Wikileaks, the 'whistleblower' website, will find out today whether a block on the site in the US is to be lifted.

The site, which hosts information that "reveals unethical behaviour in governments and corporations", has effectively been shut down in America following legal action brought by a Swiss bank

Julius Baer, which brought its action in San Francisco, maintains that when the site published internal documents purporting to detail tax evasion schemes at the bank's Cayman Islands branch, it breached the privacy of its customers.

Earlier this month, Federal District Judge Jeffrey S. White ordered that the registrar for the domain name Wikileaks.org, Dynadot, take down access to the site. Dynadot agreed, although there are still ways to access the site - through Wikileaks.cx, for instance - and through version of the site set up outside the US.

Several activist groups, including the Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF) and the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU), have since filed briefs contending that the judge's order be withdrawn, and that the case raises "serious First Amendment concerns."

"Blocking access to the entire site in response to a few documents posted there completely disregards the public's right to know," ACLU's lawyer, Ann Brick, said in a statement.

The hearing, which is scheduled for 9am in San Francisco today, was due to address whether an order by the judge prohibiting "displaying, posting, publishing, distributing linking and other providing any information" relating to the Julius Baer documents should be made permanent.

As a result of the ACLU's and others' filings, however, it is now likely to cover more legal ground, including whether any right on the part of the public to learn about the documents outweighs privacy concerns.

In a list of questions issued last night, Judge White asked whether the court's order could be enforceable, and raised the dilemma of whether a "right to privacy trumps the freedom of access to information."

Lawyers apparently representing the owner of the Wikileaks.org domain, John Shipton, have also filed documents endorsing arguments made by the EFF and the ACLU, and requested that Julius Baer's action be thrown out.

Julius Baer, which is based in Zurich, had been hoping that forcing the site to remove the documents would shift attention away from its clients, and the group has retained the Los Angeles law firm Lavely & Singer, a favourite among celebrities seeking to prevent publication of unsavoury pictures.

Instead, a raft of sites - including those of activist groups as well as bloggers - have publicised its actions, which they say as an attempt to prevent freedom of speech. "Clearly, the court and Julius Baer underestimated the ingenuity of the web development community," the group 'Project on Government Oversight' wrote on its blog.

A Google search for Julius Baer Wikileaks now throws up more than 30,000 results.

Julius Baer says that its lawsuit has nothing to do with freedom of speech, and instead concerns the protection of its customers. "This action has been brought solely to prevent the unlawful dissemination of stolen bank records and personal account information of its customers," the bank said in papers filed this week.

"Wikileaks has laid bare a road map for the unsavoury to engage in identity theft and electronic theft of account balances."

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