Anonymous, a Crusading Savior or a Menace to Society?

After the recent takedown of the file sharing website Megaupload, the group known as Anonymous took down CBS.com and Universal Music late last week in retaliation. In a video on YouTube (News - Alert) it also claimed to have access to servers of the United Nations, credit card company Capitol One, U.S. Bank and Chase Bank, as well as popular sites such as YouTube, Facebook (News - Alert), and Twitter. The group claimed if Megaupload was not restored it would shut down all of these servers and sites for 72 hours as retaliation to a violation of the freedom of speech the Internet offers.

Although that did not happen, the group’s next target appears to be social media conglomerate, Facebook. In another YouTube video posted Monday the group published a declaration of war against the United States government in reaction to the proposed Acts to stop online piracy, SOPA and PIPA. According to the video the group was encouraging people to download a linked program that can be used to attack Facebook and the site’s 60,000 servers. Putting the entire company and personal information of its users at risk. However, since the video was released Anonymous has come forward on its active Twitter account denying responsibility for the video and a potential attack against Facebook. The group tweeted this statement in reaction to the accusations:

“Again we must say that we will not attack #Facebook! Again the mass media lie.”

With the possibility of attack on Facebook being an Anonymous splinter group, or another group altogether, it is clear activism through hacking or hacktivism, is becoming a more prominent issue in the online world. Spurring the question what is hacktivism and is it necessary?

“A combination of hacking and social activism, hacktivism is defined as the use of digital tools in pursuit of political ends.”

In a sense, hacktivism is what journalists fight for everyday, freedom of speech and the publics right to information and real facts. It’s important that we hold governments and businesses accountable for their actions and that we challenge them when questionable decisions that affect the public are made, but at what cost? With online hackers able to learn and operate from personal computers and operate through capabilities beyond what these organizations have, it allows them a plethora of information that they should not be privy too. For example, what was once a safe and easily securable environment for government and corporate employees has been replaced by uncertainty. Economic and political impact aside; hacktivism is creating collateral damage that affects people who are innocently affiliated with the organizations hackers are attacking. One former Anonymous member, “SparkyBlaze” can attest to its damages:

“ I feel that it is ok if you are attacking the governments. Getting files and giving them to WikiLeaks, that sort of thing, that does hurt governments. But putting user names and passwords on a pastebin (website that allows users to post text for public consumption) doesn’t [impact governments], and posting the info of people you fight for is just wrong.”

Overall groups like Anonymous seem to fight for a common goal of free speech and equality for all on the Internet, but they fail to realize the problems and hardships they are causing to those who are innocently involved. While taking on global banks and political institutions these groups seem to overlook the fact that there are people’s livelihoods in jeopardy, which, in a way makes them just as morally questionable as the very institutions they seek to hold accountable.