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Anonymous Speaks About Australian Gov't. Attacks
daria42 writes "The loose-knit collective of individuals known as 'Anonymous' has broken its silence about the distributed denial of service attacks on the Australian government. An individual (who insisted he or she is not a spokesperson for the group) said the attacks were more effective at stopping the government's Internet filtering project than signing a petition, and that the attacks could go on for months." The site where some members of Anonymous are said to hang out, 4chan, got a visibility boost yesterday when its founder moot spoke at the TED conference.
Lol, stupid reporters.
We are legion.
Let's just check this box to post as AC and...
I've never heard of this site, "fourchan". It seems like its a pretty cool activist site. Can someone tell me more about it? I'd go there, but my ISP is blocking it :(
We are Anonymous
We are Legion
We do not forgive
We do not forget
Expect Us
(and throw a few prawns on the barbie, Skip)
"An individual (who insisted he or she is not a spokesperson for the group)"
So, basically, a nobody commented.
All right.
I am Canadian and so I say the Canadian government disapproves too. Though I insist I'm not speaking in the name of the Canadian government.
Yay?
It's more of an activity. Possibly a culture. It certainly doesn't have anyone who speaks for the group as a whole.
Pool's Closed.
Yeah, let me know when you see Anonymous on there. They're totally a bunch of black shadowy figures hanging out in /b/. Also, last time I checked, this was 4chan rule #4:
4chan has a reputation for being a launchpad for this sort of thing, but it's not, at least, not any more. Go blame IRC, go blame any of the dozen clone boards, but it's not 4chan now.
--- Mr. DOS
Just read 4chan or Encyclopedia Dramatica and you can read the latest groupthink. Anon isn't a real group and it doesn't have official announcements.
Way to go, guys. You need to learn some history and some sociology. Then you will understand that the most successful criminals DO NOT ADVERTISE their existence. At a certain nuisance level, the cost of your attacks will exceed the cost of fixing the system to stop you. And the rest of us will be made to pay for it.
From scarped cliff or quarried stone she cries "A thousand types are gone, I care for nothing, no not one."
It is an appropriate response to a figurehead politician making these rules, because it is a bunch of anonymous peons that are implementing them. The peons hide behind the facade of a government which they don't have to take responsibility for their actions.
Governments love when an individual speaks out, because they can release a bureaucratic horde of government employees to crush them. An individual who cannot be expected to address numerous rules, regulations and pressures a government can bring against them.
So Anonymous vs the government, as far as I am concerned is a fair fight.
According to Merriam-Webster, terrorism is the systematic use of terror especially as a means of coercion while terror is defined as a state of intense fear.
Nice going anonymous. While I applaud how you've peacefully gone after the Church of Scientology; DOS attacks are going a bit too far. You probably picked this type of attack because it's hard to determine who's actually launching it.
Cowards.
Al Qaeda should sue for patent infringement.
Fuck systemd. Fuck Redhat. Fuck Soylent, too. Wait, scratch the last one.
Summary says:
"An individual (who insisted he or she is not a spokesperson for the group) said..."
TFA says exactly the opposite:
"...received a reply from an individual claiming to be a spokesperson."
Authenticity of said spokesperson: YMMV.
Sig matters not. Judge me by my sig, do you?
could transform the humble Icelander into a legal superman, virtually untouchable abroad for comments written
It's a word! It's a claim! No, it's FreeSpeechMan!
Whatever will we do when Iceland is overrun with people with the power to say whatever they want?
Freedom Of Speech -- It's Scary!
Terrorists can attack freedom, but only Congress can destroy it.
of the stupidest lamest waste of time on the internet
comes the most effective force for progressive change
the one thing that an idiot has, that a wise man does not seem to have, is freedom to act
when your education acclimates you to acceptance of a lame status quo, then your education is worth less than being an idiot
intellectual property law is philosophically incoherent. it is your moral duty to ignore it or sabotage it
According to Merriam-Webster, terrorism is the systematic use of terror especially as a means of coercion while terror is defined as a state of intense fear
It's not like annonymous is running around chopping people's arms off with machetes and raping them. Or disappearing them in to covert prisons. GET A FUCKING GRIP
The will of the people is the true purpose of democracy. Regardless of the fact that people are doing this anonymously, this is similar in line to the rebellion against a tyrannical government. Just because the tyranny is not as bad (censorship of porn), and the attack by the people (DDoSing government websites) does not make it a "joke" or an immature prank. If the government was actively rounding up thousands of people from a certain ethnic group for "cleansing", you could expect everyone to gather guns to kill them. Since it is not that serious, you get a less serious, albeit effective response. It made them realize what the public wants. And I don't believe this is a symptom of the "vocal minority" simply because people don't get involved with something for no financial gain, unless they genuinely believe in it, and while it could be the act of a few, it is most likely the act of many. Even if it were a vocal minority, in the US, the constitution was created to protect the freedom of the minority. I don't know how Australia views it's minorities, but I would hope a country that everyone considers "western" holds the same ideal. Anonymous is the true unhindered will of the people. It does not give in to socially acceptable norms, or anything that hides what someone truly wants. If people want porn, they will do so under anonymous. Anonymous is legion.
