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So I hear about this anon all the time. It's a bunch of loltards on the internet with no real power. Sure they do some DDoS attacks or replace a website front page with a taunting letter right?

http://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/...m-tracked-anonymousand-paid-a-heavy-price.ars
(inb4oldarticleisold)

It's a long read, but if you're still posting ignorant opinions about them after that? I really can't change your mind.

In spirit of the subject, old story is old.

Hence my disclaimer. It's a good read for anyone who hasn't read it, or still believes it's all a dog&pony show.

I'm of two minds about Anon. On the one hand they do some amazing and great things and now that they've actually started maturing and picking targets worthy of being targeted, they are great and wonderful. But on the other hand they have at times gone off the deep end and harassed innocent people for shits and giggles whether that person was deserving of their ire or not. Ruining a corporation that did illegal or immoral actions is one thing, but to ruin the finances/lives of innocents is what keeps them from being a real force.

It's like they are Two-face. Sometimes it's heads and sometimes it's tails. But it's usually fairly random.

http://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/news/2011/02/the-ridiculous-plan-to-attack-wikileaks.ars

followup article.

Dave said:

I'm of two minds about Anon. On the one hand they do some amazing and great things and now that they've actually started maturing and picking targets worthy of being targeted, they are great and wonderful. But on the other hand they have at times gone off the deep end and harassed innocent people for shits and giggles whether that person was deserving of their ire or not. Ruining a corporation that did illegal or immoral actions is one thing, but to ruin the finances/lives of innocents is what keeps them from being a real force.

It's like they are Two-face. Sometimes it's heads and sometimes it's tails. But it's usually fairly random.

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Yea. That is why it is a collective. They may have "quadrant leaders" but some might do things that others may not agree but all under one umbrella.

I'm in the same boat as Dave: I like a lot of what Anonymous has accomplished, but I'm iffy about their methods. It's hard to take them serisously when their messages keep talking about "doing it for the lulz."

From what I understand, the vast majority of 'innocent' people that they've gone after had it coming in some way or another. I think. I'm basing that opinion on reading ED articles about various YouTube people who got taken down several pegs. Most of them were idiots who were too full of themself, threatened Anonymous, or had some pretty radical (see also: stupid) opinions.

Wow... interesting read. Quite an eye opener to see anonymous "catching a big one" here, with such little effort. Its interesting to think how far this could go in the future... the bigger anons targets get, the more attention theyre going to attract and it looks like things are already starting to get pretty real. Anon isnt a secret anymore, and itll only be a matter of time before the shit hits the fan.

Strange to think all this was born from a silly little image board...

Remember that time they went after an 11 year old girl?

Super cool.

You mean the 11 year old girl who lied about being raped and got her father arrested by pouring costume blood on herself and running out the house claiming he was beating her, all for the lulz? Yeah... I have a hard time feeling too sympathetic there.

Weren't they supposed to be busy taking down Scientology?

Finish the job before you move on to the next shiny.

It seems like the sort of thing that, the less you have to do with them, the better off you are generally gonna be.

And now they've taken down the largest child porn ring ever.

http://www.examiner.com/anonymous-in-national/anonymous-exposes-pedophile-ring-hacks-lolita-city

If this leads to a slew of arrests, then they're considered heroes in my book.

Hey, "The Dispossessed" isn't all idle musing, y'know.

--Patrick
EDIT: Also, found this amusing:

I think they've bitten off more than they can chew this time. Anonymous goes after Zetas cartel.

This can't end well.

Not until after they go after Fox on November 5!

But if they can take down the Zetas I will be very impressed.

I'm more inclined to think the Zetas will kill them and their entire families.

DarkAudit said:

I'm more inclined to think the Zetas will kill them and their entire families.

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Yeah, that's my worry as well.

This is a pretty interesting test of their reach and power. I am intrigued.

DDoSing company websites and google bombing assholes on the internet, and even outing child-porn sharing sites on the darknet is a long, long, long way from antagonizing drug warlords with a knack for terrorism and a reputation for wiping out small border towns.

I applaud their end intent here, but...it just seems like a stupid thing to do that might get a lot of people killed if they go through with it.

I have serious doubts that Anon will do anything. I think this is either a bunch of empty threats, or someone from Anon will claim that this was not an official threat and that they have no intention of following through.

It's going to get the person that was kidnapped killed for sure if he/she isn't already.

