The Internet was abuzz yesterday over the news that authorities dealt a serious blow to “hacktivist” collective Anonymous. Five alleged members of LulzSec, a now-disbanded offshoot of the group, were charged with hacking crimes.
The arrests were made possible by the work of one of Anonymous’ most prominent figures, Hector Xavier Monsegur, who was known under the alias “Sabu” and was the leader of LulzSec. Monsegur had been working as an informant for the FBI since last August, when he pleaded guilty to 12 hacking-related charges. While cooperating with the FBI, Monsegur continued to pretend to act as a cooperative member of Anonymous, tweeting on Monday, “The federal government is run by a bunch of f—ing cowards. Don’t give in to these people. Fight back. Stay strong.”
While the arrest of LulzSec members does not mean the end of Anonymous, which is a decentralized collective with hundreds possibly thousands of members, it does sow seeds of distrust in the movement.
Some see this as a bad thing, glorifying hacktivists like members of Anonymous and LulzSec as freedom fighters, noble vigilantes or modern-day Robin Hoods. The truth, though, is that these groups are little more than hotbeds of cyber terrorism and need to be targeted as such.
It is true that, as vigilantes, some members of Anonymous do mean well. Late last year, members targeted child pornography websites and visitors. Anonymous also undertook an unsuccessful scheme to publish the names of members of a violent Mexican drug cartel. However, any vigilante justice the group executes is completely overshadowed by its delusional self-righteousness.
The website of Anonymous Analytics, an Anonymous offshoot claiming to be devoted to exposing corrupt companies, notes that Anonymous as a whole is “focused on promoting access to information, free speech, and transparency.” But the collective’s actions speak louder than words.
Anonymous believes not only that its views are correct, but also that all other views should not have a voice at all. What other reason could there be for justifying the complete takedown of the websites of the U.S. Department of Justice, the Motion Picture Association of America and the Recording Industry Association of America?
The behavior of LulzSec was similarly malicious. Members previously targeted and took down the website of PBS. PBS’s crime? Unfavorable coverage of Anonymous ally WikiLeaks. If hacktivist groups actually cared about free speech, they wouldn’t try to promote themselves by silencing their opposition.
Not only do companies and agencies become the targets of Anonymous, but anyone using their services becomes a target as well. Anonymous recently released hundreds of thousands of email addresses and thousands of credit card numbers from customers of private intelligence firm Stratfor. Users of something as mundane as the website of the San Francisco Bay Area Rapid Transit (BART) system found their personal information published online last year thanks to Anonymous. The BART had decided to temporarily shut down cell phone service in its facilities to prevent a protest, an action worthy of activism in itself. But Anonymous’ behavior is not activism: It’s misguided and harmful extremism.