Inside the Anonymous Army of ‘Hacktivist’ Attackers
by Cassell Bryan-Low and Siobhan Gorman
Wall Street Journal
June 24, 2011
Hoogezand-Sappemeer, Netherlands””In this sleepy Dutch town last December, police burst into the bedroom of 19-year-old Martijn Gonlag as he hurriedly pulled on jeans over his boxer shorts. He was hauled away on suspicion of taking part in cyber attacks by the online group calling itself Anonymous.
Mr. Gonlag admits taking part in several attacks on websites, but he recently had a change of heart as some hackers adopted increasingly aggressive tactics.
“People are starting to grow tired of” the hackers, he said in an interview. “People are also starting to realize that Anonymous is a loose cannon.”
Now he appears to be a target himself. A chat room he hosts faces frequent hack attacks, he says.
Mr. Gonlag’s role reversal provides a glimpse of the unruly hunt-or-be-hunted world underpinning a string of online attacks against major companies and government bodies””incidents that have sparked a digital manhunt by law-enforcement agencies in several countries.
What once was just righteous rabble-rousing by Anonymous in the name of Internet freedom has mutated into more menacing attacks, including by a splinter group of Anonymous called LulzSec, which is alleged to have moved beyond paralyzing websites to breaking in to steal data. Continue reading “Anonymous Hacktivism”