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http://www.itproportal.com/2011/02/25/anonymous-retaliates-against-baptist-church-provocation/

Quite a funny story if you ask me. Anonymous is still going strong too, apparently (sorry to go on a tangent) they are hacking government websites of cruel regimes.

Regardless, a little bit of humour to throw into the mix of things that are going on right now.

I REALLY hate stupid "hate" and DDoS attacks...but...it's also REALLY hard for me not to be satisfied with this news.

I was initially skeptical too ddm, but if you look at the story, apparently WBC was literally challenging anonymous to take their site down

play with fire and all that...

They also hacked Aaron Burr's, some counter-hackers computer too. Lol, ah, makes me grin.

it makes me wish anonymous was an organized socio-political movement with higher goals in mind. They were in fact heavily involved in the disemination of info in Egypt and even put out "how to run from the police" brochures

I think that's what makes Anonymous so interesting, they aren't constricted by structures - they are horizontal and strike out without warning. It makes them that much more threatening to the powers that be.

it makes them no more threatening that anarchist dynamite throwers in the late nineteenth century, which is, not effective, and so good at causing media ruckus that they will almost certainly cause state backlash disproportionate to anything they have done.

Originally posted by inimalist
it makes them no more threatening that anarchist dynamite throwers in the late nineteenth century, which is, not effective, and so good at causing media ruckus that they will almost certainly cause state backlash disproportionate to anything they have done.

Nah. They are called anon for a reason: so easy that even a 14-year-old can do it. They just have to "do it" right. They freely share with each other how to "evade" the system with multiple proxies and those proxies "wipe" their data once a day.

So, by the time the investigation begins, almost all the proxies have wiped their data. After a few days, when an investigation begins, it's too late to catch them. Only the idiots that participate in "anon" get caught.

Where as the backlash been against the commnity? I see individual cases, but no major 'busts.' You know?

Originally posted by dadudemon
Nah. They are called anon for a reason: so easy that even a 14-year-old can do it. They just have to "do it" right. They freely share with each other how to "evade" the system with multiple proxies and those proxies "wipe" their data once a day.

as evidenced by the Anonymous attacks in the wake of the Assange arrest: The FBI/CIA can find you if you are behind a proxy. I don't know if it is through normal police work or cyber know-how, but they can. iirc, one of those arrested was traced through their proxy

Originally posted by dadudemon
So, by the time the investigation begins, almost all the proxies have wiped their data. After a few days, when an investigation begins, it's too late to catch them. Only the idiots that participate in "anon" get caught.

its acutally worse if we can't catch them. A group of hackers that gets media attention for attacking religion are not going to do much in favor of net nutrality. An organized group that specifically only targets issues of internet censorhip? probably has a better face for the public, which, as you and i both know, is ignorant of anything computer related (not that Im any better or anything)

Originally posted by dadudemon
Where as the backlash been against the commnity? I see individual cases, but no major 'busts.' You know?

WBC and scientology probably arent high profile enough targets. I guess where the comparison to ninteenth century anarchists falls apart is the fact that anonymous isnt going against heads of state.

thats right, of how disorganized and non-relevant anonymous is falls apart because anonymous is too disorganized and attacks too non-relevant targets /lol. I actually did lol for a second

Originally posted by inimalist
as evidenced by the Anonymous attacks in the wake of the Assange arrest: The FBI/CIA can find you if you are behind a proxy. I don't know if it is through normal police work or cyber know-how, but they can. iirc, one of those arrested was traced through their proxy

Well, I'd like to believe I covered that already:


"They just have to "do it" right. They freely share with each other how to "evade" the system with multiple proxies and those proxies "wipe" their data once a day...

Only the idiots that participate in "anon" get caught.


...

I see individual cases, but no major 'busts.'"

It certainly doesn't help that the young man bragged about it on the inner-tubes and the authorities, wanting to not look totally incompetant, HAD to arrest someone...so why not a retarded, naive, kid?

Originally posted by inimalist
its acutally worse if we can't catch them. A group of hackers that gets media attention for attacking religion are not going to do much in favor of net nutrality. An organized group that specifically only targets issues of internet censorhip? probably has a better face for the public, which, as you and i both know, is ignorant of anything computer related (not that Im any better or anything)

I see child pronz as being close to 1000 times more high-profile and much damaging to true net neutrality...it's very hard for any reasonible person to argue for net neutrality in the face of such a morally detestable element.



