Anonymous on a Rampage

I repeat, they always boast. IF Anon does something, they boast about it. Why would they deny taking down the PSN network? If they did, they would be boasting and explaining why.

http://anonnews.org/?p=press&a=item&i=848

 

Just to clear something up Annon. didn't hack Sony, it was another group called Lolz Security that hacked them.

Anyway, I can't say I agree or disagree with their actions because on the one hand it's still cyber-terrorism, but on the other hand they're doing things us ordinary users can't and getting a message that we won't sit still for this and let the goverment or corporations boss or police the internet.

 

well, i suppose a good motivation to deny something like that is that hacking Sony and causing the PSN to go down was an unpopular thing to do and they wanted nothing to do with it. but i digress, thanks for answering my questions.


anyways, i hope that Anonymous stops doing things like this because i really disagree with their actions.

 

I can't really say that I think Anonymous will be successful, or even that their vengeance is justified. They are most certainly gathering attention from the public, which is good. Anything beyond that is foolish to hope for. Furthermore, the Megaupload takedown was fair game. The owners screwed up. They flaunted their cash, discussed and admitted piracy in their internal emails and were, on the whole, hopelessly careless. Law enforcement isn't breaching the safe harbour laws, which state that providers aren't responsible for illegal content they are unaware of, as there is ample evidence to prove that they are aware.

To use an analogy, whereas SOPA and PIPA were undoubtedly foul plays, the Megaupload case is nothing but a cleanly hit homerun. It's irritating, and I'd rather the other team didn't score the point, but at the end of the day, it's a fair cop. Megaupload lost fair and square.

If we backtrack from this hypothetical motivation, we find that instead of denying the takedown, they'd be far better off simply not doing it in the first place. However, it did occur, so provided we assume Anonymous do not change their minds halfway through, it seems silly to consider them as a culprit.

That aside, Lulsec claimed responsibility for the Sony thing.

 

@Annon not being responsible for Sony/Sega

In light of this fact that I was not aware of I'll give Anonymous a little more credit, but I still don't fully agree with their methods. Taking down, attacking, or destroying someone's website is doing the same thing they claim the government is doing, the only result this will breed is a war between the two. I find myself actually torn with that idea though, because allot of things in American didn't get changed until someone stood up and broke the laws in place to change them for the better.

On another note I didn't think about the megaupload case from the perspective P just gave, I can see the point he's making about megauload bringing it upon themselves. If you were going to take a website down for piracy, that was basically one of the flagships and they have no way of denying it.

 

Yes and no. What they do is not permanent. If they wanted to, they could, but they don't.

@P - I understand what you're talking about, but Megaupload is no different than YouTube. YouTube (which in return would be Google, as Google owns YT). They are well aware that copyrighted content is hosted on their servers. They know it, but because they try to give (automated) credit to the rightful owners, it seems to be fair game.

Unless you agree; what differences were/are (they will be back up in a month, is my approximation) there between MegaUpload/MegaVideo and YouTube, besides actual filehosting. (Which shouldn't matter, if copyrighted material is copyrighted material regardless of form.)

 

To be perfectly honest, when I read things like this, about Anonymous retaliating, it makes me smile. I may be just silly, but I feel like the Internet, the people on the internet are all like a family, kinda, something like that.

When you attack the family, you get pushed back. This may not be the exact right way to go about it, but they trying to keep something they believe in.​

 

They have nothing to avenge. Avenge is revenge. Revenge is taking hurtful action against others who have caused greivance, real or perceived.

So far no one has caused a greivance in terms of SOPA or PIPA. They aren't the ones to attack first since the motion hasn't been past.
Anon are throwing the first punch. They aren't following what they've said they'd do. I'm in no way saying either bill is right, but their actions are both childish and ignorant of the consequences that could come from this.

They could help push for the support of PIPA and SOPA forward if they aren't careful.
I do not trust someone who attacks first, not to govern the state of the entire internet especially, they are emotional people with power, that rarely ends well for anyone involved let alone the billions of users on the internet.

So these de facto leaders of the internet, hdeen from public site, with the ability to ignore responsibility and accountability is allowed to roam free to do as they please, when they please, no matter who they hurt on the way?

They've cost companies millions in money, as a result we pay higher prices for films, for game membership because these companies have to make up the loss that Anon created. And if Anon do something incredibly stupid, they just go back into hiding, they could wipe the slate clean.

You have high hope in people you know nothing about who have only said they represent the people, by taking down sites no one has asked to be taken down.
Madness.

Honest. Peaceful. Direct.

Our numbers are our strength, our conviction is our strength. We need to rally together to show that this legislation is awash with foolishness. People like Ghandhi and Martin Luther King Jr. did not stand for attacks of any form, they did not stand for the cause of grief on others. They dealt with much worse then the internet simply being censored. And people feel the need to lash out in order to send a message?

