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Anonymous Takes On a Mexican Drug Cartel
New submitter NarcoTraficante writes "After one of their members was kidnapped in Veracruz, Mexico by the Zetas drug cartel, Mexican Anonymous members have issued an ultimatum to the Zetas in a recently posted YouTube video. The video demands the release of the kidnapped member and threatens to publish information of cartel members and affiliates in Veracruz if the victim is not released by November 5. The Houston Chronicle article warns that there will be bloodshed if Anonymous publishes information on the Zeta's operations, either perpetrated by rival cartels or reprisal attacks by the Zetas themselves."
Can I just say that I think it is fucking ridiculous that we send troops all over the world, even just lately to Uganda, but yet we let fucking Mexico turn into New Afghanistan before our eyes. Oh wait. I know. Keep the drug flow up, keep the police state up. More drugs more problems more need for daddy DoD to swell and swell and enforce and strip rights way.
Nevermind Mexico. As you were. We'll come knocking when you actually threaten our financial interest. Until then, keep up the good show. We won't bother.
'We are trying to prove ourselves wrong as quickly as possible, because only in that way can we find progress.' RPF
They claim to have the identities of corrupt police officers and journalists. That could prove more useful.
After all of the money spent fighting them, it would be ironic if a bunch of hackers brought the cartels down.
If Anonymous releases info, they will be lucky if they are the only ones that are killed. These cartels don't just go after you. They go after you, your family, and your friends. They are extremely ruthless, and extremely smart. The prisoner they have, if he's not already dead, is getting worked over pretty good right now, and they will get him to talk. Then they'll kill him. Anonymous is in over their heads. It's one thing to deface some websites, or DDOS some banking websites. It's different to go after a group that is well armed and not restrained by morality and laws.
The only thing necessary for evil to triumph is for it to be pitted against a slightly greater evil
This is not exactly the first online community that has been victimized by the Mexican drug cartels lately. ...So if Anonymous has the muy macho cajones, and it seems they do... I wish them well in their endeavors.
http://www.npr.org/2011/09/23/140745739/mexican-drug-cartels-now-menace-social-media
You can't be ahead of the curve, if you're stuck in a loop.
because the police make a %^&*( ton of money off the drug trade. they don't want to stop it either. a lot of the police districts in the south near the Mexican border when they seize drugs going north they get money from the feds. when they seize cash going south to the cartel's they get to keep it and add it to their budget.
if they solve the problem they will lose money, and they don't want that.
The Zetas will have to worry about the other cartels coming for them and their allies if the names are released.
If there's anything more important than my ego around here, I want it caught and shot immediately.
"Anonymous" isn't a single group, it's whatever the fuck people want it to be. "Anonymous" has been responsible for hacking kiddie porn sites, yet at the same time trolling sites for people with epilepsy by putting flashing images on them. Those two "anonymous" groups are clearly not the same. Anyone can do whatever and say it's anonymous, there are even groups that don't frequent /b/, it's just a free for all and an excuse to do whatever.
+1 IDisagreeSoHeMustBeATrollOrAnAstroturferOrAShill
Why do you bet that? I've observed several communities similar to Anonymous where the members not only have never met in real life, but they have no inclination to do so. Their entire relationship plays out online in relative or total anonymity.
And if Anonymous were primarily operating in or near Mexico, that would be a grave cause for concern. Given that Anonymous is primarily European or from the northern parts of the US, they're less of a physical threat. I highly doubt the Mexican cartels can easily strike at people living in Boston, or Washington, or Vancouver, or London, or Moscow. They're very powerful within their domain, but they don't have much reach.
Additionally, Anonymous is generally pretty good at remaining anonymous. The prisoner they have probably doesn't have much more information on the others than aliases, perhaps vague geographic areas.
Still, I don't think Anonymous has all that much ability to strike at the cartels, either. They're decent at taking down websites, but the cartels don't have any. They're good at digging up embarrassing information, but drug lords aren't public figures that can be shamed out of office. It's a classic stalemate - neither side can seriously affect the other.
