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Anonymous Begins Publishing Ku Klux Klan Member Details Online

An anonymous reader writes: Anonymous has begun releasing the personal details of members of the Ku Klux Klan, escalating its cyberwar against the white supremacist group. Last week the hacktivist group promised to reveal the identity of 1,000 members of the KKK after getting possession of the private information through a compromised Twitter account. A press release from Anonymous reads in part: "After closely observing so many of you for so very long, we feel confident that applying transparency to your organizational cells is the right, just, appropriate and only course of action. You are abhorrent. Criminal. You are more than extremists. You are more than a hate group. You operate much more like terrorists and you should be recognized as such. You are terrorists that hide your identities beneath sheets and infiltrate society on every level. The privacy of the Ku Klux Klan no longer exists in cyberspace. You’ve had blood on your hands for nearly 200 years. You continue to inflict civil rights violations, commit violent crimes and solicit others to commit violent criminal acts. You seek to intimidate and/or eliminate those that are different from you and those that you dislike by any means possible. You seek to terrorize anyone and anything that you feel is a threat to your narrow view of the 'American way of life'."

13 of 546 comments (clear)

  1. What's with the .ru accounts? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Insightful

    Looking at the Pastebin data, seems almost all the E-mail addresses in the pre-release come from a Russian site. It would be interesting to have some confirmation before people listed in the data get the dogs of war sicced on them.

  2. Irony by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Insightful

    One anonymous criminal organization exposing another. For transparency no less!

  3. Who is to say that this "list" is legit at all? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Insightful

    There are no journalistic controls in place. They can put whoever they want on that list.

    1. Re:Who is to say that this "list" is legit at all? by Coren22 · · Score: 5, Insightful

      Because they wore Guy Fawkes masks and everything! They must be the very same Anonymous...

      I'm wondering when the Black Panthers leak is coming, as they are just as much a hate group.

      --
      APK likes to ask for responses to the same things over and over. Maybe he just likes the responses?
  4. Re:The Klan Is Always Getting Bigger by TomR+teh+Pirate · · Score: 5, Informative

    The usefulness of your post notwithstanding, I heard in a news broadcast a few months ago (to my recollection) that the Klan's membership used to numbers in the millions at its peak and is now measured in tens of thousands. Happily, it's a club apparently on the decline.

  5. Questionable Accuracy: Include Gay, Latina Mayors by Koreantoast · · Score: 5, Interesting

    The short post of four US Senators and five US mayors includes one openly gay mayor and a older Latina woman who started her political career organizing Mexican laborers with Cesar Chavez. That alone casts a bit of doubt on the accuracy of this list.

    An alternative theory - a lot of these individuals may have signed up for these mailing lists simply to monitor these groups, and some of them may have just been signed up by other people as a prank. Just pulling information from a mailing list hardly represents membership.

  6. The Reason for the Russian by Shoten · · Score: 5, Insightful

    So, a lot of people have been asking about this...asking why so many of the addresses end in ".ru"

    Fundamentally...think about it. Russia is a haven for a lot of different things, including bulletproof hosting that is beyond the reach of the FBI and other Western LEOs, either via direct raids, wiretaps or by more procedural means (subpoenas, etc.). So it entirely makes sense that people who are, in the truest sense of the word, interested in the overthrow of the US Government as it exists today should use email accounts that are hosted in Russia, far from the reach of the organizations that are out to get them.

    --

    For your security, this post has been encrypted with ROT-13, twice.
  7. Not dangerous? by Elfich47 · · Score: 5, Insightful

    Cases of arson, lynching, beatings, killings, cross burnings and voter suppression in an organized manner against a specific segment of the population? These activities have been ongoing for over a hundred years in a systematic manner? The frequency is down but it still occurs or is overlooked. I would call that terrorism at the very least.

    --
    Architectural plans are like computer source code with a couple of differences: You only compile once.
  8. Re:Rednecks Anonymous by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Interesting

    and active law enforcement officials too.

  9. Re:The Klan Is Always Getting Bigger by Impy+the+Impiuos+Imp · · Score: 5, Informative

    In Freakonomics, they delve into one man's 30 year war against the KKK, where he broadcasts things like their secret rituals and so on, on radio shows, effectively turning them from a serious organization to a laughingstock few people (relatively) wanted to join, in the early part of the century.

    The vast bulk of damage to them is already long done. The point of the article was mockery, rather than outlawing, seemed to be much more productive.

    --
    (-1: Post disagrees with my already-settled worldview) is not a valid mod option.
  10. Re:Rednecks Anonymous by 93+Escort+Wagon · · Score: 5, Insightful

    I'm sure there's no possibility that there will be any names released who aren't actually KKK members.

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    #DeleteChrome
  11. When was that again? by SuperKendall · · Score: 5, Insightful

    Cases of arson, lynching, beatings, killings, cross burnings and voter suppression in an organized manner against a specific segment of the population?....The frequency is down but it still occurs or is overlooked.

    But when was the last time any of that happened? I have not seen stories about anything like that for many years - the most recent stuff being black churches set fire to, which it turned out was not don't by the KKK at all (who would seem to have been a primary suspect).

    I'm not saying the KKK has not been a horrible organization in the past, or even that they are in any way an organization that should be supported today. I'm saying that they have become essentially irrelevant, and the resources used to combat the "terrorists" of the KKK would be far better spent on real terrorists - but they aren't because the real terrorists can bite. Attacking the KKK like this is lame because it's pretending to help people while actually helping no-one.

    The KKK is dying, why even give them the publicity these attacks grant? It can only help the KKK at this point.

    --
    "There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley
  12. Re:The Klan Is Always Getting Bigger by reboot246 · · Score: 5, Insightful

    You don't know anything about the Tea Party except what you've been told by CNN, MSNBC, CNBC, etc. If you knew anything about them, you'd probably agree with them. Don't let your ignorance blind you.

    They are not a "hate" group and have plenty of black members. They even have a lot of members who are Democrats!