The hacker group "Anonymous"

poetinahat · Jan 2, 2013

sulong said:
"Anonymous", do good deeds for society.

Who decides what constitutes a good deed? Or what constitutes society?

Whether I agree with the deeds, the intent and the target, I still have qualms about self-appointed arbiters of justice. Much as I love Clint Eastwood films.

CrastersBabies · Jan 2, 2013

missesdash said:
I don't think he should get any jail time, but if he went to high school with me, I'd definitely out him as someone who watched a girl get raped, joked about it on video (on the night that it happened), tweeted more jokes about it and then denied it ever happened to cover up for his rapist friends. Cause that doesn't make him a dumbass kid as much as a shitty human being.

The guy in the video in the link is also one of the students who live-tweeted the (purported)rape, with choice comments like: "You don't sleep through a wang in the bu**hole #deadgirl," "Some people deserve to be peed on," and "Song of the night is definitely Rape Me by Nirvana."

If you google around, you'll find tweeted pictures of the girl being dragged around, unconscious. Few were willing to come forward as witnesses.

I read some of the comments by users on that article and a few are saying things like, "That's just how young guys talk these days when they're in a group or alone. If you took a recording device everywhere, you'd all be guilty of the same type of thing."

And to that I have to call utter and complete BS. Twenty years ago when I was in high school, I had more guy friends than girl friends and never (ever) did I hear anyone ever talk like this guy or say these types of things. As a matter of fact, the guys I hung out with would have probably put a stop to the hate-mongering ASAP.

If this truly is how young people (of this generation) talk about things like this, then what the heck? I'm really astounded. I can only imagine what his parents are thinking.

Perhaps it's time for people to stop thinking that they're safe spewing hate-speech online or in groups (where the guy had to know he was being recorded).

Celia Cyanide · Jan 2, 2013

benbradley said:
I don't know quite what to say about Anonymous, I have mixed feelings and aren't even quite sure what they are.

While looking around I found this:

http://www.heraldsun.com.au/news/wo...rmented-in-death/story-fnd134gw-1226497411838

The article (and especially the mother of the man named) seems to indicate there's some question as to whether the person named is the actual abuser. But presuming he is, and that they can reliably do this in other cases, I'd very much like to see such abusers exposed BEFORE such a suicide happens. (hey, it' free advice, folks)

I agree with you. What that man did to that girl was disgusting, but how do we know it was him? It would be a horrible thing to be accused of, if you didn't do it.

Celia Cyanide · Jan 2, 2013

CrastersBabies said:
The guy in the video in the link is also one of the students who live-tweeted the (purported)rape, with choice comments like: "You don't sleep through a wang in the bu**hole #deadgirl," "Some people deserve to be peed on," and "Song of the night is definitely Rape Me by Nirvana."

If Kurt Cobain were alive today, he'd drop dead.

CrastersBabies · Jan 2, 2013

Celia Cyanide said:
I agree with you. What that man did to that girl was disgusting, but how do we know it was him? It would be a horrible thing to be accused of, if you didn't do it.

This is where I balk. What if someone is innocent but the group is convinced they are guilty? While it's great to see this type of organization user their hax0r powers for "good," there is a lot of potential tragedy that might come as well.

Magdalen · Jan 2, 2013

CrastersBabies said:
This is where I balk. What if someone is innocent but the group is convinced they are guilty? While it's great to see this type of organization user their hax0r powers for "good," there is a lot of potential tragedy that might come as well.

No shit! Or so Arthur Miller quite demonstrated, twice!! I'm all for more than typing activism, but there appears to be a muddle of hack vs. act that I'm still trying to put my finger on.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Crucible

(Miller wrote the play as an allegory of McCarthyism, when the U.S. government blacklisted accused communists.[1] Miller himself was questioned by the House of Representatives' Committee on Un-American Activities in 1956 and convicted of "contempt of Congress" for refusing to identify others present at meetings he had attended.)

thebloodfiend · Jan 2, 2013

CrastersBabies said:
If this truly is how young people (of this generation) talk about things like this, then what the heck? I'm really astounded. I can only imagine what his parents are thinking.

It's not.

I'm astounded people actually raised idiots like that.

kuwisdelu · Jan 2, 2013

thebloodfiend said:
It's not.

I'm astounded people actually raised idiots like that.

