Is Anonymous The Internet's Most Powerful Mirage? Inside the Hacker World

With Linked In a victim of a major hack this week [http://xfin.tv/LoifJX], it's worth mentioning Parmy Olson and her writings about Anonymous and web hacking in general. As she describes it, she tracks people who are disrupting the world of technology and beyond. "Non-conformists, innovators and agitators" are the "unsung heroes" of her blog, "from innovative entrepreneurs to scientists, to rebellious hackers".

After numerous articles for Forbes, her investigation into the hacker collectives Anonymous and LulzSec, has evolved. She is attempting to tell the bigger story of the global cyber insurgency movement, and its implications for the future of computer security with a book; We Are Anonymous: Inside the Hacker World of LulzSec, Anonymous, and the Global Cyber Insurgency.

Over at Forbes, her most recent article Is Anonymous The Internet's Most Powerful Mirage?  is a continuation of her ongoing series on the topic.
In the piece, she explains why these supporters join in. "Everyone has their own reasons — something to do, the engaging community of people to talk to, the thrill of being part of a secret crowd. Sources in Anonymous that I have spoken to over the last year often speak to a sense of purpose they get from Anonymous, and sometimes the justification to do the subversive, often-illegal things online that they would not otherwise do. It’s mob mentality with a twist — the activist element of protest, twinned with the culture of trolling and exaggeration that runs through image boards like 4chan.
For law enforcement, who happen to chase anarchists with particular zeal in the United States, there isn’t so much a criminal organization to rope in as the mirage of one. No system with leaders and rules, but a culture and etiquette that is changing all the time. Many of the figureheads who organized the Anonymous attacks against Scientology in 2008 have left the community to focus on college or full-time jobs, many happy to break away from the frenetic pace of operations and the constant paranoia about getting doxxed. Those who’ve been arrested are upheld as martyrs within the network, and there are many more who are joining, and who think they can do a better job of hiding from the police.
Anonymous will continue to exist for some time, taking new followers, changing tactics, and often staying one spontaneously-placed step ahead of the police. They’ll fight for the right to their anonymity, to expose other people’s information, or anything they want, and they’ll come and go from the headlines. But these chaotic actors will stick around, and their greatest power will continue to be not their skills or abilities, but the very name that they can invoke."

You can hear Parmy interviewed by Leonard Lopate at the WNYC website:  http://www.wnyc.org/shows/lopate/2012/jun/08/inside-hacker-world-lulzsec-and-anonymous/  





For Extra Credit:  You can read an article by Tim Rogers, at D Magazine.  He has a piece about one of the public faces of the famous internet hacker group, Barrett Brown. Rogers's profile is called “Barrett Brown is Anonymous.”