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PayPal, Symantec Hacked In Anonymous November 5 Hacking Spree
New submitter Journe writes "Anonymous claims to have begun a hacking spree for the 5th of November. In their spree, they've laid waste to several Australian Government sites, and, for some reason, the site of Saturday Night Live. They also claim to have leaked VMware source code, along with user and employee info from Paypal and Symantec. There's some argument however that Anonymous is falsely taking claim for Symantec."
They also tried to deface Slashdot by correcting the spelling of "Symnatec", but the Slashdot editors kept them at bay.
by releasing user and employee data from paypal and others? So only us regular people actually suffer the consequences.. good move!
Having no leadership, no structure, and no goal (beyond that afforded by the community politics of certain outspoken folks), Anonymous is free to rationalize anything however they like. There is no need for logic or restraint. In an orgy of solidarity, the "with us or against us" mentality reigns supreme. PayPal, MasterCard, government, and anybody else who opposes their attacks are just added to the list of targets.
To each individual, the notion that they could be doing more harm than good is offensive. They've already passed judgement on their enemies, and deemed them evil, and anybody who disagrees must be evil as well. Sure, PayPal, Symantec, and every other company have done some bad things in their history, and should not be lightly forgiven. However, it is important to remember that every individual has also done equally bad things, and should not be the sole judge and executioner of any person, corporation, idea, or organization.
You do not have a moral or legal right to do absolutely anything you want.
I think believing that these attacks are targeted that finely, or that there haven't just been a bunch of random people attacking anything that looked vulnerable isn't realistic.
What probably happened is they searched for particular sites running particular combinations of software (it's not all that hard to find out what someone *claims* to be running), or even had just an automated sweep which returns a few likely candidates (my web server is hit all the time by people looking for proxy / malware PHP files that obviously only exist if you're vulnerable / infected already).
I mean, there were Ghanan consulates in that list and all sorts. I think it's more a question of "what was vulnerable" when a particular date for a hacking spree was decided upon rather than any political message (although, sure, one of the hackers might have a motive, or they might look at certain websites first, etc.).
And the age-old argument - Anonymous is not "any one person". It's not even a coherent group. Just about anybody that hacked a site and bothered to tell Anonymous would have been listed there because, by their own admission, they have no idea who their members are / are not and they have no "entry requirement" as such.
It seems much more random to me. If you wanted to make a political statement, you could have gone for US presidential candidates or particular organisations and made the news. But obviously most of those places secure their stuff quite well.
So we end up with PayPal (who are currently denying that anything happened, which I wouldn't be shocked about - there's been a lot of "didn't actually happen" hacks lately where people just post convincing lists of usernames as if they are hacked data), an antivirus vendor and an embassy in some African state.
It's hardly targeted anarchy. It's more like "who left their window open?".
They've already passed judgement on their enemies, and deemed them evil, and anybody who disagrees must be evil as well.
I see. So they're a religion.
Kind of makes you wonder at the level of maturity the average Anonymous member has.
Profile: pickly-faced youth, average age about 15.4 years, dwells in mum's basement, no sexual experience to speak of, no political sensibility, pot-smoking and rootbeer-swilling, more computing power at his fingertips than is good for him... or for you and me, that is.
There, FTFY.
Religous speak to God. Insane are spoken to by God. When all shut up, one can finally hear Shostakovich in peace
It was NBC in general, not SNL. Also, this may surprise you, but Anonymous is not generally known for having a conservative bias, given their extremely anti-authoritarian core moral values. And four years is an awful long time to remember something like that—did you think they were elephants or something? ;)
Bio questions? Ask me to start a Q&A journal. Computer analogies available for most topics!
The VMware source is old and has been on Pirate Bay for six years. Nothing new there.
Your post is well thought out and your points elegantly stated, but I think I'll stick with "they're a big box of douches".
As for SNL, turns out that was an - Alcoholic - Anonymous who defaced their site. He had much to drink and thought it was a funny thing to do at the time.
Now that he has sobered up, he can't even "Remember, Remember The Fifth of November".
Let he who is without transgression launch the first low-orbit ion cannon.
My God, it's Full of Source!
OUTSIDE_IP=$(dig +short my.ip @outsideip.net)
A few minutes of not being in the news, and they pull a stunt - a rather weak one at that which only reinforces the governments agenda of net surveillance.
Does that not make you question whether or not it is "anonymous" at all"? After all it does further many governments agendas in relation to the internet.
The US government (and, in fact, any government, political organisation etc) have the right to be part of Anonymous if they want to. It's the single biggest problem with any "anarchy", if all people are free to do what they want then this must include setting up a governmental system of whichever type they choose, be it dictatorship, democracy, or a dictatorship dressed up as a democracy. In this case the "anarchists" may well be assisting the political aims of their "enemy" who, for all Anonymous know, are also part of Anonymous.
