator Norm Coleman leak.

Your email address and personal details appear on a list of 51,000 Coleman supporters / donors / contacts accidentally released by the Coleman Campaign on January 28, 2009.

The list:

http://wikileaks.org/wiki/Senator_Norm_Coleman:_detailed_list_of_51%2C641_supporters_and_web-site_users%2C_28_Jan_2009

Background context:

http://wikileaks.org/wiki/The_Big_Bad_Database_of_Senator_Norm_Coleman

Uni of M. statistical analysis of leaked Coleman Donors:

http://wikileaks.org/wiki/Coleman%27s_Compromised_Donors:_Where_They_Came_From

You are on the list because you gave the Coleman for Senate Campaign your email address OR because Senator Coleman purchased your email address from another
mailinglist.

As you might be aware, the accidental leak by the Coleman Campaign has attracted national media interest this week:

http://news.google.com/news?pz=1&ned=us&hl=en&q=wikileaks&scoring=d

Several national news organizations, such as the AP, and local organizations in MN have asked us for your feedback. Rather than have the these organizations mail you and clutter your inbox, we have all agreed to to pool resources and ask you for this one-time comment.

We will publicly release all comments longer than one paragraph. If you ask for your comment to be anonymous, or “not for attribution,” your identity will be kept strictly confidential and removed before it is passed onto other media groups.

We will release all comments longer than one paragraph, ordered by quality of writing. No comments, provided they are over one paragraph will be excluded.

Q: What is your reaction to the Coleman leak?

Thank you, and have a nice weekend,

Jay Lim,
Wikileaks Press Office
Sunshine Press
Stockholm – Nairobi – Washington

Coleman attorney Fritz Knaak expressed confidence that state and federal law enforcement agencies “will get to the bottom of this.” But Knaak conceded that “we are deeply concerned about what this means to our relations with our supporters.”

Coleman and Knaak made the comments to reporters outside the Minnesota Senate election contest trial in St. Paul, which is nearing its end after nearly two months.

“We became aware of the fact that someone had tried to access the server” more than a month ago, Knaak said. But after what he termed a “very thorough” forensic investigation, the campaign decided “there had not been a compromise of the data at that time.”

The campaign learned of the breach from donors on Tuesday night. “Obviously we are going to have to review … the process,” Knaak said, adding, “The system is secure.”

Video of the full statements to reporters by Coleman and Knaak is available at the UpTake.

Marty Owings of KFAI-FM contributed to this report.