What It's Like To Participate In Anonymous' Actions

The Atlantic:

But there is a lot more to how Anonymous, at least in this operation, deliberate about their mission, make decisions, and produce collective statements, such as Manifestos. Here I want to give a fuller picture of what it looks like to participate in Anonymous, how they arrive at some consensus, how they change tactics, and how they use technology to produce collaboratively. Although this is quite an incomplete picture, it will perhaps give a more human face to an operation that otherwise seems faceless.

Read the whole story: The Atlantic

Comments

[Chazmania]

02:25 AM on 12/13/2010

The concept of the collective moving organically to serve the will of the whole as apposed to the small percentage of elite power manipulators is an intriguing concept and can seemingly sidestep the pitfalls and almost certain dysfunction that plaques all organized corporate and political style hierarchies. I see this ass possible real change that cant be beaten down as they did wiki leaks..problem i see is I wonder how to get involved without having the psyc0tic power structure employ its draconian authoritative beat down to anyone that gets caught trying..

[joebaggadonuts]

10:40 PM on 12/12/2010

If they have the skin in the game here, why attack a mercantile site? Why not hit foreign governments which are our sworn enemies instead?

At least momentarily, the west has the software edge. And that edge is maintained via open source programmers to a large extent. Is the West really going to leave this battle to the amateurs? Is that how much its leaders are willing to invest in their own self defense?

When you look around, the Chinese government at least and many others are actively trying to infiltrate and conquer the Western software infrastructure, and the West does..... sounds of crickets chirping....

Freedom's just another word for nothing left to lose?

[planetjeffy]

12:23 AM on 12/13/2010

Anon is a worldwide community - for an open internet. These "attacks" are trying to draw attention to their cause - not trying to conquer anything or anyone. All this is written in the article.

[joebaggadonuts]

12:25 PM on 12/13/2010

I just wonder at their strategy. Irritating the sleeping giant so that he will wake up and help you seems odd, doesn't it?

[Returners]

07:28 PM on 12/13/2010

The Chinese government isn't doing these attacks

these attacks originate from the Red Hacker Alliance/Honker Union/Human Flesh Search.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Red_Hacker_Alliance
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Honker_Union
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Human_flesh_search_engine

If you visit their IRC channels they operate in the EXACT same way that anonymous does, anybody can enter the channels and start participating or suggesting targets. Also extremely similar to the Iranian Cyber Army.

There is no evidence of government control or government creation.

Some of their attacks don't even make sense most of them revolve around petty internet wars

http://www.chinasmack.com/2008/stories/tvxq-chinese-fan-incident-internet-war.html

http://www.chinahush.com/2010/06/11/69-jihad-incident-chinese-internet-users-holy-war-against-korean-pop-fans/

[joebaggadonuts]

09:32 AM on 12/15/2010

Interesting links, thanks.

[Wilburrr]

09:55 PM on 12/12/2010

What is that photo? Captain Kirk with a crew member wearing a red shirt? That guy is toast!
http://wiki.answers.com/Q/How_many_red_shirts_die_in_Star_Trek

[Smugglez]

05:58 PM on 12/12/2010

Anonymous is one guy with a helluva multiple personality disorder.

[TaxpayingVoter]

01:31 PM on 12/13/2010

DAVID!

[netzwerg]

05:30 PM on 12/12/2010

I went to their IRC channel where they coordinate their stuff (easy to find with google), it's just a bunch of kids from around the world whos joy it is to download LOIC or type sudo hping3 www.websitetocrash.com --flood -S in their Linux console donating their mums DSL upload bandwidth with enough power combined to crash major websites and getting enjoyment from from them mediareports on them. Funny.

[jbarelli]

03:55 PM on 12/12/2010

Interestingly, I note that some of the folks commenting on various boards are saying that participating in Anonymous' DDOS attack is safe because the police cannot differentiate between actual attackers and the folks who are unwittingly participating because their computer has been hijacked by a trojan as part of a botnet.

