READ IT: Assange conspiracy indictment includes charges of computer hacking and conspiring with Chelsea Manning

Charges were announced against WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange in an alleged computer hacking scheme.

The 47-year-old Assange was arrested Thursday in London after his asylum was withdrawn by Ecuador, whose British embassy he had lived in for nearly seven years.

The U.S. Department of Justice charged Assange with conspiracy to commit computer intrusion for agreeing to break a password to a classified U.S. government computer.

Federal investigators said Assange engaged in a conspiracy with Chelsea Manning in March 2010 to steal classified documents and communications.

Assange actively encouraged Manning, a former intelligence analyst for the U.S. Army, to break into U.S. Department of Defense computers to download the classified information and transmit it to him for publication by WikiLeaks.

Investigators said Assange agreed to help Manning crack a password stored on the Secret Internet Protocol Network, which allowed the former soldier to log onto government computers under a username that did not belong to her.

“After this upload, that’s all I really have got left,” Manning told Assange at one point.

Assange replied: “Curious eyes never run dry in my experience.”

If convicted, Assange faces up to five years in prison.

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