Zetas are no joke. But I don't know how strong their web-presence is. Annon can rail and threaten but I don't think that there is anything to "take down" in a hacker sense. Then if there was something that Annon could do to hurt Zetas, I don't think there is anything Zetas could do to find Annon directly.

It would not be wise to sit in a cyber-cafe in McAllen reading /b... though.

I'm fairly sure that the Zetas have computers, connected to the internet, that have massive amounts of their cartel connection information somewhere on the network. All Anon would need to do is bring all that to light and watch the chaos unfold.

Targeting an organization that is willing to literally kill them and everyone they know? This should be interesting.

Which is exactly why they're "anon". Can't kill what you can't identify.

Yeah but all it takes is one fuck up to kill someone. They sure better be flawless. I bet the "script kiddies" felt pretty invincible too until they got arrested. I don't have any personally against anon--I'm rather neutral towards them--but you have to admit that's taking a pretty big risk.

Shegokigo said:

Which is exactly why they're "anon". Can't kill what you can't identify.

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Don't suspected anon members get found all the time? The Zetas are hardly short of resources.

Nor are they particularly discriminatory, what with the whole mass murder thing.

Frankie Williamson said:

It's going to get the person that was kidnapped killed for sure if he/she isn't already.

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this. If they already got a member, then that member is probably now being torture for information and such.

SpecialKO said:

Don't suspected anon members get found all the time? The Zetas are hardly short of resources.

Nor are they particularly discriminatory, what with the whole mass murder thing.

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Keyword: Suspected.

Will innocent people die on false leads to Anon? Probably. Will it be less than if Anon does serious damage to the Cartel (wrecking financial info, garnering name lists and address books)? Probably.

Shegokigo said:

Keyword: Suspected.

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Yeah, because the Zetas are about due process...

Will innocent people die on false leads to Anon? Probably. Will it be less than if Anon does serious damage to the Cartel (wrecking financial info, garnering name lists and address books)? Probably.

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So...you're agreeing that fewer people will die if Anon doesn't actually do anything. We're all on the same page then, it seems.

I'm saying some will die while they attempt to track down Anon, though largely less will die if Anon does serious damage to the Cartel.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/technology/2011/nov/02/anonymous-zetas-hacking-climbdown?CMP=twt_gu

lol

I am not surprise really. Anon do have a ton of informational power, but I figure these cartel are not some "backwood" people either. They manage to find the real identity of some of these posters in the past (per the article) so that means they have some hackers working for them also.

Honestly, these aren't the kind of guys they could be embarrassed into stopping or who they could ruin a business deal for. The Zetas are a criminal cartel that operates outside the law, with no legitimate face... the best Anon could actually do would be to discover member lists or info on deals and then inform INTERPOL or something.

Information networks like Anonymous are powerful, but some targets can only be affected so much by information warfare. Sometimes you need ACTUAL warfare.

Entire lists of weapons/drug dealer locations/names/identities would have been devestating to have released. Sadly it was not realized.

Shegokigo said:

Entire lists of weapons/drug dealer locations/names/identities would have been devestating to have released. Sadly it was not realized.

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Yeah... but only if the governments and police agencies acted on them. They'd have to take into account the info might be bad and was released explicitly to trap and kill agents. That's the Catch 22 of this sort of thing.

Yeah, and that doesn't account for massive police corruption in Zetas-controlled areas of Mexico. It might help in other areas a lot, but the problem in the Zetas' areas is likely not that people don't know who the dealers are, it's that there's literally no one to stop them short of an outside task force rolling in. And that's not really a new tactic in the Mexican side of the drug war...

Nuke 'em from orbit. only way to be sure.

(assuming the guy with his finger on the button isn't working for the Zetas already)

DarkAudit said:

Nuke 'em from orbit. only way to be sure.

(assuming the guy with his finger on the button isn't working for the Zetas already)

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That's honestly one of the things that really does keep me up the night - the horrific idea that, inevitably, some terrorist group or pseudo-military dictatorship will actually get their hands on a nuke and have the technical and operational capability to do something with it.

SpecialKO said:

That's honestly one of the things that really does keep me up the night - the horrific idea that, inevitably, some terrorist group or pseudo-military dictatorship will actually get their hands on a nuke and have the technical and operational capability to do something with it.