You missed the point - anonymous isn't trying to end the drug cartels - they want the release of a certain person or they'll expose all the cartels "partners" - the crooked cops, politicians, newswriters, etc., who are enablers.
Then the other cartels go after that cartels partners-in-crime - either by co-opting them, or eliminating them if they don't play ball. The problem with co-opting them is they're not all that useful once it's known they're crooked.
Another side effect is that's one cartel less to worry about.
So anonymous takes out kiddie porn rings, exposes crooked politicians and cops and drug dealers ... someone want to remind me of how they're supposed to be the bad guys here when they're doing the jobs that the cops and politicians won't touch?
International drug trade is pretty high-tech these days. If Anonymous was able to strike Freedom Hosting for child porn, they'll at least inconvenience places like Silk Road.
The drug lords are sitting unashamed and well-armed in Mexico, but the infrastructure that finances them is all over the world, on the internet, and likely tied to people who can be shamed and arrested.
The person reportedly kidnapped is not named...
So your organization is called Anonymous and when one of you goes missing you threaten the suspected culprit while still not naming the missing guy?
It's not like the Zetas only 'disappear' a couple guys a year; they're a massive paramilitary threatening the public safety of entire states. How the fuck are they supposed to know which guy to return? Furthermore, this splinter of Anonymous is already at war with the Zetas. If they believe they can damage the Zetas so heavily with their supposed cache of information why didn't they do so weeks ago?
It all seems like weird internet posturing, although of course hacker groups and drug runners aren't exactly paragons of transparency. There may be so much back story missing that it's pointless to comment on.
So why are they getting their panties in a bunch over what a bunch of nerds publish about them? And kidnapping people that they believe to be part of Anon?
Given the PR that they like to generate about themselves, I'd say they are very sensitive about both details concerning their operations and their public image. Perhaps Anon can hurt them in ways that the Mexican authorities cannot. Anon doesn't give a sh*t about which politicians get taken down with the cartels, so that's one factor in their favor. Anon isn't constrained by laws the same way the police are. There are no rules of evidence, court issued warrants, civil rights, etc. that they have to concern themselves about. As long as they can keep themselves physically secure, its game on for the cyber war. Keep in mind that Mexican Anon doesn't necessarily have to be located in Mexico. Its going to be tough for the Zetas to reach out and touch someone posting from Boise, Idaho. Unfortunately, the person they have kidnapped will probably have to be written off as dead.
The other advantage that Anon has is that they can tailor their releases of info to instigate inter-cartel warfare. The Mexican police may be unwilling or unable to act. But the competition next door will be more than happy to take their enemies out.
Have gnu, will travel.
This has nothing to do with the USA (assuming that's what you meant by "we"). The threat is that they will publish a list of police officers, politicians journalists, etc. aligned with the Zetas. The competing cartels then kill them in the hope of weakening the Zetas - I don't think they are strong on needing proof.
Anonymous is threatening the Zetas with exposure to get their member released, they aren't threatening all the cartels.
someone want to remind me of how they're supposed to be the bad guys here when they're doing the jobs that the cops and politicians won't touch?
It's a philosophical question of vigilantism. Is it morally right to take the law into your own hands when you perceive that the police, judges, and juries aren't doing their job? We can probably come up with scenarios that all but the purist will sit back and snicker about (e.g., CP) -- and we can come up with scenarios that fewer people support (remember Bernhard Goetz?). We might even come up with scenarios that almost no-one supports (e.g., road rage -- yes, road-rage is a form of vigilantism where a person goes berserk over a perceived crime and seeks their version of justice).
When these unelected, unaccountable, <ahem> anonymous people do something you agree with is one thing; when they do something you disagree with, now what?
Note: I'm not passing judgement. I'm just answering your question.
In mexico, the police are running scared.
Only the honest cops. The rest are on the cartels payroll. And it also doesn't help that in many cases the Mexican army has also helped and protected the cartels as well. Of course, this comes more into play in protecting the cartels at the border from ICE.