Actually, that's exactly how Zoombie and I converse IRL.

J.W. Alden · Jan 2, 2013

thothguard51 said:
My other issue with Annon is that they claim there is no central body and any wacko's can act in Annons name? How are we innocent bystanders to understand it was a wacko and not a real Annon project? They all look the same to me...

They should, because they are the same.

Anonymous is not a "they," it's an "it." That's where the bigger misconceptions of the group come from. The founding tenet of the group was that literally anyone can be anonymous, and you can commit any act as anonymous. If you go rob a bank tomorrow and say that you're anonymous, that means anonymous robbed that bank.

Over the years the "core" members that have organized many of the high profile ops have taken gradual steps away from the more "lulzy" acts done under the name of anon (of which there were more in the early days) and tried to make it clear that there should be some morality at play with an op. But even that is not a hard and fast rule, because there are no hard and fast rules in anonymous. It's an anarchic group, and that's not an exaggeration. The idea is that if you're dissatisfied with something, but don't want to fight that something in your own name (whatever the reason—maybe because it's illegal to fight that something), you can do it as anonymous.

But there's no rule about what that something is. Maybe it's some great injustice in the world, but maybe it's just boredom on a Wednesday night.

thebloodfiend · Jan 2, 2013

kuwisdelu said:
Actually, that's exactly how Zoombie and I converse IRL.

I'm sure.

Not even my guy friend who was in the bloods talks like that. Nor do his friends.

I mean, seriously, when is raping a girl, or watching a girl get raped, funny? Maybe, maybe, I can get the prison rape jokes. I mean, I do laugh at that episode of the boondocks, the booty warrior. There's some twisted disgusting logic behind that. But what they were joking about? I just don't get it. Am I missing something?

kuwisdelu · Jan 2, 2013

thebloodfiend said:
I mean, seriously, when is raping a girl, or watching a girl get raped, funny? Maybe, maybe, I can get the prison rape jokes. I mean, I do laugh at that episode of the boondocks, the booty warrior. There's some twisted disgusting logic behind that. But what they were joking about? I just don't get it. Am I missing something?

I don't know. I can find some pretty sick stuff funny or amusing when it's totally fictional.

When it's real? I don't get it, either.

Magdalen · Jan 2, 2013

J.W. Alden said:
They should, because they are the same.

Anonymous is not a "they," it's an "it." That's where the bigger misconceptions of the group come from. The founding tenet of the group was that literally anyone can . . . .

But there's no rule about what that something is. Maybe it's some great injustice in the world, but maybe it's just boredom on a Wednesday night.

So what you're saying is that Anonymous is mostly people who have given up trying to read Infinite Jest?

Celia Cyanide · Jan 2, 2013

kuwisdelu said:
I don't know. I can find some pretty sick stuff funny or amusing when it's totally fictional.

When it's real? I don't get it, either.

Yeah, me too. I can have a pretty sick sense of humor when it comes to fiction, and I usually do. That said, I have a hard time respecting someone who not only talks like that about a real life situation, but allows himself to be filmed saying it.

Celia Cyanide · Jan 2, 2013

J.W. Alden said:
They should, because they are the same.

Except that Anonymous has claimed that some of the actions taken in their name were not theirs.

kuwisdelu · Jan 2, 2013

Celia Cyanide said:
Except that Anonymous has claimed that some of the actions taken in their name were not theirs.

You're still trying to think of it as an organization. It's not.

(Or rather, you'll hurt yourself if you try to think that way.)

Celia Cyanide · Jan 2, 2013

kuwisdelu said:
You're still trying to think of it as an organization. It's not.

No, I'm not, really. It's just that Anonymous, being what it is, cannot claim, "we didn't do that." They can't expect it to mean anything, really.

kuwisdelu · Jan 2, 2013

Celia Cyanide said:
No, I'm not, really. It's just that Anonymous, being what it is, cannot claim, "we didn't do that." They can't expect it to mean anything, really.

Sure, but it doesn't mean they can't or won't try if the act wasn't popular among Anons or the higher-ups didn't like it. It both was and wasn't Anonymous.

Anonymous is rife with contradictions.

Haggis · Jan 2, 2013

kuwisdelu said:
Sure, but it doesn't mean they can't or won't try if the act wasn't popular among Anons or the higher-ups didn't like it. It both was and wasn't Anonymous.

