A new underground group has formed and you may have heard or seen it without even realizing it. The groups name is Anonymous and the members are known as Anons. No one knows who is a part of Anonymous because it's not organized and doesn’t have any official members. Anonymous has been known to be made fun of for being a group of foul immature teens and hackers. Although Anonymous is not just a “Nerd Brigade” as Stephen Colbert put it. Anonymous was originally created on a image-board site known called 4chan. 4chan a site for people to go, post pictures and discuss topics and interests is most commonly associated with its board random known as /b/. 4chan is unconventional in that it has no sign up or any sort of identification when you enter the website. When people go on and talk no knows who is writing any comments. This creates an unbiased opinion from the reader’s perspective. Nothing is known of the author so the reader must decipher what the message really means and why it was written. Anything and everything is posted and there are absolutely no rules when it comes to posting.
Anonymous and /b/ are tied together as one. When one talks about /b/ they talk about Anonymous and vice versa. Anonymous is unpredictable in its action. When an Anon wants to attack or raid a specific site it does so by posting on /b/ and asking others to help. When Anons agrees to raid it usually is because it had been provoked or saw something it didn’t like.
Recently WiKi Leaks claimed that they had information on a major U.S. bank regarding corporate malfeasance but never directly specifying who. Bank of America became worried that it was them and hired a counter hacker by the name of Aaron Barr. Aaron Barr said that he would begin to attack WiKiLeaks credibility by falsifying documents so WikiLeaks would look unreliable and “Cyber attacks against their infrastructure”. The group Anonymous had been known to protect WiKiLeaks so Aaron Barr had also issued a threat against them. Anonymous retaliated by hacking Aaron Barr’s email account, took down his website, and remotely wiped his Ipad. After hacking his email account Anonymous began posting his controversial tactics of hacking as well as many personal emails including one where his wife told him she was filing for divorce. This was seen as a great success for anonymous protecting WikiLeaks from a corrupt corporation for trying to expose them.
This group “Anonymous” does not only defend WiKiLeaks specifically though. It defends or attacks whatever it feels like. Sometimes it attacks websites or groups for the simple reason of “For the Lulz”.”For the Lulz” is another way of saying just because or for fun. This begins to worry people because there is no real purpose or set goals involved in the way this group acts. Almost like a super hero without the moral compass, it is unpredictable and has no name or set person and it cannot be questioned or punished.
When Anonymous attacks one of its most common methods is a Dos attack. A Dos stands for denial of service, it’s where a group of people or person crash a certain website forcing the site to shut down denying access to the people who would actually use it. They used this method when Anonymous had declared war on Scientology. In 2008 Scientologist removed and banned the playing of a humiliating interview of tom cruise anywhere. Outraged by this censorship Anonymous declared war on Scientology. Using the Dos attack they shut down the website many times to annoy and agitate scientologists.
For the cases of attacking Scientology and Defending WiKiLeaks Anonymous feels like it is contributing to society and making it better. However many groups despise Anonymous. Anonymous receives much criticism being called a cyber terrorist group or just antisocial nerds not having anything better to do. Most of Anonymous actions are not different from standing outside of a building and protesting. It’s just a special way of doing it through the internet. Occasionally, Anonymous has been known to fight for something substantial. This however is masked by how it does what it feels like and pranks random sites for no reason.
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