I'd expect that Slashdot moderators would be savvy enough on the internet to know enough and know enough about 'anonymous' to post a news item that's not an unknowing parody of mainstream news sites. When Fox news gets the internet completely wrong, that's funny... but Slashdot? C'mon Kdawson.
Where can I sign up to be ddos'd by this?
boycott slashdot February 10th - 17th check out: altSlashdot.org
Around sixty years ago some rather clever, industrious American physicists, engineers and other scientists invented, designed, tested and produced an ingenious device that can solve troublesome problems like Australia for ever. Allowing them to collect rust underground unused would be a great insult to their dedicated service to their country.
And honestly, with all of the crap Australians allow their government to get away with (e.g., 'cyberbullying panic button', ISP-level filtering, refusing classification to L4D2 while allowing a game with an airport massacre scene untouched, and so on) and the potential for it to corrupt the rest of the world, they've had it coming for far, far too long.
Blowing up the buildings housing the filters would also be more effective than a petition, but that's not legal either.
I've abandoned my search for truth; now I'm just looking for some useful delusions.
All these periodic "public raids" do is stuff b full of what is commonly called "cancer" (I call them IE users who click on the ads that infest b). Anyone who had been paying attention lately knows that the scroll rate of b was down significantly. people were even able to pull off slowpoke combos. So I guess mootykins (or one of the mods) decided it was time for a new cause complete with raids and IRL failfests.
This whole idea of anonymous was created by a group of young men trying to monetize a website. It is one of the largest trollings in the history of the internets. If they were doing it for the lulz then it would be fine but i suspect they do it for the ad dollars (despite Christopher's strong denials).
If they used their *own* machines to do the loading I'd agree. But they almost certainly used a small botnet or at least the compromised machines of others to do the dirty work, so they would remain, er, anonymous. Taking over other peoples machines isn't civil disobedience, its quite uncivil. Part of civil disobedience is getting hit by the water hoses to make a public point. If there are no repercussions, its just ignoring laws you don't like, not civil disobedience. A more appropriate analogy would be stealing cars from everyone along a block and putting them in front of a store's entrance so no one could use it until they were removed. Everyone loves car analogies.
refactor the law, its bloated, confusing and unmaintainable.
People in positions of power are afraid of unfettered access to information of all sorts. They are afraid of arenas where the "regular" people can say whatever they want. They are scared of anything that allows the "regular" people to exchange information and ideas. This is why the first amendment was placed where it was.
I will submit a WWII example, but not the one you're probably thinking of.
What would have happened if there was an internet during WWII where Americans could find out what Stalin REALLY was? People in positions of power knew he was a mass murderer and genocidal maniac. Instead, he was routinely referred to in propaganda, mainstream news, and the general public as "Uncle Joe". Think about that for a minute.
People in positions of power have, in the past, relied on the control of the flow of information in order to maintain control and steer "regular" people toward a desired response. This is how they maintain social/political control. There are so many articles and documentaries about this it isn't funny. There are various ways of doing this. Basically through the use of framing through the control of information and propaganda you can be fairly sure to condition a desired response.
This is why there will be filtering. Not to save the children, not because of libel, not because someone may be offended. Those are just ways to sell the public on it. It is because it makes it easier to condition a response and thus people easier to control. It won't just be China, Iran, Australia, etc, either.
This filtering is just one part of a larger issue for everyone who cares about the truly free exchange of ideas and information.
in 3...2...1...
Oh boy. All those hipster college kids are gonna be in for a NASTY surprise when Teh Party Van sweeps them away to gitmo....
I think the Jake Brahm incident (when he threatened to bomb stadiums) may have been a better avenue for saying that anonymous sites can still track someone stupid down and work with government officials.
Don't mess with football
Jake Brahm
Anonymous is a non-hierarchical group with no objectively defined membership and no legitimate representation, but saying that it is nonexistent is strange.
That would be like saying coffee-drinkers or speakers of American English are nonexistent, just because they have no representative and there is no objective way to determine who belongs to this group. (Does drinking a single cup of coffee once in your life make you a member or only regular consumption? And what qualifies as regular? ... )
Anonymous exists, it is currently troubling the Australian government and has troubled Scientology before. It seems to be hard to grasp - for some minds and prosecuters alike ;-)
However, for that reason it is a non-story. I totally agree with you there.
"Hannibal's plans never work right. They just work." Amy/A-Team
How do you know what Bin Laden does or doesn't do?
