Talk:Anonymous (hacker group)

Habbo source

This Wired blog can be a citation for the Habbo activity. [1]

Unauthorized access of Sarah Palin's Yahoo! Mail account

Moved from main page until unsourced claims are settled with documentation. This is too serious to leave on mainpage in its present state. -- Fyslee / talk 02:31, 24 October 2008 (UTC)

Main article: Sarah Palin email hack

On September 17, 2008 Republican vice presidential candidate Sarah Palin's personal Yahoo! Mail email account, which critics allege that she used for official business in order to get around public record laws, was compromised, and screenshots of photos and messages were posted over the internet. News of a Yahoo! mail account owned by Palin appeared on one of 4chan's boards, and several readers of the board tried unsuccessfully to hack into the account. The account was finally compromised by an individual who successfully guessed the answers to the security questions that allow one to reset the password. He then realized that he had only one proxy for protection and thought of what would happen if the FBI got involved. He panicked, published the password on 4chan's "/b/" board, thus allowing all posters to login into the account, and he erased all the information from his own system and disconnected himself from the internet.

About that time, one of the readers of the board decided to change the password to stop people from logging into the account, and then warn Palin of the hacking through a mail to one of her friends. However, this person then accidentally posted the new password on the board, and several readers of the board tried at the same time to use it to set a new password. Yahoo! software has security measures in place that triggered an automatic "freeze" which prevented anyone from accessing the account even with the correct password, and the account was later deleted by Yahoo!. The freeze occurred before all emails accessible on the account could be downloaded. Anonymous users later passed all the information that could be retrieved before the freeze to Wikileaks, which published it. The individual who originally hacked the account later complained that he had "passed the torch" to Anonymous users after doing all he could do well, and that "the white knight fucker came along, and did it in for everyone".

The FBI and Secret Service began investigating the incident shortly after its occurrence. On September 20 it was revealed they were questioning the son of Mike Kernell, a Democratic State Representative. The handle used by the hacker when making his post pointed to him, this evidence was inconclusive because of the frequent pranks pulled at that board, but later, the proxy service provided its logs, which pointed to the residence where he was living. At age twenty the son, David Kernell, is a self described "Obamacrat" and a student at the University of Tennessee. FBI agents served a federal search warrant at the Knoxville Tennessee residence of David Kernell in the early morning hours of September 14, 2008. Kernell, according to witnesses, fled the scene when the FBI agents arrived. Agents spent 1.5 to 2 hours taking pictures of everything inside his apartment. Kernell's three roommates were also subpoenaed and expected to testify the next week in Chattanooga. A grand jury is set to convene regarding the case on the 23rd of September. Kernell Sr. told Wired that he was aware that his son was a suspect, but he did not ask him anything about it over concerns that he may have to testify in court. David Kernell was indicted on October 8, 2008, for his connection to the intrusion.

It is also much too long, a very short summary about the connection between the "hacker", the breach of the email, and 4chan/Anonymous (used the Wired sources) should be enough. A few sentences at most. DigitalC (talk) 02:55, 24 October 2008 (UTC)

Agreed. There is too much that is unsourced here. It doesn't read like an encyclopedia, but like a teenager's scribblings. -- Fyslee / talk 03:07, 24 October 2008 (UTC)

"but like a teenager's scribblings." Maybe I'm missing something, but I believe this is rather well written, if not a bit long. CompuHacker (talk) 04:13, 26 October 2008 (UTC)

A name change

It is generally considered as a blanket term – not tied to any monolithic group – for the vox populi or members of the Internet culture.

Actions attributed to Anonymous are rarely connected to an organized group.

Quoted from the article, the explanation directly contradicts the "(group)" description in the title. I am moving this page to Anonymous (internet culture) because I believe that it provides a better overall description of the phenomenon in question. One main purpose of the page is to document notable media reporting on usage of the term, which can easily provide the false impression that all the aforementioned events were perpetrated by an organized group with this name.

