Anonymous:
Modern Day Cyber Anarchy
[Author: Nicole D'Angelo]
The
Internet is possibly the most anarchic space to ever exist. Everyone is
faceless and known only by a screen name, thus creating both equality and
anonymity among everyone on the Internet. Ideas and jokes fly through online
communities depending entirely on how well they are liked, not on the status of
the person who said them. The website 4chan embodies this Internet equality
perfectly. 4chan witnesses the creation of almost all of the most popular
Internet jokes or ideas. The site is simply a series of message boards onto
which people post pictures or messages. What makes 4chan special is its
complete anonymity.[1]
While most websites require at least a valid email in order for a user to start
posting, 4chan does not even require that basic identification. It was on the
anonymous message boards of 4chan that a group of Internet pranksters first
came together. They called themselves Anonymous after the nature of their posts
and came together by working with each other to “troll,” or perform pranks on
the Internet. Popular Internet pranks include prank calls, sending pizzas to
random houses and flooding sites with more traffic than the site’s bandwidth
could handle.[2]
Anonymous existed only as a small, unknown group on 4chan for years. However,
their identity completely changed in 2008 when actions taken by The Church of
Scientology prompted them to do something more.
The
Church of Scientology got Anonymous’ attention by trying to remove from the
Internet a video of Tom Cruise speaking about the religion. The church found
the video embarrassing and attempted to censor it to improve their image. This
censorship sparked a conversation among Anonymous members that led them to take
actions against what they saw as a morally corrupt institution, both because of
the Internet censorship and because of the allegations that the Church of
Scientology cheats its adherents out of their money.[3]
The word spread about the protest through YouTube, and within the next few
weeks protesters gathered outside various scientology headquarters around the
world. Protests lasted throughout February and into early spring of 2008.
Anonymous also was able to crash the sites of several scientology chapters and
flooded the Church of Scientology with prank calls and black faxes.[4]
This movement became known as “Project Chanology,” because of its beginnings on
4chan. Project Chanology marked an important turning point for Anonymous.
Stated by Cole Stryker, an author of a book on Anonymous, “Basically a group of
Anons realized, ‘Well, we have this ability to harness the power of thousands
of strangers through the Internet to pull all those resources in making
someone’s life miserable. Why don’t we take that power and use it for good?”[5]
Further action on using Anonymous’ power for good—or at least what they term
good—grew over the years and came to a head in 2011.
2011
was a major year for Internet activism, with movements such as Arab Spring and
Occupy Wall Street all either beginning or being publicized over the Internet.
Anonymous was supportive and occasionally active in all of these movements. In
January 2011, the group hacked into the Tunisian government’s website, crashed
it, and released a video speaking out against the Tunisian government’s
injustices. The group stood behind Occupy Wall Street, spreading the word and
urging more people to participate. In addition to larger political movements,
Anonymous made waves by hacking into company networks such as HBGary, PayPal and
Stratfor; immoral websites such as child pornography sites and hate sites; and
governmental groups such as NATO. In 2012 Anonymous hacked the CIA website and
other law enforcement accounts. On the same day, they recorded an FBI
conference call and posted it on YouTube. In protestation of the recent shutdown of Megaupload, Anonymous
hacked the sites of CBS and Universal Music and posted links to free downloads
for a variety of different musical artists, all of whom were represented by
Universal Music.[6]
Anonymous’ actions are varied in goal, scope and legality. Its actions have no
clear direction because the organization itself is decentralized and
leaderless. Yet despite their unorganized nature, the actions of Anonymous are rippling
throughout the world.
Anonymous
is indicative of the scope and power of the Internet as it exists today. The
Internet is perhaps the greatest means available of organizing a large amount
of people. Yet the Internet cannot be considered an agent of organization, but
rather an agent of chaos and anarchism. In fact, Anonymous has taken for its
symbol a Guy Fawkes mask, as seen in the graphic novel V for Vendetta and its movie adaptation. The graphic novel centers
around the ideas of anarchism, and the use of the Guy Fawkes mask sends the
message that members of Anonymous do as well. However, that is all that can be
known for sure about the political views of the members of movement. How far
they support anarchism, what anarchism means to them, and what actions they are
willing to take to further anarchism is impossible to pin down because
political opinions are slightly different for every anonymous member. Like the
original anarchists of the late 19th and early 20th
centuries, the movement is leaderless, decentralized and random in its actions.
Unlike the traditional anarchists, though, Anonymous and other Internet
activist groups may now have the power to change the world anyway.
For Further Exploration
Note: There are very few scholarly resources to be
found on Anonymous, as the world is still struggling to make sense of the group.