The only thing necessary for evil to triumph is for it to be pitted against a slightly greater evil
I don't think you're reading his statement correctly. I'm not sure you can read any justification for sovereign manipulation into his statements. He's simply saying that if we insist on putting troops in other countries to suit our interests (which includes nations we like, by the way, such as Japan, Germany, and Turkey) why do we ignore that option when an immediate neighbor has paramilitary uprisings in border territories?
Asking why we're pursuing the imperial option stupidly and inconsistently doesn't mean he's justifying the imperial option itself.
You can pic any issue of Proceso magazine to read about corruption in Mexico, the Anonymous list will be used or can be used to falsely flag people in the payroll of cartels. We have already big troubles with the anonymous report of innocent people as members of cartels or kidnappers, we don't need a list made by script kiddies. My grandmother was falsely accused of being a kidnapper and had her house stormed by the army, my uncle beaten and my cousin sent to the hospital. In the end, it appeared that the ones doing the tip were the actual kidnappers to make a big fuss in my grandmother's small town were she is a loved and respected citizen, the kidnappers got away. Due process exist for a very good reason, laws were not written by tree hugging hippies, they were wrote by victorious revolutionaries that put their life in the line to make a better society.
Mexico: 100% conservative's America now!
Of course there is. The anti-drug establishment is huge. Not only does it employ tons of people in law enforcement, but it allows a lot of otherwise law-abiding people to be incarcerated, which supports the penal system, which is a huge industry and has a lot of influence on our legislature.
Considering modus operandi of Los Zetas, I would fully expect the person in question to be released - as a set of disjoint parts, and probably with a video detailing the process.
Remember, when they call them "ultra-violent", it's not an overstatement. It's a cartel that thrives on violence and terror it begets to control their areas.
I wish Anonymous the best of luck. At best, they can release a few names and cut some heads off the Hydra. They will be replaced by equally corrupted politicians, policemen, journalists, etc. They might even be replaced by people that will refuse to be corrupted, at first, until they are offered the choice of plata o plomo (silver or lead = become corrupted or die). Most likely, though, they will find out which kidnap victim is being referred-to, torture him until he names names, then follow the chain of names, torturing them and their families, and leave them all hanging from bridges. Honestly, I can't see how this could possibly be a good move. The best move is to pay the ransom or forget about your friend, instead of getting him tortured to death.
A slashdotter with a japanese name, quoting aspects of american law, and stating that his family is mexican? Let's face it, you're 16, white, and from toledo...
He has a ID of 1098, so he was around since the founding of Slashdot.
Considering Slashdot was founded in 1997, which is 14 years ago, for him to be 16 now, he would've joined the site when he was 2 years old.
He may be white and from Toledo, but I'm guessing he's at least 30+ in age.
AFAIK, the bodies were never identified. No one is quite sure if they actually were bloggers or if they were merely used to create fear among bloggers. If they were bloggers, there's no way to know what kind of precautions they took, if any. Given the large numbers of bloggers still criticizing the cartels, it doesn't appear that the cartels truly have the ability to identify and kill anyone who posts things they don't like. For people outside of Mexico, which I assume is most of Anonymous, the risk seems to be minimal to nonexistent.
Anonymous is already aware of that. So, when doing nothing is going to result in your aforementioned scenario, why not try something different, if only to make them - and everyone else - think twice about jacking a member of Anonymous.
Anonymous is just using the same logic as the Russians did - and if you recall, it worked. And they're in a better position to do it than the Russians were, because it's not like the drug cartel can target other members of Anonymous. So the cartel really has only two choices - release the hostage, or lose a lot more than "an eye for an eye."
Apparently you're allowed to choose any username you like on here. It doesn't even have to be your real name.
It doesn't? Aw, damn-- *now* they tell me...
Il n'y a pas de Planet B.
"Due process exist for a very good reason, laws were not written by tree hugging hippies, they were wrote by victorious revolutionaries that put their life in the line to make a better society."
That didn't happen in Mexico, which needs another revolution to liquidate organized crime.
"This post is an artistic work of fiction and falsehood. Only a fool would take anything posted here as fact."
Uhh, actually, this has a LOT to do with the USA.