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It has to happen eventually. There were 70,000 nuclear warheads in the world in the late 80s, and that has be drawn down to a "mere" 23,000 as of a few years ago.

Mutually assured destruction only matters if the opposing party has something they don't want to lose.

Terrorists don't care.

Further, the modern nuclear weapons approach 20 megatons of power, whereas the bombs that were used on Japan were 15 and 20 kilotons. Not double, not ten times, not even a hundred times - today's weapons are a thousand times more explosive than the weapons used to decimate Hiroshima and Nagasaki.

So yeah - when someone loses one of those 23,000 nukes, and it's used in a populated area, it will be astonishing.

Thanks, stienman, I'm never sleeping again...

stienman said:

So yeah - when someone loses one of those 23,000 nukes, and it's used in a populated area, it will be astonishing.

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Oh it shall.....

SpecialKO said:

Thanks, stienman, I'm never sleeping again...

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The US is very, very large. Even the largest bombs would wipe out only a single city. In the worst case you'd see little damage beyond 30 miles from the blast, but at 7 miles from the blast you'd see little left standing. Of course the radiation and fallout will damage people further from the blast. I live over 30 miles from my nearest big city (detroit) and so do most americans.

It would terrorize us, and kill hundreds of thousands or millions depending on the target (New york and LA being some of the densest cities in the US) but even our densest cities are fairly sparse by world standards for big cities.

So chances are good that you wouldn't be directly affected by such a blast.

stienman said:

The US is very, very large. Even the largest bombs would wipe out only a single city. In the worst case you'd see little damage beyond 30 miles from the blast, but at 7 miles from the blast you'd see little left standing. Of course the radiation and fallout will damage people further from the blast. I live over 30 miles from my nearest big city (detroit) and so do most americans.

It would terrorize us, and kill hundreds of thousands or millions depending on the target (New york and LA being some of the densest cities in the US) but even our densest cities are fairly sparse by world standards for big cities.

So chances are good that you wouldn't be directly affected by such a blast.

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Nah. Just radioactive fall out and mutate!!!

Chibibar said:

Nah. Just radioactive fall out and mutate!!!

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RADICAL!

Heh. But you know, I was re-reading "Alas Babylon" there was a sentence (which I can't remember exactly but here is the gist of it) Nuclear weapons were use as a deterrent, but when it is no longer deter, we lose the war.

Will nations ever use nuclear weapons? who knows, it is possible that a single nation with nuclear capability COULD use it, but it is like last resort because any result from that is everyone else is using them (defending themselves) and that will get ugly.

Shegokigo said:

Oh it shall.....

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I didn't think destruction from a distance was your style. You always struck me as an "up close and personal" type of gal.

I'm an all kinds of destruction girl. Besides, without nukes how can I have my Post-Apocolypic mohawked rule?

stienman said:

The US is very, very large. Even the largest bombs would wipe out only a single city. In the worst case you'd see little damage beyond 30 miles from the blast, but at 7 miles from the blast you'd see little left standing. Of course the radiation and fallout will damage people further from the blast. I live over 30 miles from my nearest big city (detroit) and so do most americans.

It would terrorize us, and kill hundreds of thousands or millions depending on the target (New york and LA being some of the densest cities in the US) but even our densest cities are fairly sparse by world standards for big cities.

So chances are good that you wouldn't be directly affected by such a blast.

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Stop ruining fiction!

Quotemander Prime said:

Stop ruining fiction!

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Sorry. How about this:



Better?

Actually the US just dismantled it's largest nuke at 9.something megatons. Our largest nuke now is somewhere in the 2 megaton range

Shegokigo said:

I'm an all kinds of destruction girl. Besides, without nukes how can I have my Post-Apocolypic mohawked rule?

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Ah, I hadn't grasped your evil intent. If you ever need a right-hand minion to keep track of your empire, I'm organized, efficient, and know 4 ways to kill someone with a file folder.

Emrys said:

Ah, I hadn't grasped your evil intent. If you ever need a right-hand minion to keep track of your empire, I'm organized, efficient, and know 4 ways to kill someone with a file folder.

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Too bad three of those ways involves a firearm of some kind

I only know one way to kill with a file folder.

Though, I suppose, I could argue that I wouldn't need more than one way, anyway.

I dunno, I haven't seen any evidence of Shego's competency in ruling the twisted mutated freaks of a post-apocalyptic hellhole. What's she going to do when people start complaining that the Thirpples have begun taking extra food to give to the super-intelligent ant colony living in their third breasts?