In short, any individual or group can apply the label to themselves. Ergo, the incidents described herein should not be directly tied to each other under the false impression of an organized "group". Spidern (talk) 17:48, 29 October 2008 (UTC)

It was a very, very poorly-considered idea to move this article without reaching consensus among editors of the article first. the skomorokh 17:55, 29 October 2008 (UTC)

I agree with a change, but it should be just Anonymous (internet) or (web) as the existance of a 'culture' is just as debatable as the existance of a 'group'. This would fit with the guidelines at WP:Disambiguation#Naming the specific topic articles which says that it should be "the subject or context to which the topic applies" which in this case is the internet and be the simplest term possible. --neon white talk 18:12, 29 October 2008 (UTC)

Admittedly, I suppose it may have been a bit hasty to make the change without first discussing it, and I appologize. To remedy the situation, let's discuss it now. I am open for "internet" as a disambiguation term. Spidern (talk) 18:51, 29 October 2008 (UTC)

Restored to Anonymous (group). This name change and move was made with zero prior discussion or consensus. Discuss here first, then go through WP:Requested moves please. Thanks. Cirt (talk) 22:28, 29 October 2008 (UTC)

Once again, I apologize for my move which was made in haste without first discussing it. So lets discuss this now. Due to the aforementioned points, I suggest that we move the page to Anonymous (internet culture). As it stands, the article is a member of the already existing Internet culture category. As described in the definition: "Cyberculture is the culture that has emerged, or is emerging, from the use of computer networks for communication, entertainment and business." I am also not opposed to moving it to Anonymous (internet), however I believe that this is less descriptive and is better placed under culture (as Anonymous is a direct result of internet culture seen on 4chan, encyclopediadramatica, and others). What are your thoughts? Spidern (talk) 23:33, 29 October 2008 (UTC)

I agree the name needs to be changed. How about Anonymous (chan) or 4chan? Verbal chat 09:51, 30 October 2008 (UTC)

Anonymous (4chan) is far too specific. Although the phenomenon emerged from sources such as these, they are certainly not limited to those sites. Spidern (talk) 09:55, 30 October 2008 (UTC)

I like the Anonymous (internet culture) idea. I think it's better than Anonymous (internet) because the latter could be confused with internet anonymity. --Explodicle (T/C) 16:37, 30 October 2008 (UTC)

Where does the idea come from that name changes always have to be discussed first? Spidern, speaking as an admin who handles a lot of move requests at WP:RM, you were justified in BOLDly moving the page. It was moved back, and now it's being discussed. This is entirely healthy and good, per WP:BRD, and there is no need to browbeat an editor for making a move that seemed to them like a good idea. No one need attain consensus before making an edit that they do not know to be controversial, and that includes page moves. No harm, no foul.

On topic, it's true that Anonymous isn't a group; it's more of a generic Internet identity. Would a name such as Anonymous (identity), Anonymous (Internet identity) or Anonymous (screen name) make sense? -GTBacchus^(talk) 17:14, 30 October 2008 (UTC)

Thank you for your comments, GTBacchus. I am not sure if I agree with identity because we are not dealing with internet anonymity in general here. What we're dealing with is a specific mode of usage, which is notable as per the references listed. What we are describing is the phenomenon of unnamed users committing actions with a sometimes shared goal. It is for that reason that I suggest "internet culture", because the phenomenon has arisen directly as a cultural aspect of the internet. Spidern (talk) 17:26, 30 October 2008 (UTC)

Yes, I agree that we're talking about a very specific usage. I didn't intend the name Anonymous (identity) to refer to anonymity in general (which is a sort of lack of identity), but to the specific identity/role, emerging from 4chan, participating in the Chanology project, etc., whose name is "Anonymous". It's a specific identity or pseudo-identity that many people assume when acting in certain modes, as you say. I'm not sure what is the best and simplest way to get that across. -GTBacchus^(talk) 17:41, 30 October 2008 (UTC)

After further consideration, it came to my attention that Anonymous in this context may be best described as a meme. Quoted from the meme article:

A meme (pronounced /miːm/)[1] consists of any idea or behavior that can pass from one person to another by learning or imitation. Examples include thoughts, ideas, theories, gestures, practices, fashions, habits, songs, and dances. Memes propagate themselves and can move through the cultural sociosphere in a manner similar to the contagious behavior of a virus.