With great anonymity comes great confusion as to which side is which.
Please consider this account deleted, I just can't be bothered with the spam anymore.
Here's an article I found (by clicking through a few times from TFA). For those who don't want to read:
However according to PayPal’s head of PR, they claim to be investigating the alleged hack, but so far they have stated that they are unable to validate any evidence that there has been a security breach which we can only take to be a good thing.
They also say 28,000 accounts, which means the odds of an individual being hacked are very very low (considering there are over 110 million users). Even still, it's a good idea to change your password, at least.
If you can't convince them, convict them.
Can't get too upset about Anonymous. Think about it. Aren't drone strikes just like Anonymous hacks? They are acts of judgement and execution without due process wrought by anonymous people from a far away distance. Oh, and there is always collateral damage and victims can't mount a legal defense. If you want to call acts like that chicken-shit and douchy, then go ahead.
Sure, PayPal, Symantec, and every other company have done some bad things in their history, and should not be lightly forgiven. However, it is important to remember that every individual has also done equally bad things, and should not be the sole judge and executioner of any person, corporation, idea, or organization.
Really?
Really?
What was the last thing YOU did that was "equally bad" as the shitshow that is PayPal?
Or maybe you worked for Union Carbide and are responsible for the Bhopal disaster
99% of individuals will never have the opportunity to do anything "equally bad" as a multinational corporation.
Your kind of false equivalence is a weak attempt to minimize the negative effects of corporations on the citizenry.
[Fuck Beta]
o0t!
What was the last thing YOU did that was "equally bad" as the shitshow that is PayPal?
For starters, this morning, on my way to work, I took a place in line at an exit ramp, delaying and irritating a few hundred other cars slightly. I do that every morning. Under a very conservative estimate of only one hundred other people irritated daily, I've managed to annoy about 10% of my city (about 36,000 people total) slightly in a year. For comparison, how many people are irritated with PayPal, and how annoyed are they? How many years of traffic disruptions does it take to equal one PayPal?
99% of individuals will never have the opportunity to do anything "equally bad" as a multinational corporation.
Almost everyone is evil, in some small part. Yes, there are some that commit their trespasses all at once in heinous acts of negligence, apathy, or malevolence, but most "evil" effects come from individuals doing things they don't think are wrong. Small offenses like bringing home pens from work or delaying others' commute add up to a far greater total of distress in the world.
Your kind of false equivalence is a weak attempt to minimize the negative effects of corporations on the citizenry.
There is no false equivalence here. I am absolutely certain that my actions and inactions have resulted in somebody's death. I do hope that my death toll hasn't hit the 10,000 of the Bhopal disaster, but I can't be sure. I could indirectly be a homicidal maniac and not know it.
Let's suppose though, for argument's sake, that I am a pristine pinnacle of innocence, never having harmed anyone, directly or not. Do I now magically have the right to judge others and deem them worthy of attack? Am I qualified to assert that a civilian killed in a war is so important that anyone who stops encouraging the endless retelling of their story is to be condemned to eternal harassment, even if their support was withdrawn under duress? After all, that's the train of thought that made MasterCard a target for withdrawing support of WikiLeaks.
Anonymous does not seek justice. Anonymous is a vigilante group, attacking anyone for any perceived wrong, without the need or desire to dole out appropriate punishments to fit the crimes. Yes, multinational corporations do bad things. So do national corporations, local small businesses, nonprofit charities, religions, and individuals. That does not excuse anyone from causing harm to anyone else.
You do not have a moral or legal right to do absolutely anything you want.
With drone strikes, there is a public command and control structure that can be held accountable.
And there are often wedding guests that can act as witnesses.
I think you don't understand the rules of engagement. The Military is not a police force and the people they fight with are not civilians in the strict sense. Yes, drone strikes may be sent against non-governmental fighting forces but they are still armies and they are still at war with us and to insinuate that they are not is just wrong.
It'll be a V for Vendetta movie reference, more accurately.
Which is sort of derived in part from the whole Guy Fawkes thing, but I bet most of Anonymous have very little idea about anything outside of that film[1].
[1] I initially meant "anything about Guy Fawkes outside of that film", but I'll leave it as it stands.
I'm relatively sure "they" has a long history of being used for a set of people without implying they're a specific group with any sort of organisation.
For instance: "Bakers are excellent. They make delicious things for me to eat."
If you think bakers are a more concrete group than Anonymous then you're kidding yourself. Anonymous is simply "anyone who identifies as Anonymous in some context".