Log In | Register
Live Poll
If asked to, would you avoid purchasing books, magazines, theater tickets, music, DVDs, Blurays or downloading media (illegally or otherwise) for the month of March?
Greetings fellow viners. I've sat on the side lines for more than a year, mostly due to efforts at work and home fully preventing me any time to spend here. However, things are headed in a bizarre direction once again during an election year (I suppose that shouldn't come as any surprise). Now, the point of this article, and those that will follow, is to provide a single reference point on Newsvine for anyone interested in what the group Anonymous is up to. I will also try to provide links to any relevant material I can, within the scope of what is legal, of course.
Let me begin with some background information. On January 21st, 2012 (sort of the Mayan antonym) Anonymous basically declared that the internet, in aggregate, is a sovereign nation and will not tolerate regulation by any foreign power [source]. I know this isn't the first action this group has taken, Tom Cruise and Scientology bear that distinction. Now, if anyone here recalls my love for Thomas Paine, the Constitution and stuff like that, I can't help but find this as one of the most remarkable events of this century. I am sure some may see the situation a bit differently, like a bunch of kids getting uppity over video games. Nevermind the internet represents a domain where (as of 2009) more than 500 exabytes of information is stored. How big is an exabyte you ask?
A million terabytes. That's right. In 2009 the internet represented something like half a damn billion terabytes. What's even more compelling is that the internet is growing, roughly, by over 100,000 websites, per day. Never at any point in recorded human history have we had this kind of access to this much information or been able to communicate with each other with this kind of bandwidth. Anybody with access to a phone line, internet cafe or smartphone can tap into basically limitless knowledge, in any language and then share whatever they want (video, photos, art, poetry, anything) with any limitless combination of people.
If that isn't something to get worked up over, I don't know what is.
We Are Anonymous
We Are Legion
We Do Not Forgive
We Do Not Forget
Expect Us
Current Anonymous Activity
Recently, Anonymous managed to intercept communication between Scotland Yard and the FBI. They did it by apparently hacking the FBI email server and extracting the conference call phone number and access code. They then simply called and listened. Here is the conversation for your listening enjoyment.
In conjunction with the OWS movement, Anonymous posted a ton of personal data related to the City of Oakland administrative staff and police department. This is apparently in retaliation for repeated acts of brutality conducted by the police bolstered by general union thuggery (letting schools go down the tubes, park closures, but no police pay cuts dammit!). That information can be found here.
On the horizon is Operation Black March. This is actually their toughest operation to date. They are asking consumers to stop all support for the movie, software, music and media industry for the entire month of March. This is a brain hack if you ask me. You can listen to their request here. Granted, public sentiment has shifted in recent years but this is similar to the "gas outs" during the oil shock of 2008. I will fully acknowledge that we really need to use gasoline/diesel for pretty much everything and these are purely entertainment based consumables being discussed here. I just wonder where our hearts are with this one.