I present an alternative to my original proposal as Anonymous (meme). When you think about how the idea for Anonymous emerged, it is apparent that all of the elements necessary are present for it to be considered a meme. Generally speaking, the phenomenon requires an idea to emerge whose execution is propagated by a fuzzy consensus among users through online communication. Having witnessed other internet memes, I believe that the inception, propagation, and general behavior of Anonymous certainly falls into this category. Spidern (talk) 17:52, 30 October 2008 (UTC)

There has been some good back and forth discussion above. I think it may be productive to set up a straw poll. Let me know if you would like me to set that up. Cirt (talk) 19:27, 30 October 2008 (UTC)

Sure, let's push this forward. Spidern (talk) 20:48, 30 October 2008 (UTC)

I think its a group in the sense that it is a group of people. The fact that it isn't well-defined isn't, I think, very relevant. What does Christianity include? Who chooses? There's lots of people who claim various groups (Mormons, for instance) aren't really Christian. I think the same fuzziness applies here. Anonymous is definitely not a meme, though the name may qualify as such - but this article isn't really about the name, its about the group/internet culture. Its either a group or a culture. I wouldn't be opposed to moving it to (internet culture), but I wouldn't support it, either. I definitely would oppose moving it to (meme), as it isn't one. There's really no good reason to move it from (group), as I think it describes them fairly accurately, and no less accurately than (internet culture) would. Titanium Dragon (talk) 21:59, 30 October 2008 (UTC)

The primary difference is that we're dealing with a collection of individuals who emerge spontaneously without meeting in public. Group implies a certain unity which simply isn't present in this case. Anonymous is also not even necessarily a group, individuals can assign the label to themselves arbitrarily. If an action is notable enough and gets media coverage, people [who will be looking up this page] will ascribe it to Anonymous. That is one reason why I believe it more closely resembles a meme than a group. In the end, the media and general public are more concerned with the act (or acts), rather than the assembly of people themselves.

A group in the traditional sense shares a general consensus of some sort (in varying degree) in order to be considered a single group (i.e. Christians believe in Jesus, a corporation works towards selling their products, a therapy group shares an ailment). That single consensus is not necessarily present here. Whether mainstream Christians accept them or not, Mormonism and Christianity both share a belief in Jesus. In fact, since Anonymous can be applied to people with practically any belief, you may consider it a grouping of groups. With Anonymous, the consensus is much less defined as a whole. In short I think that the word "group" carries connotations which may give some people the wrong impression. Spidern (talk) 22:37, 30 October 2008 (UTC)

Analysis of sources

I started going through the most notable sources to se what they called Anonymous, but by the second source it was already clear that they call it a group.

“ "the group has its own aesthetic" "the group's stock-in-trade" "Anonymous's transformation from pranksters with a tendency to overstep the mark to a group serious enough to scare Scientology" "Anonymous is not a group in the traditional sense — it has no leaders, no head office and no agreed-upon agenda. It resides in anarchic, occasionally disturbing online communities that are also engaged and knowledgeable." "By the time the group took to the streets" "Even the term "Anonymous" is really a meme — a descriptive term for 4chan, 7chan and other communities, with its own mythology and aesthetic. Every time you've ever posted anything on the internet without stating your name, you've been Anonymous, and that's all that defines Anonymous," Guy says." ninemsn [2] ”

“ "The loosely bound group of net activists" "A Fawkes-masked spokesman for Anonymous, who wouldn't give his name but whom several protesters identified as the organizer of the L.A. event, explained one of the group's concrete goals." L.A. Times [3] ”

“ "The group, which goes by the name of Anonymous, is a disparate collection of hackers and activists." Fox News (even Fox, lol)[4] ”

“ "a hacker group called "Anonymous."" Wired (this is not part of the quotes from Fox, this is a description provided by Wired before quoting Fox's description) [5] ”

“ "Anonymous, an informal Internet-based group." The Boston Globe [6] ”

Notice also how the sources constantly refer to the members of Anonymous and how Anonymous is composed by people X and people Y, and how the members of Anonymous do stuff. A meme doesn't have "members". An internet culture has members, but it's never called that on the sources, that I know of.

Notice this US Department of Justice press note regarding a self-confessed Anonymous member "an underground group called “Anonymous.”" [7].