The following are articles or resources on Hacktivism in general:
Denning, Dorothy E. “Activism,
Hacktivism and Cyberterrorism: The Internet as a Tool for
Influencing
Foreign Policy.” IWS—The Information
Warfare Website. 2001. http://
Samuel, Alexandra. Hacktivism and the Future of Political
Participation. August 2004.
The
following are news articles on both hacktivism in general and Anonymous in
particular:
Barrett, Devlin. “U.S. Outgunned in
Hacker War.” The Wall Street Journal. March
28, 2012.
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052702304177104577307773326180032.html.
Accessed April 17, 2012.
Lunden, Ingrid. “The Megabreach is Back: Hacktivists to Blame
for 58 Percent of Stolen Data
in 2011, Says
Verizon Study.” Techcrunch. March 22,
2012. http://techcrunch.com/
2012/03/22/the-megabreach-is-back-hacktivists-to-blame-for-58-percent-of-stolen-data-in-2011-says-verizon-study/
Accessed April 16 2012.
Mills, Elinor. “Old-time
hacktivists: Anonymous, you’ve crossed the line.” CNET News. March
30, 2012. http://news.cnet.com/8301-27080_3-57406793-245/old-time-hacktivists-anonymous-youve-crossed-the-line/.
Accessed April 16 2012.
Wilcox, Joe. “Are hacktivists more
dangerous, or just more determined?” betanews.
March 22,
2012. http://betanews.com/2012/03/22/are-hacktivists-more-dangerous-or-just-more-determined/.
Accessed April 17 2012.
Links
Pen,
Joann. “The Evolution of Anonymous.” Mashable.
March 26, 2012. http://mashable.
com/2012/03/26/ evolution-of-anonymous/. Accessed April 19
2012.
Anon News—Everything Anonymous. http://anonnews.org/
Twitter
@YourAnonNews https://twitter.com/#!/YourAnonNews
Tumblr:
“Your Anon News: You Should have Expected Us.” http://youranonnews.tumblr.com/
The
following are archival elements—news articles and YouTube videos—from some of
the events mentioned above:
“Anonymous downs
government, music industry sites in largest attack ever.” RT News. January
20,
2012. Ed. March 7, 2012. http://rt.com/usa/news/anonymous-doj-universal-sopa-235/.
Accessed
April 19, 2012.
Barkham, Patrick.
“Hackers Declare War on Scientologists amid claims of heavy-handed Cruise
control.”
The Guardian. February 3, 2008.http://www.guardian.co.uk/technology/2008/
Kazmi, Ayesha. “How
Anonymous emerged to Occupy Wall Street.” The
Guardian. September
“Message
to Scientology.” http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JCbKv9yiLiQ&feature=player
_embedded. January
21, 2008. Accessed April 19, 2012. YouTube Video.
“Anonymous—Operation
Tunisia—A Press Release.” http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BFLa BRk 9wY0. January 5 2011. Accessed April 19
2012. YouTube Video.
“Occupy
Wall Street—Sept. 17.” http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded
&v=zSpM2kieMu8.
August 30 2011. Accessed April 19 2012. YouTube Video.
“FBI and
Met conference call on Hackers—Hacked for the Lulz.” http://www.youtube.com/ watch?v=M6DfI0GBbjE. February 3, 2012. Accessed April
19, 2012. YouTube Video.
[1]
“What the Hell are 4chan, ED, Something Awful, and ‘b’?” Gawker. Jan 18, 2008. http://gawker.com/346385/
what-the-hell-are-4chan-ed-something-awful-and-b Accessed April 19, 2012.
[2]
“What’s Anon?” Mashable. http://mashable.com/2012/03/26/evolution-of-anonymous/
Online Video. March 26, 2012. Accessed April 19, 2012.
[3]
Barkham, Patrick. “Hackers Declare War on Scientologists amid claims of
heavy-handed Cruise control.” The
Guardian. Februaray 3, 2008. http://www.guardian.co.uk/technology/2008/feb/04/news
Accessed April 19, 2012.
[4]
Schliebs, Mark. “Internet group’s war on Scientology.” News.com.au. January 25, 2008. http://www.news.com.au/
technology/internet-groups-war-on-scientology/story-e6frfro0-1111115399994.
Accessed April 19, 2012.
[5]
Stryker, Cole. Qtd. Joann Pan, “The Evolution of Anonymous.” Mashable. March 26, 2012. http://mashable.com/
2012/03/26/evolution-of-anonymous/. Accessed April 19, 2012.
[6]
Pan, “Evolution of Anonymous.”
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