Anonymous Hackers Target CIA, UK Supreme Court Over 'Pirate Bay' Censorship

Anonymous Hackers Target CIA, UK Supreme Court Over 'Pirate Bay' Censorship

www.ibtimes.com

Hacktivist members of the online collective called "Anonymous" targeted the websites of the United Kingdom Supreme Court and the CIA on Friday, responding to efforts by both governments to stifle internet freedom. Anonymous has named its new campaign to fight online censorship "Operation The Pirate Bay" (TPR) and "Operation Trial At Home."

On Friday afternoon both websites were knocked offline and inaccessible to the public, most likely with a DDoS attack. The cyber-attack comes just days after the British high court ruled that Internet service providers must block all access to The P

(visit the link for the full news article)


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An interesting unfolding of events. So, do DDOS attacks on these websites help their cause? Does it send the message they want to send, with the intended effect?

Or does it just end up justifying more 'regulation' of the internet for our own 'protection'?

Tough to say. One can certainly argue that anon are, at least at times, lead into actions by people who are setting up a trap (Re SABU).

What say you?

www.ibtimes.com
(visit the link for the full news article)

reply to post by stanguilles7

What say you?

I say its useless, ddos attacks do not accomplish anything, at all.
If what we hear is true (which it probably isnt) these hackers attack and steal credit card and social security info from financial institutions but can only DdoS government sites?
The main point of DdoS is to deny access to that site for a period of time, so the only organizations that would be adversely affected, would be a site based on commerce.

yeah, ddos attacks are useless. Sites are back up within the hour and all is back to normal. Anon need another approach.

Originally posted by Acidtastic
yeah, ddos attacks are useless. Sites are back up within the hour and all is back to normal. Anon need another approach.

Yup i agree and worst of all once ddos attacks stop your IP no matter what proxy your using you will be easily traced.

Originally posted by Agent_USA_Supporter

Originally posted by Acidtastic
yeah, ddos attacks are useless. Sites are back up within the hour and all is back to normal. Anon need another approach.

Yup i agree and worst of all once ddos attacks stop your IP no matter what proxy your using you will be easily traced.

edit on 5-5-2012 by Agent_USA_Supporter because: (no reason given)

its more convenient for the good guys if the bad guys (Credit card thieves like Anonymous) are still using unsophisticated attacks

real hacktivists don't attack the CIA website

It's cyber war, ever hear of diversionary tactics?

Controlled Opposition

Just as "Al Qaeda" has become a pretext for draconian security measures whose ultimate effect is absolute control over domestic populations, "Anonymous" is now a bogeyman governments can point to as a justification for similar measures online.

We need to be protected from "Anonymous", which is why governments must scrutinize everything that comes into, goes out of or resides on our personal computers, and every shred of personal information stored on any social media website. And collect it. And analyze it for troublesome patterns of behavior such as criminality or independent thought.

That the "protest" in this case is over a website devoted to illegally distributing copyrighted material is icing on the cake, since it highlights the notion that not only is "Anonymous" dangerous, but that extreme, unreasonable and intrusive measures are also needed to combat online piracy -- the most popular pretext used to promote shocking, Gestapo-esque regimes for absolute Internet control.

Pro Tip for Wannabe Hacktivists: If someone from "Anonymous" or any known online "hacker" group approaches you and asks you to join them in "fighting the system", they are almost certainly affiliated with, or under the direct surveillance of, a government agency interested in entrapping and prosecuting you.

"Anonymous" can be anyone, including governments and their agents or informants, as has already been publicly demonstrated in the "LulzSec" bust (and that's just the one case they made public; other sting operations are almost certainly underway and will likely continue indefinitely), rendering any concept of it serving as a vehicle for social or political change utterly meaningless.

"Anonymous" (outside of 4chan, anyway) is dead. Long live independent thought and action -- and, hopefully, a little common sense.

reply to post by Majic


As long as anonymous posting is still possible on the internet, anonymous will never be dead.
Anon existed long before 4chan was even an idea, and will likely exist long after it is laid to rest.

Nowhere And Everywhere

Originally posted by TKDRL
As long as anonymous posting is still possible on the internet, anonymous will never be dead.

Indeed. It lives on as honeypot for would-be online activists and a stalking horse for the machinations of aspiring tyrants.

Perhaps it should now be called what it has become in fact: "Ignominious."

I think Anonymous is mostly wasting their time.

Aside from the children on 4chan and the people on ATS..... no one I've met or spoken with in the last 4 months had any idea what it is or what they're about.


More and more lately I'm reminded that we a minority, but thats a topic for a rant thread.

reply to post by stanguilles7


Strange logic: "Let's voluntarily curtail our freedoms so they aren't regulated away." ...Are you thinking this should work like corporate self-regulation? Where the big guys do what they want? And the little guys bite the bullet?

Originally posted by Agent_USA_Supporter

Originally posted by Acidtastic
yeah, ddos attacks are useless. Sites are back up within the hour and all is back to normal. Anon need another approach.