The United States' "War on Drugs" is the root cause of all that violence in Mexico. And, NAFTA helped to deprive the common man in Mexico of his livelihood, mostly small farmers, thereby driving more recruits into the cartels. Add to that, the fact that there are now about 20 million lawbreaking illegal aliens in the United States. Some indeterminate number of those illegals are also members of Zeta and other cartels.
Everything drug related has to do with the United States. Everything.
"Windows is like the faint smell of piss in a subway: it's there, and there's nothing you can do about it." - Charlie Br
They usually dump raw data that is incredibly hard to fabricate. Whether there are subtle changes within that data is another matter entirely.
Petty rivalry like this will only keep the machine rolling...it will not change anything.
The most effective way to defeat the Mexican drug cartels is very, very simple.
Take away their money.
No money, no power base, and that's that.
The most effective way to take away their money is equally simple:
Legalize their product. Put it under proper federal quality regulation and have legitimate taxpaying law-abiding businesses sell it.
In one action you simultaneously create millions of legitimate and sorely-needed jobs, and also instantly dis empower the strongest criminal segment of our society.
The war on drugs has empowered the worst of humans, and has utterly failed to restrict the supply of drugs available to our children in their schools. This approach to keeping our kids safe is thoughtless and does far, far more harm than good (which is no good at all). This is always the *inescapable* consequence of making highly-desired commodities illegal. More money wasted on law enforcement will only add fuel to the flames.
Keep kids off drugs by educating them about the dangers, not by ensuring that they must share a world full of extremely wealthy and powerful criminal drug lords who have no qualms about lacing food with drugs to get children addicted, or kidnapping and murdering them to get their own way.
Of course, the two biggest opponents of the clear-and-obvious-right-thing-to-do are:
1) conservative religious types who utterly lack the capacity for basic critical thinking
2) The drug lords themselves, who profit greatly from the fact that drugs are illegal
Honestly, I am not sure which is worse....the evil...or the stupid.
Be as facetious as you care to be. No other nation on earth declared a "War on Drugs", then spent untold billions persuading other nations to join that war. No other nation imports as many drugs as we do, while at the same time incarcerating everyone caught doing so. We have indeed created the situation in Mexico. The fact that so many Mexican officials are corrupt only makes the problem worse. The situation is our creation.
Got anything constructive to say? Would you like to refute any of my points? Or, would you prefer to make more pointless, inane comments?
"Windows is like the faint smell of piss in a subway: it's there, and there's nothing you can do about it." - Charlie Br
You can pic any issue of Proceso magazine to read about corruption in Mexico, the Anonymous list will be used or can be used to falsely flag people in the payroll of cartels. We have already big troubles with the anonymous report of innocent people as members of cartels or kidnappers, we don't need a list made by script kiddies. My grandmother was falsely accused of being a kidnapper and had her house stormed by the army, my uncle beaten and my cousin sent to the hospital. In the end, it appeared that the ones doing the tip were the actual kidnappers to make a big fuss in my grandmother's small town were she is a loved and respected citizen, the kidnappers got away. Due process exist for a very good reason, laws were not written by tree hugging hippies, they were wrote by victorious revolutionaries that put their life in the line to make a better society.
So, your bitching about anonymous, using an example that has actually nothing to do with what anonymous is doing, but with corrupt or stupid ass police officals, who decided that a "tip" they received was enough proof to terroize your family.
Sounds to me like your just angry.
You know, the police in your grandma's town probably are working with the kidnappers, and used it as an excuse to beat some sense into your family. Because by your post, you need it.
ARMY, ARMY moron. The police in the town was used to deal only with domestic violence and the occasional brawl in the bar, not to face tugs with RPG's, AK-47 and Barret guns. The next door neighbor was kidnapped 7 months ago, a honest hard working man, leader of the real main opposition party in that municipality. His family now only expect to find his body. I can't visit my sick grandmother because the road is too dangerous to do that trip, so please go and fuck yourself. You don't know nothing.