Srlsly, even Scientologists call it a group. Insisting that Anonymous is not a group is just WP:OR original research unless you provide sources saying that it's not. --Enric Naval (talk) 17:24, 31 October 2008 (UTC)

Your position is well justified and sourced. However, if we are to take the position that Anonymous is in fact a cohesive group, I believe that the media incidents must be reconsidered. There is no evidence linking any of those incidents to Anonymous as a single group beyond media speculation. Spidern (talk) 19:13, 31 October 2008 (UTC)

I'm not sure that using the title Anonymous (group) means we're taking a position that Anonymous is a cohesive group, or any particular kind of group. The article lead makes it clear that there's no "monolithic" or organized group. I don't see the word "group" as carrying much weight in the direction of cohesiveness. -GTBacchus^(talk) 19:31, 31 October 2008 (UTC)

Maybe not, all I was worried about was first impressions. My single biggest concern in all of this discussion was to eliminate the implicit assumption that Anonymous is a single group. That very idea is being pushed with great force in several circles that I am aware of. However, Enric has a point about sources, so I suppose I will have to abandon the idea at this point. Spidern (talk) 19:39, 31 October 2008 (UTC)

I saw "collective" too, but check the Collective article: "A collective is a group of people who share or are motivated by at least one common issue or interest, or work together on a specific project(s) to achieve a common objective." . On wikitionary wiktionary:collective the nearest meaning is "(grammar): Expressing a collection or aggregate of individuals, by a singular form; as, a collective name or noun, like assembly, army, jury, etc." or "A farm owned by a collection of people.", where wiktionary:Collection would mean "2 Multiple related objects associated as a group." --Enric Naval (talk) 15:32, 1 November 2008 (UTC)

• Even when its not discussing Chanology protesters, the media reports it as a group ("Wired seems to think it was the group Anonymous... - RealtechNews). However, 2 other sources about the Epilepsy attacks called them an "internet collective". Is there any support for a rename to that, or should we follow the majority of the reliable sources and keep it as (group)? DigitalC (talk) 22:22, 31 October 2008 (UTC)

Not sure the media can be trusted on this, they commonly refer to Al-Qaeda as an 'organisation', whereas more academic sourced understand it as an idealogy or movement due to it's lack of organisation. It should be find to represent the views of the media but to rely on it for definition is dodgy in my opinion. However it should be note that disambiguation isnt intended to be informative but nevertheless should be accurate. --neon white talk 00:37, 3 November 2008 (UTC)

WP:TITLE states: "Generally, article naming should prefer what the greatest number of English speakers would most easily recognize, with a reasonable minimum of ambiguity, while at the same time making linking to those articles easy and second nature." WP:V states: The threshold for inclusion in Wikipedia is verifiability, not truth. So, what we need to do is follow the sources, and use what the majority of the sources use, because that is what the "greatest number of English speakers would most easily recognize". DigitalC (talk) 02:38, 3 November 2008 (UTC)

• • Although I have extensive personal experience with Anonymous, I believe that Enric is correct about WP:OR at this point. Unless we can get a larger number of reliable sources which supports the idea of Anonymous as a collective, the status quo should remain. Spidern (talk) 03:55, 1 November 2008 (UTC)

Notability of a lot of this stuff?

A lot of the stuff on this page seems to be pretty weak - apart from the Fox News 11 report and Project Chanology, how much of this is actually relevant? Some of this stuff doesn't even seem to be related to anonymous, such as the assault on the Epilepsy forums. Just because you're on the internet and are anonymous doesn't mean you're Anonymous. Titanium Dragon (talk) 08:53, 30 October 2008 (UTC)

Notability only matters in terms of whether there should be an article or not. However, even so, the Epilepsy forums section makes it clear that it was alleged that Anonymous (not anonymous people) performed the acts. DigitalC (talk) 10:56, 30 October 2008 (UTC)

One quick note: once that there is an article on a topic, you enter into which viewpoints/sources about the topic are more notable and which should get more or less space or even appear at all --Enric Naval (talk) 12:01, 30 October 2008 (UTC)

Anonymous didn't attack the epilepsy forums. It was Ebaumsworld and they keep trying to pin it on us. CompuHacker (talk) 14:12, 30 October 2008 (UTC)

Unfortunately the media reported it that way, whether eBaum's instigated it or not. Because the media reported on the incident, it is notable and should probably be on the Anonymous page detailed here.