Originally posted by inimalist
WBC and scientology probably arent high profile enough targets. I guess where the comparison to ninteenth century anarchists falls apart is the fact that anonymous isnt going against heads of state.

thats right, of how disorganized and non-relevant anonymous is falls apart because anonymous is too disorganized and attacks too non-relevant targets /lol. I actually did lol for a second

lol

I lol'd at you lol'ing at that.

I'm with dadudemon on this. The ringleaders, such as they are, are basically immune to retaliation and computing is modular enough that they can spread a good portion of that immunity to thousands of people with very little effort.

Originally posted by dadudemon
I see child pronz as being close to 1000 times more high-profile and much damaging to true net neutrality...it's very hard for any reasonible person to argue for net neutrality in the face of such a morally detestable element.

I was about to say "I don't see why that would be." but then I looked at wikipedia. There doesn't seem to be a perfect consensus on what net neutrality exactly means. I'd always been of the impression that it was purely about preventing tiered service, not completely eliminating censorship.

Originally posted by Symmetric Chaos
I was about to say "I don't see why that would be." but then I looked at wikipedia. There doesn't seem to be a perfect consensus on what net neutrality exactly means. I'd always been of the impression that it was purely about preventing tiered service, not completely eliminating censorship.

I'm "old" school and it only means, to me, that ISPs are to NOT interfere with the data being bused by their systems: as long as the customer paid, they turn a blind eye to the traffic and neither actively monitor it nor prevent or allow specific types of traffic: allow all.

It has expanded to include government, as of late, due to various censorship thingies.


Originally, from what I know, it was ISPs blocking traffic to allow for "higher premium" traffic to get through...which stemmed from competitors' traffic being bused on an ISPs network. It's what happens when your content provider is also your data provider: net neutrality goes out the window as the data provider will obviously have a business interest (as they should) in prioritizing their premium content and/or their business partners' premium content. That's ethically wrong...but not necessarily legally wrong.

maybe net neutrality was the wrong term, what I am saying though, is that small, soft targets like churches are going to cause more backlash than they are worth. Might individual members of anonymous get away without getting caught, sure. Does this change the fact that the logical end result of their action is going to be more invasive policing of the internet?

I'll post this, its an hour long, but it talks about the French Anarchists, and I think the comparison is apt. They had all of these loosely affiliated individuals who would carry out this "propoganda of the deed", not really causing that much danger or change in their societies, but creating a situation where the state overreacted and, essentially, layed the groundwork for a lot of the modern police state. At the very least, the professors last point, about how the reaction of the state is always disproportionate and draconian, is extremely relevant: without some larger goal or motivation, Anonymous actually risks losing their ability to be anonymous.

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the point about pedophiles is 100% wrong though. sure, I'm happy they get arrested, but the vast majority of child porn cases never pierce mainstream media coverage, or get a quick summary on local news. Anonymous sends a hoax letter to WBC and it gets picked up. It is this media image itself that will kill anonymous faster than anything. After Assange, anything Anonymous does gets headlines. To the public, it makes them seem much more powerful and dangerous than they really are. its that paranoia that will make people willing to sacrifice internet privacy such that they might be safe, much, again, like the anarchists or terrorists of modern time.

I was hoping Anonymous would post a bunch of homosexual images or pro homosexual messages on the site.

Originally posted by BackFire
I was hoping Anonymous would post a bunch of homosexual images or pro homosexual messages on the site.

I'm sure you can get your "homosexual images" fix elsewhere for the time being.

They did the other day, had the site re-linked to a homosexual online sex community.

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Anonymous hacks the church during a live broadcast. Near the end.

Oh my god, that woman is ****ing insane. Why is she even allowed to talk on television?

Originally posted by RE: Blaxican
Oh my god, that woman is ****ing insane. Why is she even allowed to talk on television?

For our amusement.

taFOsUPb9ts

ok, ya, I'm not saying we are going to become China because Anonymous messes up the web site of some churches, but we've already seen the government step in to try and shut down torrent hosting sites through both legislation and direct connections with corporations.

