The Internet's Own Boy: The Story Of Aaron Swartz review

The 2013 suicide of hacktivist Aaron Swartz made him an instant martyr to internet freedom, a cause that will only be advanced by a moving documentary that puts the blame for his death squarely on the unfeeling US authorities determined to make an example of him in this age of Snowden and WikiLeaks.

That his “crime” was merely to liberate academic texts kept behind a corporate firewall makes his persecution all the harsher – though Brian Knappenberger’s film arguably undermines its case a tad by relying so heavily on interviews Swartz gave to Russia Today , hardly a beacon of democratic transparency.