Apparently, much of the attack is carried out unwittingly by folks who have no interest in attacking anyone.

For me, at least, this completely negates any positive that the idea of an enraged population wants to let a large corporation know that people are angry with it. The hackers have just put themselves in the same category as Russian porn spammers.

How many actually participated? 50,000? 5,000? Or was it just some hacker living in his mom's basement with nothing to do because he couldn't get a date?

5,000 actual people making their voices heard by a major corporation means something, just as a march on a corporate headquarters by 5,000 angry people would mean something.

Using a botnet is like having one loser with 5,000 angry cardboard cutouts marching.

[ThinkAnonymous]

08:03 PM on 12/12/2010

I know for a fact there were at least 1,900 participating at one time.
I hear there were a few people running botnets but they were outside the hive mind.

[TaxpayingVoter]

01:28 PM on 12/13/2010

There were OVER 9000

[J Hogan]

08:26 AM on 12/13/2010

I agree that using a botnets or trojan-controlled zombie computers crosses an ethical boundary that is in the same category as Russian porn spammers.

However, there were NO BOTNETS used in "Operation Payback". The LOIC used by Anonymous is a modified test-tool that only uses the user's browser and bandwidth. Anonymous used IRC, Twitter and Chan forums to coordinate the timing and use of their individual browser-based LOIC software.

[Returners]

07:52 PM on 12/13/2010

Do you honestly think that a few thousand kiddies with DSL can knockdown a website?

I hung out with hacker gangs in my youth doing the typical metasploit + milw0rm shenanigans.

The kiddies at 4chan are just a scapegoat and a bunch of kids who call themselves anonymous

There are actually two anonymous groups

Anonymous started in EFnet

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

>Due to EFnet's nature, it has gained recognition over the years for warez,[12] hackers,[13] and DoS attacks.[14]

They moved to 4chan where they adopted the name anonymous from the nature of 4chan posting and used 4chan as a place to share exploits, warez and child porn.

After moot the webadmin on 4chan started cracking down on the childporn and 12 year old kids started flooding in due to the word getting spread the real hackers left and now the old anonymous (viscous hacker gang) resides on EFnet in hidden channels and the new anonymous a bunch of 12 year old kids who think that they are internet superheroes

The actual hackers from EFnet frequently manipulate the 12 year olds from 4chan into doing their bidding by making simple spamming tools

[jo smith456]

01:39 PM on 12/12/2010

"The Atlantic..." a neocon frontliner....no way!!!! Could be a trap...

[Marianne TB]

09:45 PM on 12/11/2010

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sHPVdbCtMxw&feature=player_embedded#!

[WTFbush]

06:51 PM on 12/11/2010

I thought that was pretty cool article. I still have no idea what "hierachy" exists. It seemed to be a discussion board. The fact that they can what they can do is wild. I think the gov't will hold off on any espionage charges until after Christmas. It is a mind blower when you think about the whole thing.

[ThinkAnonymous]

06:07 AM on 12/12/2010

I'll explain the hierarchy
3 types
1. None, actions are crowdsourced. Anons throw in ideas, come to consensus via arguments and polling and Anonymous does it as a whole.
2. Temporary leader. it's like #1 but the person who comes up with the idea runs it, this can be short lived(we're talking minutes)
3. Resource control. who ever has power on the site, IRC, or board is basically running things

there are no permanent leaders, no formal joining or anything close to it. Anonymous is a cruel friendly neighborhood beast. We're united by one and divided by zero.

[WTFbush]

01:12 PM on 12/12/2010

Keep on rockin' in the free world

[ZoeyEpicurean]

08:03 PM on 12/12/2010

Sounds like Lord of the Flies.

[eric14]

06:17 PM on 12/11/2010

Decision-making processes without established hierarchy indicates that some kind of internal polling takes place. If this organisation grows in strength and purpose, the lack of hierarchy will make the defining of tasks more difficult.