And no, I also don't think Anonymous is the specific group that is going to cause this. Frankly, the way the media attached the title "former hacker" to Assange probably did more damage so far as making people think hackers are a dangerous and "plotting" group than does Anonymous.

maybe my point is more like: If someone is going to risk government backlash, make it worthwhile.

Originally posted by inimalist
the point about pedophiles is 100% wrong though. sure, I'm happy they get arrested, but the vast majority of child porn cases never pierce mainstream media coverage, or get a quick summary on local news. Anonymous sends a hoax letter to WBC and it gets picked up. It is this media image itself that will kill anonymous faster than anything. After Assange, anything Anonymous does gets headlines. To the public, it makes them seem much more powerful and dangerous than they really are. its that paranoia that will make people willing to sacrifice internet privacy such that they might be safe, much, again, like the anarchists or terrorists of modern time.

I disagree: I did not hear of the anon thing on any place except for the internet.

Child porn? Every single damn arrest gets put on local TV. Sometimes, if there was enough porn involved, it makes it to national TV.


How many times have I heard "anon" in the national news: 0. I've only read about their exploits on the internet by bloggers and online-only new reports.

That's part of the reason why we have so many laws and precedences on child porn and very little progress in "net neutrality" for things other than child porn. Child porn, forgive the phrase, is 'sexier' media coverage: we get to "out" a pervert and it makes us feel better to scoff at a scumbag. It's also more "shocking" than covering an obscure site hit by a bot-net of 50,000 anon machines.


Now, that's not to say that my anecdotal experience actually proves or disproves which gets more media coverage. But, I assure, you, "hacking" gets virtually no coverage.

to be fair, there are probably more child porn cases than hacking ones, but like, Chinese hackers made international news several times over the past few years, stuxnet, etc. Not all the same thing, but this stuff does get into the public sphere.

And Anonymous had media coverage (though it might have been local) long before Assange, and I think even before their scientology campaign. The last time I saw any major coverage of child porn was an article in Macleans a few years ago about how little coverage pedophile net rings get in the media... then again, there is a huge difference between American and Canadian media, and I do pretty much exclusively get my news from the net.

The other part to this is that, like we agreed on before, Anonymous' targets are pretty low key at this point. As the stories I mentioned above proove, if they did something big enough, the media would eat it up like crazy. Going after churches... idk, that to me seems to be a high-risk low-reward type of strategy.

Originally posted by inimalist
to be fair, there are probably more child porn cases than hacking ones, but like, Chinese hackers made international news several times over the past few years, stuxnet, etc. Not all the same thing, but this stuff does get into the public sphere.

And Anonymous had media coverage (though it might have been local) long before Assange, and I think even before their scientology campaign. The last time I saw any major coverage of child porn was an article in Macleans a few years ago about how little coverage pedophile net rings get in the media... then again, there is a huge difference between American and Canadian media, and I do pretty much exclusively get my news from the net.

The other part to this is that, like we agreed on before, Anonymous' targets are pretty low key at this point. As the stories I mentioned above proove, if they did something big enough, the media would eat it up like crazy. Going after churches... idk, that to me seems to be a high-risk low-reward type of strategy.

Americans LOVE their "low-brow" news stories which include child pronz.

Anyway, yeah, I don't think Anon is going to get in trouble for hacking the website of the most hated church in America.

the thing is, there are also reports that they have caused some nuiscance to website for epilepsy sufferers, etc. They deny it and say it was scientology posing as them, so idk.

But like, its hard to tell what is going to strike a cord with people and what is going to be manufactured into news.

Originally posted by inimalist
the thing is, there are also reports that they have caused some nuiscance to website for epilepsy sufferers, etc. They deny it and say it was scientology posing as them, so idk.

But like, its hard to tell what is going to strike a cord with people and what is going to be manufactured into news.


The thing about anon is...that...they are anon.