The only proof that Anonymous will show if only they show a list with names will be their word. For less than that people as died at the hands of the army, the police and criminal gangs. The problem in Mexico is systemic, we have a impunity rate in crime of 98-99%, more than half of the population below poverty line and half of the nation's wealth in the hands of less than 40 families that monopolize all the economic life in the country. For a big percentage of our population the only chance to ever improve their lives is to emigrate to the USA or join a crime cartel. The first step is to break the monopolies, end the impunity at the top and send to jail all the corrupt politicians that rule the country, but, since they are allies of the USA like that SOB of Musarraf or Pinochet is hard to make it happen, even more when the DEA and ATF send happily thousands of guns to the criminal gangs and the US DoD even more weapons to the army.
Mexico: 100% conservative's America now!
I really think you don't understand 'Anonymous' at all. There is no 'Anonymous', 'Anonymous' is anonymous to itself. You do not join 'Anonymous', you either carry out activities in the name of 'Anonymous' anonymously or you do not.
In any case, when you comes to oppression, you either resist and work to end it or you live in fear and die when others choose to make you a random example anyhow.
The drug war is an insane activity of a corrupted organisation, the US government, designed it seems to promote pharmaceutical profits, allow the CIA a ready source of income, a means by which to destabilise other countries by forcing them to participate in drug war (whilst surreptitiously supporting the drug dealers ie money laundering and of course keeping the drugs illegal), ensure inflated profits for privatised prisons, maintain a massive anti-drug operation to suppress challenges to the status quo, allow intelligence operations to enter foreign countries masquerading as drug enforcement agents or paradoxically as drug dealers and of course the number one to win votes with the 'we're tough on crime' bullshit (of course excluding muggings, house break ins, car thefts, purse snatching, home invasions, crimes that affect the majority because, they are to busy chasing and convicting drug users).
The best war to declare war on violent criminals involved in the drug trade is to legalise drugs, quite simply bankrupt them.
Chaos - everything, everywhere, everywhen
Yes - I understand who and what Anonymous is. You seem to miss an important point about Anonymous. While the rank and file of Anonymous is indeed very much anonymous, there are some core leaders who are very much less anonymous than the hangers on. The script kiddie who checks the forums now and then, and occasionally participates in an attack, is indeed quite anonymous. Not so with some of the higher profile people. While HBGary made complete asses of themselves, it is NOT an insurmountable task for a dedicated group of IT professionals to identify and locate some of the most active members of Anonymous. In fact, I'd be very surprised if the CIA and/or FBI haven't already done so.
Now, back to my point. To date, Anonymous has mostly gone after corporations, governments, and individuals who are civilized. To attack any criminal organization with no government, church, or social oversight is dangerous. Take a look at what is happening in Mexico today. People are butchered. In fact, truckloads and busloads of people are butchered. Many mass graves have been discovered in Mexico, some holding hundreds of bodies, others only dozens. In other cases, pickup trucks loaded with bodies have been dumped on major thoroughfares. The cartels are as lawless, and as savage as any organization in the world.
The most insane Muslim radicals have nothing on the cartels.
If and when the cartels identify anyone who they think belongs to Anonymous, we will be reading about yet another dismembered body, whether that body be in Mexico or the United States.
Oh yeah - Zeta doesn't have any special burden of proof to meet. If some foot soldier is only partly sure that he has identified an Anonymous member, that's good enough. No burden of proof, at all. In fact, if they are half sure that Anonymous has a member who lives in a subdivision, but can't determine who it is, they may well round up every living soul in that subdivision, slaughter them all, and leave one of their famous messages. Written in the victim's blood, of course.
"Windows is like the faint smell of piss in a subway: it's there, and there's nothing you can do about it." - Charlie Br
He does have a point. We declared the war on drugs. No one else. And barring the war drugs, legit pharmaceutical companies would be who provided the dugs (of a much higher quality) - NOT cartels. Cartels wouldn't have a chance at even competing with big business
Add to that both the Netherlands and Portugal who have (basically) stopped the war on drugs, and have found that their drug problems drastically decreased. (You can start here if you aren't already aware of what i'm trying to explain: http://www.time.com/time/health/article/0,8599,1893946,00.html) and it should be clear that we are definitely partly to blame for these problems. i suppose human nature and greed would be where the rest of the blame falls....
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