As the battle between those who are bound and determined to protect intellectual property (IP) and those who want free reign over the Internet continues to make the news as reports of the Anonymous group lashing out against the potential Protect IP bill hit the wires. In their latest strike against perceived injustices went after the United State Chamber of Commerce’s site.
Currently, the US Chamber of Commerce’s site is having intermittent success, the latest Anonymous attack was successful in one thing: disrupting the functionality of the site in question. The question is, does this kind of mischief help the causes Anonymous so readily defends or does it make it worse? It’s not like Anonymous’ attacks are going to endear the group to the lawmakers who want to leave a footprint of control on the Internet.
Is a DDOS attack really going to make Senator Patrick Leahy rethink his position on the Protect IP bill? Incredibly doubtful.
Nevertheless, Anonymous continued their strategy, which they outlined in the following video:
They also followed through with their threats, regardless if their desires are met, and the attack was indeed successful. The US Government uses Drupal? Who knew?
While it may be easy to get behind such shenanigans, the question remains, does Anonymous’ website attack strategy help in relation to meeting their “demands?” Considering the Big Brother approach the U.S. Government is adopting concerning telecommunications, one would think such mischief would only make things worse, while leaving the opposition embattled, determined to nip such behavior in the bud. I’m surprised the RIAA hasn’t tried to plant “stolen files” on Anonymous members’ computers in an effort to facilitate their response. I guess that’s why the group calls themselves “Anonymous.”
In other news, considering Anonymous actually targeted a government institution, it’s also surprising the lawmakers in question don’t put pressure on Twitter to out the identity of at least the person running the group’s Twitter account, targeting posts like this one. Would they even need warrants to do so? In today’s world, it’s really hard to tell.