(Note: Blaming Ebaumsworld is the favorite pastime of many a young Anonymous.)CompuHacker (talk) 19:23, 30 October 2008 (UTC)

Lol, I think that he didn't get the joke. Of course that poor Ebaums didn't do it :D

Even the ED article http://encyclopediadramatica.com/Epilepsy_Foundation claims that it wasn't scientology. It blames 420chan and then accusses 7chan of stealing the fame for the attack. --Enric Naval (talk) 15:32, 31 October 2008 (UTC)

I don't know that the incident itself, nor the hip-hop incident, are even notable in the first place. People attack websites all the time; its not an uncommon occurrence, and oftentimes there will be a brief bit of reporting in the media then it will die away. Its not really notable. Really, apart from Project Chanology, I'm not sure that much the group has done is notable in any real way. It seems like people are simply adding new, very inconsequential, incidents onto the article; I'm not saying they're being bad, but I don't think this stuff really belongs on Wikipedia. Titanium Dragon (talk) 21:56, 30 October 2008 (UTC)

The epilepsy attack is notable because it was "possibly the first computer attack to inflict physical harm on the victims"[8], and only notable attacks get reported on Wired (notice it's "www.wired", where articles are posted, and not "blog.wired", where minor news get covered in blog format). mind you, it's not an original attack because it was attempted previously by someone else[9], it just appears to be the first *successful* attack

The hip-hop attack appears to be notable too by wikipedia standards, as it got covered on MTV's website and got a note on the NPR's website (the two sources on the article). --Enric Naval (talk) 15:18, 31 October 2008 (UTC)

However, this creates an inextricable link between the protest group under the same name, which to many may appear to cast their actions in a negative light. This is one reason why it is necessary to move this page to a more descriptive disambiguation term; because many people may mistakenly think that the two are somehow part of a larger cohesive group. Spidern (talk) 16:14, 30 October 2008 (UTC)

"Project Chanology" IS Anonymous. They are both the same Anonymous. However, there is no possible way to confirm that reliably or properly source it. Also, I believe that Anon should be labeled a... well, the only way I can describe it is "religion", but it doesn't match up. A group of people that share similar ideas? I don't know. If that helps. CompuHacker (talk) 19:23, 30 October 2008 (UTC)

Chanology may be Anonymous, but Anonymous is not Chanology. They are NOT the same. DigitalC (talk) 22:03, 30 October 2008 (UTC)

I agree with DigitalC. Also, alot of people say they are Anonymous and the name is associated with many different events. However, you cant just label everyone that has said they are Anonymous as one group. TyranaRaptor —Preceding undated comment was added at 08:23, 2 November 2008 (UTC).

I apologize, let me restate that. There are several different types of Anonymous. Habbo raiders, Chanology raiders, Bill O'Reilly raiders, etc. All of them collectively operate and are aware of Anonymous, it's memes, it's culture, etc, but don't all participate in the same activities. Say for example, some might browse ED and operate in Habbo with friends, and some might exclusively use the Partyvan wiki and participate in Chanology activities. I agree with an above comment, Anonymous is a "group of groups", but not because Anons come from all walks of life, but because they are all aware of each other but do different things. I'm working on a better explanation. CompuHacker (talk) 19:57, 2 November 2008 (UTC)

And to note, I beleive blaming eBaumsWorld is also a meme. ViperSnake151 15:29, 12 November 2008 (UTC)

Copyvio - Texas Pool Incident refs

I am removing links to youtube which are copyright violations. The actual links of course can be found in the edit history. I will attempt to turn these into proper cite news references in the next few days (does anyone know the date of these broadcasts?), but my current connection does not allow me to watch the videos, so I can't do it yet. If anyone else feels like fixing them, go for it. DigitalC (talk) 23:30, 31 October 2008 (UTC)

Also popular: dressing as the anti-Scientology protesters Anonymous

• Derrick, Lisa (November 1, 2008). "WeHo's Paucity of Palins Points to Political Drag". The Huffington Post. HuffingtonPost.com, Inc. Retrieved 2008-11-01.

I think it is interesting that "Anonymous" has made it into society in general as a meme to such a degree that dressing up as anti-Scientology "Anonymous" protesters for Halloween as a form of political protest costumes is now commonplace along with costumes of zombies and lingerie models. Cirt (talk) 20:45, 1 November 2008 (UTC)

oh lawd

7chan.org, an imageboard that has been described as a stronghold for Anonymous 10/10 :D 71.176.161.136 (talk) 02:17, 11 November 2008 (UTC)