Anonymous is rife with contradictions.

How can there be higher ups if it's not an organization?

J.W. Alden · Jan 2, 2013

Haggis said:
How can there be higher ups if it's not an organization?

Higher ups is not the right phrase, me thinks, but there's a small group (or groups) within anonymous that organizes many of the higher profile ops. Many of them are founding members (but even that phrase is a little fuzzy, since its entire inception was kind of organic and gradual), and many of these are the same people who've tried to steer as much of anonymous along a moral path as they can.

But anyone can do whatever they want, and they can do it in the name of anonymous. If other anons don't like it, sometimes they'll claim it wasn't in the spirit of anonymous or even go so far as to say that it wasn't anonymous. Think of it as two heads of the same hydra arguing about who eats what.

kuwisdelu · Jan 2, 2013

Haggis said:
How can there be higher ups if it's not an organization?

Because like I said, it's full of contradictions.

On the one hand, everyone's anonymous, and anyone can be Anonymous. On the other hand, lots of the people who call the shots during ops have internet handles they go by, and it isn't hard to find and talk to them. Ideally, ideas rise and fall solely on their popularity and merit, because everyone's anonymous. In practice, that can work for stuff like DDoS attacks because it doesn't take any skill to aim the LOIC, but for an op that requires more hacking skills, you need people who actually have those skills. So there are people who rise to the top and call lots of the shots. But that still doesn't really make it like an ordinary organization, nor does it mean you can try to apply that kind of logic to it, because sometimes leaders get vanned. Although a certain kind of hierarchy does emerge, the idea of Anonymous exists outside the bounds of that hierarchy, and will continue to function and exist even if it collapses.

J.W. Alden said:
Higher ups is not the right phrase, me thinks, but there's a small group (or groups) within anonymous that organizes many of the higher profile ops. Many of them are founding members (but even that phrase is a little fuzzy, since its entire inception was kind of organic and gradual), and many of these are the same people who've tried to steer as much of anonymous along a moral path as they can.

Yup.

poetinahat · Jan 2, 2013

Haggis said:
How can there be higher ups if it's not an organization?

Amen. Maybe they should add "... and Unaccountable" to their name.

kuwisdelu · Jan 2, 2013

poetinahat said:
Amen. Maybe they should add "... and Unaccountable" to their name.

...but anons get vanned all the time.

Also, JW and I just explained that.

Haggis · Jan 2, 2013

poetinahat said:
Amen. Maybe they should add "... and Unaccountable" to their name.

Perhaps one of the advantages of being (small a) anonymous?

kuwi--vanned? Don't have a clue what that means.

J. W. and kuwisdelu, thanks for your insight. I'm trying to understand. I just don't quite get it yet.

kuwisdelu · Jan 2, 2013

Haggis said:
kuwi--vanned? Don't have a clue what that means.

You know, when the FBI show up and take you away in a van.

J. W. and kuwisdelu, thanks for your insight. I'm trying to understand. I just don't quite get it yet.

It's really easier if you just think of Anonymous as a social phenomenon rather than an organization.

poetinahat · Jan 2, 2013

kuwisdelu said:
...but anons get vanned all the time.

Also, JW and I just explained that.

Yeah, without context, that explanation could apply to Al Qaeda or the IRA. Seemed not so much an explanation as a justification.

Look, I'm not saying I'm against them particularly. I'm saying I'm wary of folks - folks who won't identify themselves - saying, "trust us, this is for the general good". Today, maybe. This particular case, maybe. As a matter of policy, though? No way.

kuwisdelu said:
It's really easier if you just think of Anonymous as a social phenomenon rather than an organization.

Ah. Like Deadheads. Okay, I'm good with that...

The hacker group "Anonymous"

say it loud

Burninator!

Joker Groupie

Joker Groupie

Burninator!

Petulantly Penitent

Cory

Revolutionize the World

The King Who Bore the Sword

Cory

Revolutionize the World

Petulantly Penitent

Joker Groupie

Joker Groupie

Revolutionize the World

Joker Groupie

Revolutionize the World

Evil, undead Chihuahua

The King Who Bore the Sword

Revolutionize the World

say it loud

Revolutionize the World

Evil, undead Chihuahua

Revolutionize the World

say it loud