Democratization is a difficult path to take. Instead of developing internal democratic processes they could rely upon outside sources for direction in the form of, for example, opinions expressed on the Internet by thousands not directly associated with them. By developing this approach (assuming it is feasible) they could become responsive to political activities outside of their organization, taking upon themselves a supportive role.

Better, I think, than the alienated anarchist route of judging others whilst being detached. A continuous dialog with those who share their goals is desirable.

[Linda Williams]

11:40 PM on 12/11/2010

"taking on a supportive role", this is a good precept. I do not understand what you mean by "the alienated anarchist route of judging others whilst being detached."

[eric14]

05:21 PM on 12/12/2010

You got me there Linda W. I think I was projecting myself too much. Anarchist groups can become detached from mainstream political processes. Their detestation of the great evils which obtain in society make it impossible to work with others. Those who oppose the plutocratic oligarchy that is enveloping the world are lacking in organization and leadership.
Groups like ''Anonymous'' have valuable skill sets that are needed - not just for destructive purposes.

Although I do not think there is much wrong with giving the oligarchs a smack now and again. They destroy cities and countries, kill countless millions and call it necessary.

So please, set aside my overstatement. It was more confessional than observational.

[I3edlam]

10:36 AM on 12/12/2010

The organization is mutable. It's not something that's very self-preserving in nature. Therefore when it "grows in strength and purpose" it's for a purpose agreed upon with as much strength as members care to lend.

If your asking for more, your asking the wrong people. Anonymous is more intelligent than people give it credit for. They forgo the mistakes of hierarchy deliberately. Willingly accepting the costs of it, for the benefits that elude the common mind. They members remain free and effective. They do it for their own reasons. Not the head monkey's ideas.

[eric14]

10:47 AM on 12/12/2010

Time passes, organizations mature. Cute labeling terminology fails to fend of reality. Associating with and working with those with whom you do not totally agree becomes necessary. The purity of youth cannot be preserved.

Unless the goal is the self-satisfaction derived from the gestural, changing nothing.

Situationist anarchists advocated 'no holidays for the rich' and threw paint on cars in Monte Carlo. You appear to offer an updated scenario with a some folks banging away on keyboards causing cyberspace inconvenience. Either that or some kind of elitist authoritarian, puritanical, egalitarian BS.

[Jack Barron]

05:39 PM on 12/11/2010

I heard it was ebaum's world.

[I3edlam]

10:43 AM on 12/12/2010

lol. Yeah it was ebaum's world! Saying that is still like saying that the people of the state of Georgia perpetrated some crime. What does it mean? Vacationers from other places? Georgian's out of state? Only people in the state at the time? Blaming it on Ebaum's means nothing at all.

Word to the wise as well. Ebaum and ED and 4Chan are not on the best of term's. :) You could be picking up and repeating something stemming from the many vendettas, or even someone from Ebaum trying to steal the thunder. The fact is, it was anonymous. (I swear!)

[Alloy]

03:20 PM on 12/12/2010

It's for the lulz.

[Jack Barron]

12:53 AM on 12/13/2010

You Herped when you should of Derped.

[TaxpayingVoter]

03:16 PM on 12/11/2010

ZOMG...another lulzy attempt to get a handle on Anonymous.

[Linda Williams]

02:54 PM on 12/11/2010

Anonymous tells who they are. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WpwVfl3m32w

[callmeslice23]

03:37 PM on 12/11/2010

Listen - you probably don't know any better but just a heads up...they're tr0|ling and you fell for it.

[TaxpayingVoter]

03:57 PM on 12/11/2010

Gotta love a tro// that can make Oprah say OVER 9000 penises on daytime television.

[Linda Williams]

05:31 PM on 12/11/2010

For whom is this bell trolling? Who is "they"?

[alexunlv]

01:25 PM on 12/11/2010

Hello world.

[zelduh]

03:13 PM on 12/11/2010

Hi back.

[Princess Fiona]

07:18 PM on 12/11/2010

Hello Fellow earthling! (I think :)