Kill them. Duh.

CrimsonSoul said:

Actually the US just dismantled it's largest nuke at 9.something megatons. Our largest nuke now is somewhere in the 2 megaton range

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unforunatly what you need to understand about ours is we have MIRVS which have 10-20 2 megaton warheads, think like a nuclear cluster bomb

Bones said:

unforunatly what you need to understand about ours is we have MIRVS which have 10-20 2 megaton warheads, think like a nuclear cluster bomb

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When one nuke just isn't enough?

Bones said:

unforunatly what you need to understand about ours is we have MIRVS which have 10-20 2 megaton warheads, think like a nuclear cluster bomb

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Now see that's what I'm talking about. Why destroy one city's downtown when you can hit all the vital spots in a 500 mile radius? Since detonation power decreases in 3 degrees - ie, cube root - then a 2 megaton is a 3 mile blast while a 20 megaton is a 7 mile blast - you get much more bang for the buck with 10 2mt weapons than with 1 20mt weapon.

But it's unlikely that a terrorist group would be able to grab a loaded MIRV with the necessary skills, knowledge, and equipment to launch it in a manner that would make it most effective.

I'd give them a less than 10% chance of finding and detonating an older, smaller weapon anyway, but the modern weapons would be very difficult to detonate without actually having all the equipment, launch codes, etc.

Probably would have better chance infiltrating another nuke equipped country stealing and detonating theirs.

oh I didnt mean terrorists would ever have that tech, i was simply refering to the fact that while our largest warhead is 2 megatons there are many of them on each missile

http://www.cnn.com/2011/11/04/world/americas/mexico-anonymous-threat/index.html?hpt=hp_c2

He's dead.

I give it a week. Month tops.

bhamv3 said:

Kill them. Duh.

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But then there will eventually be no one left but Shego and a bunch of mutants with extra boobies....
....
....
Ooooooooh...

Shegokigo said:

http://www.cnn.com/2011/11/04/world/americas/mexico-anonymous-threat/index.html?hpt=hp_c2

He's dead.

I give it a week. Month tops.

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I'm hoping this is a sting - fake name, persona, etc. Being watched 24/7 by agents trying to draw a reaction from either anonymous or the zetas.

If not, I wish him luck... from a distance.

MSNBC is comparing them to Tim McVeigh now.

DarkAudit said:

MSNBC is comparing them to Tim McVeigh now.

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Noooooo, they're comparing Guy Fawkes to McVeigh and then questioning whether or not protesters understand the symbol they're using. It's not quite comparing protesters to McVeigh.

"It's not about bombing anything; it's about being anonymous — and peaceful."

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...

I understand why they're questioning.

Tress said:

Noooooo, they're comparing Guy Fawkes to McVeigh and then questioning whether or not protesters understand the symbol they're using. It's not quite comparing protesters to McVeigh.

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It actually makes me question whether or not the media understands the symbol they are using, as while it's true that Guy Fawkes was an anarchist bomber, the symbol has an entirely different meaning when you take into account it's history with V for Vendetta (mainly the movie) and it's use by Anonymous. Symbols evolve over time... the swastika used to be a universal symbol of peace and unity, but once it was co-opted by the Nazis it became shorthand for hatred and violence.

Basically what I'm saying is that Guy Fawkes no longer owns his face and it now belongs to those who wish to protect their identity while showing unity for a cause. You can blame Hollywood.

AshburnerX said:

It actually makes me question whether or not the media understands the symbol they are using, as while it's true that Guy Fawkes was an anarchist bomber, the symbol has an entirely different meaning when you take into account it's history with V for Vendetta (mainly the movie) and it's use by Anonymous. Symbols evolve over time... the swastika used to be a universal symbol of peace and unity, but once it was co-opted by the Nazis it became shorthand for hatred and violence.

Basically what I'm saying is that Guy Fawkes no longer owns his face and it now belongs to those who wish to protect their identity while showing unity for a cause. You can blame Hollywood.

Click to expand...

That's a valid argument. I'm just saying that MSNBC did not equate OWS protesters with Timothy McVeigh.