"An individual (who insisted he or she is not a spokesperson for the group) said the attacks were more effective at stopping the government's Internet filtering project than signing a petition"
No they aren't. While a petition may not be effective, neither will this. It just feels cooler and more anti-establishment to be a h4x0r than to try and engage in the political process. I'm sure Australia has a liberal media of some sort. Here in the UK, ID cards went from being a vote winner to a vote loser, thanks to an effective campaign that made good arguments and got support in the mainstream press, in spite of terrorism and immigration still being major issues in the public conciousness. A DDoS will end censorship in Australia in the same way that it brought down the Church Of Scientology.
As cheesy as it is to take phrases from anime, I really can think of no better term for this.
Anonymous is a Stand Alone Complex, a group of individuals acting as copycats with no clear original, produced by the confluence of thoughts caused by mass exposure to similar media. This sort of thing is easily caused by the Internet in general, and especially the echo-chamber effect and high information volume on 4chan (and others, including Slashdot, though we tend to be less active about it).
Also, though Anonymous no longer shows this, SACs tend to be composed of people acting independently, with no knowledge of the others actions. Or, they can be thought of as a leaderless group caused by networked, subconscious groupthink on a massive scale.
I highly encourage the adoption of this term, not because I like the anime it came from, but because I think it is an extraordinarily accurate description of phenomena like Anonymous.
"Anonymous" isn't a particular group; it's the personification of anonymity. When you go to the grocery store and pay cash, you're a "member" of "Anonymous". Anyone who claims to "represent Anonymous" as if it's a coherent group is full of it.
If anything I think of Anonymous as a sort of physical collective superego and id for the internet with no mediating ego, they're more like a force of nature than anything else.
Stop trying to put a fucking label on me jackass. It's people like you that eat babies because they are so very fresh and rather delicious but then have the nerve to go and never file your tax returns because the government 'disagrees' with your child molesting church hobby deduction. I mean seriously, when are you going to respond to the fact that in 1997 you raped and murdered a 97 year old man just to see if it was something you'd be interested in majoring in up at the local community college?
Not posted anonymously because I don't fucking feel like waiting.
A denial of services attack by numerous individuals is civil disobedience, obviously.
A bot-net based denial of services attack is more like civil clashes between economic entities, like if amazon pulls some publishers books, although the bot-net was obviously illegal anyways.
A even more criminal version of a denial of services attack would be identifying all the government employees involved, identifying their personal information, and giving it all the nigerian scammers.
A good rule of thumb is "It's not terrorism if it does not involve an attempted killing."
The Christian religion has been and still is the principal enemy of moral progress in the world. -- Bertrand Russell
Good on them, we need awareness made about this, no matter how it is done. Anonymous - I salute you.
Here's the list of party positions determined: http://shockseat.com/communications/internet-filtering-scheme
/disclaimer, I run shockseat.com
However, the DDOS attacks are preventing me from determining the votes of Lower and Upper House on issues like Copyright for the upcoming Federal Election, so whenever some of the government sites are up I am unable to access it at all, especially Copyright Amendment Bill 2006 at aph.gov.au (http://parlinfo.aph.gov.au/parlInfo/search/display/display.w3p;adv=yes;db=;group=;holdingType=;id=;orderBy=priority,title;page=3;query=Dataset%3AbillsPrevParl%20Decade%3A%222000s%22%20Year%3A%222006%22;querytype=;rec=5;).
Some media are talking about it occasionally, it's not front page news and mostly it's just aggravating the government, the officials and site visitors. This isn't making the government abandon it or raising strong awareness with the public.
I implore you guys not to attack the government websites for months on end. If you're going to protest, try something else that's better at raising awareness.
Can anyone think of a historical (as in pre-internet :) ) example of something similar?
Christians.
Wrong answer - thinking is something you do with your "brain". Christians became well - dead - wiped out and every effort made to obliterate them and their records. See Dead Sea Scrolls - did you think they were hidden from the Buddhists??
Or do you believe the whole Constantine line.
Try "heretics" "gnostics". Next you'll be confusing "first birth" with "virgin".
Try history over shooting your mouth.
Wishing you peace, love. and a very Merry Christmas.
Actually if someone really were so stupid to even *want* to speak for Anonymous, he would be in for some of the worst harassment you can imagine, apart from all the things they'd do just to make him and them look bad.
OTOH, it would probably lead to one or more trials with defendants telling the judge ITIFTL. Which would be lulz indeed.
Who is General Failure and why is he reading my hard disk?
Argh. IDIFTL, not ITIFTL.
Who is General Failure and why is he reading my hard disk?
Well, I, for one, am extremely disappointed that this does not involve some IRL mass, shirtless demonstrations. I think the sight a few thousand pair of pasty, flopping man-boobs would make people sorry they ever crossed horns with anonymous. Then we'd see who's really looking out for the kids. (The goggles; They do nothing!)
The cost of that cleanup, of course, will be borne by taxpayers, not industry.