Prosecuting a group whose trail goes cold every 24 hours, is difficult. There are always "mult-bit layer forensics recoveries" but with the very small storage space put on those anonymous proxies that ALSO purge their contents every 24 hours, it is highly likely that the "5-th layer"* of retrievable information is out of reach by the time the authorities know where to look and have a subpoena to the owners of the anonymous proxies.\


*In digital forensics, you can retrieve data, fully intact, up to 3 bit-layers. The "magnetic platters" on a hard drive actually do not "flatten" or "ridge" perfectly when they are re-written and there is a "layer" that can be read, perfectly, of up to 3 writes on the same physical locations on the platters. When you hit the 4th bit-layer, it becomes corrupted. When you hit the 5th layer, most of it is garbage. FTK is a program that you can use to recover data and it is one of the most popular with authorities. What does this have to do with anon? Like I said above, the information cannot be retrieved from the "log files" of the proxies when they are deleted every 24 hours. Some set the cleaning to every 48 hours. They do this to provide 'security' for those who wish to remain anonymous such as investigators, shamed pornography searchers, internet trolls, and hackers. The authorities usually get around to figuring out the first proxy server's location, with a subpoena in hand, at around the 2 week mark, in a GOOD scenario. Good luck getting the forensic data 6 layers deep: it's impossible. This means that "anon" WILL remain "anon" if they continue to set themselves up, properly. Additionally, legislation which requires proxy providers to keep their servers logged and archived for, say, 3 months, will fail: hacker groups like anon will just setup their own proxies and clean them after use. Then what? It becomes even MORE impossible to track, then, because the proxy server's owner, and the proxy server itself no longer exist. (Some already do this...and it's much easier to do than one might think.)


What I think would be hilarious is to execute a DDoS attack on a website but have your botnet PCs spoof the subnet of the white-house. People would say, "Obama hacked shit, n'stuff...."

Feb 24th episode of Colbert had a segment on Anonymous

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unfortunatly the Greenwald interview is cut, he is amazing and the interview is pretty good

Originally posted by dadudemon
The thing about anon is...that...they are anon.


Prosecuting a group whose trail goes cold every 24 hours, is difficult. There are always "mult-bit layer forensics recoveries" but with the very small storage space put on those anonymous proxies that ALSO purge their contents every 24 hours, it is highly likely that the "5-th layer"* of retrievable information is out of reach by the time the authorities know where to look and have a subpoena to the owners of the anonymous proxies.\


*In digital forensics, you can retrieve data, fully intact, up to 3 bit-layers. The "magnetic platters" on a hard drive actually do not "flatten" or "ridge" perfectly when they are re-written and there is a "layer" that can be read, perfectly, of up to 3 writes on the same physical locations on the platters. When you hit the 4th bit-layer, it becomes corrupted. When you hit the 5th layer, most of it is garbage. FTK is a program that you can use to recover data and it is one of the most popular with authorities. What does this have to do with anon? Like I said above, the information cannot be retrieved from the "log files" of the proxies when they are deleted every 24 hours. Some set the cleaning to every 48 hours. They do this to provide 'security' for those who wish to remain anonymous such as investigators, shamed pornography searchers, internet trolls, and hackers. The authorities usually get around to figuring out the first proxy server's location, with a subpoena in hand, at around the 2 week mark, in a GOOD scenario. Good luck getting the forensic data 6 layers deep: it's impossible. This means that "anon" WILL remain "anon" if they continue to set themselves up, properly. Additionally, legislation which requires proxy providers to keep their servers logged and archived for, say, 3 months, will fail: hacker groups like anon will just setup their own proxies and clean them after use. Then what? It becomes even MORE impossible to track, then, because the proxy server's owner, and the proxy server itself no longer exist. (Some already do this...and it's much easier to do than one might think.)


What I think would be hilarious is to execute a DDoS attack on a website but have your botnet PCs spoof the subnet of the white-house. People would say, "Obama hacked shit, n'stuff...."

they don't need to catch anonymous to take away privacy in the name of internet security

You can't really take away internet privacy without just shutting down the internet, I'm relatively sure. Since it's all just a matter of code, it can always be re-written unwritten by someone skilled enough. That's why the "anti-virus vs. virus" war will never end.

because Greenwald is so awesome, but sorry to spam....

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huh, seems like Anonymous took my advice, lol!

anyways, remove foot from mouth:

http://content.usatoday.com/communities/technologylive/post/2011/03/anonymous-actively-probing-koch-brothers-corporate-networks-/1

they were on Colbert again on the 28th