That message only says that more needs to be done in order to restrict people from the internet since some have too much power, too much control over something so crucial of modern day living. We should be showing that we the people, are able to respond in a calm collected manner, able to deal with our issues openly without resorting to something so destructive.

So your point here is stating that they are effectively able to destroy the internet. Not save it. Or defend it. When has the term Nuke ever been peaceful?

 

PAW is right; while I often do agree with the sentiment behind Anon's actions, I disagree with their methods. Call it a naive belief, but civil disobedience is the right way to make a stand. A peaceful protest. If we truly have any shred of a democracy left in the US, if we get involved and make the will of the majority known, our officials will listen--as what we saw happen with SOPA and PIPA.

And Anon going as far as to hack web servers and delete their files, widespread DDoS attacks, luring innocent people into participating in these attacks, etc., is just going to reinforce the belief that governments have that the internet is out of control.

 

Agreed. And although some of what they've done is good, I would be just as happy if they were gone. Hacking into creditcard numbers and crap like that is NOT accceptable in any way, shape, or form.

 

The difference between YouTube and Megaupload is that YouTube does not openly admit that its business is that of aiding pirates, and they remove infringing material as soon as they are aware of it. They make every effort to help authorities, ban accounts after infringements, and go so far as to erase audio if it is copyrighted. When it comes to being in the safe harbour, YouTube is docked on a foundation of reinforced concrete. Megaupload, in contrast, gave authorities the run-around. They delayed removing material, and when they did, they only removed links, as opposed to the uploaded material itself. They openly state in internal emails that they are the middle men for pirates, and in some cases they upload and download infringing material themselves. They had a reward program, by which people could earn money for uploading content, much of which was illegal. They also charged money for Premium Membership, which, when the other factors are taken into account, is tantamount to charging for material that they do not own the rights to.

The two are not necessarily mutually exclusive. By taking down sites, they send a message not to the authorities, who honestly couldn't care less about the sites, but to the everyday people, in order to raise awareness, and incite the peaceful protest you discuss. This XKCD comic addresses the point nicely. The experts know how insignificant the actions are, but the everyman is surprised into action. Besides, it's not as though Anonymous are attacking anything particularly important. No one uses the CBS site in their daily lives. It's not an enormous inconvenience. All it does is give the media something to shout about. It's akin to occupying a busy street; you inconvenience people, but it's nothing incredibly disrupting.

 

^this.


And holy shit Anon...

****ing CBS?!

I'm as pissed about what happened to MU, and I would do the same as Anon, but...

Damn.

If they take down CNN or NBC, then I'll start to get scared.

 

Anonymous is a very real threat. They could very well do it.

 

Pretty obvious.

I'm just wondering if our own government has any "cyber soldiers" to defend against Anonymous's attacks. If we do, they're not doing such a great job.

I have a feeling SOPA and PIPA will come back with a vengeance. By that, I mean Congresspeople will be somewhat more willing to vote for SOPA and PIPA.

Anonymous retaliates, and it becomes a vicious cycle.

 

They do have people to take care of the internet. None of them exceed the skills of Anon as a group, though.
And frankly, I doubt anyone will vote for a SOPA/PIPA-like bill in a long time.

 

I wouldn't say that none of them exceed Anon. Individually they may but put Anon together and there will be problems.

 

Yeah, that's what I said. They don't exceed Anon as a group. One of the reasons Anon are able to have the impact they have is because they have some people who are expert at something, and some on others.

 

So the attack of the FBI website was ignored completely by authorities? I doubt that such an attack would be ignored/ At the verry least it's not a top priority, I can understand that, but completely ignored? I don't believe that would be the case.

And why does everyone seem to be speaking for these groups? For Anon, for the authorities? We know nothing about what either group have in mind. We can simply analyse their actions and their words that we know of, we can't simply guess what they are thinking or are going to do. Otherwise we'll have rumours abound with so many untruths that no one cant tell what's going on.

 

I can see why anonymous is scarred. MU was deleted, PIPA, and SOPA almost had unanimous support in congress, and now we are all just learning about ACTA ( basically an international PIPA) being formed behind the publics' backs!
Still I think Anonymous is getting just a little ahead of themselves in their actions since no real laws have been activated. If I were in anonymous, which by the way I'm NOT, I'd make damn sure that I'd only be acting in self defense.

I agree that peaceful, and well mannered communication should always be our first response to anything, but if things get out of hand: ""Be nice. Untill it's time to not be nice."~Roadhouse

Edit: By the way, I found a link addressing that anonymous is not targeting facebook:

Spoiler

 

Acknowledged. I was being hyperbolic. They would not ignore it completely. It doesn't, however, cause sensitive data to be leaked, cause a notable amount of revenue to be lost or do anything particularly noteworthy. As such, it would be a low priority item.

I'm merely discussing the effects of their actions. It does not matter whether they intend for their actions to influence the public, as opposed to authorities. Perhaps they really do expect the authorities to crumble? Either way, the outcome is that little harm is done, and the public rally around them.