Yup i agree and worst of all once ddos attacks stop your IP no matter what proxy your using you will be easily traced.

edit on 5-5-2012 by Agent_USA_Supporter because: (no reason given)

Not quite true. If you use a hive system, your IP can be buried amongst thousands of other IP's.

Not that I encourage attacks against the corrupt government....

reply to post by Juggernog


I agree that it's a pretty useless attack. A minor inconvenience at best, especially when it isnt a commercial site that might be losing business, like the CIA.

Originally posted by soficrow
reply to post by stanguilles7

 

Strange logic: "Let's voluntarily curtail our freedoms so they aren't regulated away." ...Are you thinking this should work like corporate self-regulation? Where the big guys do what they want? And the little guys bite the bullet?

I'm not sure I understand your point, especially considering you put something in quotes that i didnt say.

reply to post by stanguilles7


All of these 'incentents' remind me of a story my high school history teacher told me once. I don't remember the exact situation (I was never good at remembering trival facts) but I do recall the main points.

Basically there was a protest in the mid 1900's in the US and the local PD did not approve of the protestors nor their cause. So... one of the off duty officers dressed up as a protestor and acted in negative manner (i.e. violence or provoking negative actions, again i don't remember the specifics). He or she did this to give the protestors a bad name. It was determined that the perp was an office duty officer because of his shoes. He was wearing his government assigned shoes.

Does anyone remember this event and the details? Anyways... Ever since I heard this, Ive been skeptic to believe that a group actually commited said action if it opposes their cause. I'm not saying its true, but if I were the government and I wanted more regulations on the internet, I would create a harmless situations or situations with minimal harm to someone that validates my cause. The reason I believe it would have to be a harmless situation is because it is a lot easier to sweep that situation under the rug and still make people aware of it. If a person or business suffers drastically and it makes the front page of every newspaper, than the public will demand someone to be held accountable.

From my knowledge, anon hasn't done anything drastic enough to make me believe it is a group of vigilants. I mean seriously, what have they done? Shut down a few websites for maybe an hour? 'Stole' a few emails? If someone is able to hack into something and not get caught, I'm assuming they could do something with a little more 'impressing' than that. Idk but if I were to bet, I would say its an off duty officer. Quick question; What kind of shoes do anon wear?

reply to post by 1plusXisto7billion


Yeah, I mentioned the name Sabu. You can look him up. He was recently exposed as turning informant after being busted by the feds. He apparently lead many people from within anonymous (he was kind of a well respected dude) on a lot of 'attacks' in the recent past, and apparently got a lot of people busted for crimes he explicitly encouraged them to engage in. Under the direction of the Feds. Now THATS entrapment.

It makes me wonder how much of what they do is a 'honeypot', like others in this thread have mentioned, to pull potential internet rebels into a trap before they end up doing something that actually might cause damage.

As far as the notion that nothing they do makes any real difference, though, I'd like to point out many Anons helped coordinate social media for many of the middlleeast uprisings form the very beginning. They bragged about shutting down and defiling government sites, helping local activists use social media to connect to others in their own country, and even helping circumvent local government internet blackouts. For better or worse, those are actions which did have consequence.

Also, I dont know about he case you mention, but three cops in Canada were caught a few years ago at some international summit trying to instigate violence, and some had big rocks. They were dressed up like 'anarchists' and were identified mainly because of their police issued boots.

Originally posted by stanguilles7


An interesting unfolding of events. So, do DDOS attacks on these websites help their cause? Does it send the message they want to send, with the intended effect?

Or does it just end up justifying more 'regulation' of the internet for our own 'protection'?

Tough to say. One can certainly argue that anon are, at least at times, lead into actions by people who are setting up a trap (Re SABU).

What say you?

www.ibtimes.com
(visit the link for the full news article)

Since we can't say who anonymous is, all we can do is judge their actions. I found a few of their attacks suspect, but it could well be that multiple people with different agendas are using the same alias, thus the bad guys giving the good guys a bad reputation.

Or anonymous is not as sound as we think. Perhaps they have not figured out everything yet and are making mistakes. For example why hack the government for going after illegal downloading? Freedom of speech is one thing and encouraging actual piracy is quite another.

Originally posted by EarthCitizen07


Since we can't say who anonymous is, all we can do is judge their actions. I found a few of their attacks suspect, but it could well be that multiple people with different agendas are using the same alias, thus the bad guys giving the good guys a bad reputation.

Agreed. No reason to believe its all the same people. Nonetheless, the majority of these actions are generally 'lead' by the same handful of regulars.

For example why hack the government for going after illegal downloading? .

I agree. This specific actions seems entirely useless.

reply to post by 1plusXisto7billion


Agent provacateurs are not based on hollywood. Yes I have heard multiple accounts of under-cover cops putting on their hoods and following union marches just to start trouble and then the media takes over and spins it that lefty dirty hippies are causing fights/fires/bombs to explode/larceny......whatever!

Basically anything to demonise the left, as the military and police are tradionally right wing oriented. In the old days they simply shot you, kicked you in the face, bust your ribs with their heavy battons.........but now they choose the subtle approach....since winning the propaganda war is the easiest and safest way.