AshburnerX said:

It actually makes me question whether or not the media understands the symbol they are using, as while it's true that Guy Fawkes was an anarchist bomber, the symbol has an entirely different meaning when you take into account it's history with V for Vendetta (mainly the movie) and it's use by Anonymous. Symbols evolve over time... the swastika used to be a universal symbol of peace and unity, but once it was co-opted by the Nazis it became shorthand for hatred and violence.

Basically what I'm saying is that Guy Fawkes no longer owns his face and it now belongs to those who wish to protect their identity while showing unity for a cause. You can blame Hollywood.

Click to expand...

Sort of how like Che Guevara's face now means "I shop at the mall."

Che would be rolling in his grave if he knew what people were using his image for these days.

I really love the movie(s) Che

So it looks like it's over: http://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/...-cartel-after-release-of-kidnapped-member.ars

I still think they should have gone through with it. Break a few eggs to make an omlette etc.

what's stopping you from taking down the zetas

Non-disclosure agreements

Charlie Don't Surf said:

what's stopping you from taking down the zetas

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Why would I stop what I enjoy so throughly?

Shegokigo said:

Why would I stop what I enjoy so throughly?

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ok

Charlie Don't Surf said:

what's stopping you from taking down the zetas

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Well? Why don't you go after them for that matter?

Anyway...

it is silly to think that a Para-military-Death-Squad-Narco-Cartel will have a web-presence that anyone could hack to begin with...

sixpackshaker said:

Well? Why don't you go after them for that matter?

Anyway...

it is silly to think that a Para-military-Death-Squad-Narco-Cartel will have a web-presence that anyone could hack to begin with...

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Not really... in the end, it's gotta be lead by a few people and they have to be laundering their profits somehow. Considering the sheer amount of area you need to cover to run a successful drug enterprise, it's entirely likely they are using text messages and emails to communicate at the very least... and they are very clever about the methods they use to communicate. For instance, Second Life is now monitored by the CIA because gangs were using it to discuss business.

Shegokigo said:

I still think they should have gone through with it. Break a few eggs to make an omlette etc.

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You're not fooling anyone you know... you just want a way to hide your spree among someone else's...

Antonio Banderas could do it. Back when he was still cool.

sixpackshaker said:

Well? Why don't you go after them for that matter?

Anyway...

it is silly to think that a Para-military-Death-Squad-Narco-Cartel will have a web-presence that anyone could hack to begin with...

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I am going after them by supporting the legalization of drugs in the US.

People in criminal organizations need to communicate and pass information between each other. Phones can be traced and tapped just a bit more easily than internet packets right now, so while they may not have a web "presence" they certainly use the internet for at least some of their operations.

A diligent hacker, focusing solely on them, should be able to find out some useful information that would put them at risk.

What's interesting is that the zetas complied - with a threat, sure, but the question is will they change their operations in order to avoid tangling with anonymous in the future, or to get rid of those risks that were possibly exposed so the information anonymous may have becomes obsolete. I doubt they are going to be able to get rid of enough of anonymous to ensure that the information they claim they have becomes extinct.

Perhaps they let the guy go simply to give them more time to figure out who's behind the threats - they have hackers, and I'm sure they tapped as much of the guy they released as they could - computers, phones, family's computers, ISP, etc. They don't have just police and cabbies in their pay/pocket.

stienman said:

Perhaps they let the guy go simply to give them more time to figure out who's behind the threats - they have hackers, and I'm sure they tapped as much of the guy they released as they could - computers, phones, family's computers, ISP, etc. They don't have just police and cabbies in their pay/pocket.

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This is probably it. While the Zetas could likely survive whatever Anon could release, why take the chance when you have billions of dollars? Release the guy...and start looking for the Anons or at least trying to figure out whether you have any areas of vulnerability.

fade said:

Back when he was still cool.

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Fuck you! Antonio Banderas is still...still...

Weren't they supposed to attack Fox News yesterday? Did they forget about that?

and Facebook.

Anon totally went on a bender Friday and slept all Saturday. I'm sure they'll remember next year.

http://www.wired.com/dangerroom/2011/11/mexican-blogger-decapitated/

Information informants and spies are being murdered by the various cartels. I suppose it won't really be news until anonymous itself is hit...

stienman said:

http://www.wired.com/dangerroom/2011/11/mexican-blogger-decapitated/

Information informants and spies are being murdered by the various cartels. I suppose it won't really be news until anonymous itself is hit...

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Well done, Anonymous. You're getting the closest thing to an open press there is in some of those places killed.