A loosely organised group of hackers has been targeting oppressive regimes and has said this is just the beginning.
Anonymous
Al-Jazeera
".....When a release by WikiLeaks revealed the depravity of just how corrupt and horrid the Tunisian government really was, it prompted Tunisians to step up active dissent and take to the streets en masse for the first time.
In response, a loose network of participants within the international Anonymous protest organisation attacked non-essential government websites - those not providing direct services to Tunisians - at the prompting of our contacts.
Several such sites were replaced with a message of support to the Tunisian people, while others were pushed offline via distributed denial of service (DDoS) attacks, involving thousands of computer users who request large amounts of data from a website simultaneously, overwhelming it.
Other assistance programmes followed, even after the deposed Ben Ali fled the nation that reviled him, with Anonymous and other parties working with Tunisians - both in-country and abroad - to provide the nation's people with the tools and information resources they needed to begin building up new, reasonable political institutions capable of ensuring a freer civic life.
Our "Guide to Protecting the Tunisian Revolution" series - a collaboration between hundreds of veterans of traditional revolutionary movements as well as practitioners of "new activism" - were disseminated both online and in print; aside from tips on safety during confrontation and the like, these also explain how to establish secure yet accessible networks and communications for Tunisians, as well as instructions on establishing neighbourhood syndicates capable of uniting in common cause.
Already, such organisations are being established across Tunisia, just as they will be established elsewhere as the movement proceeds.
The seeds of cyber revolution
Anonymous is a means by which people across the globe can assist in the hard work being performed by the Tunisian people ......
Although we have made great progress in convincing individuals from across the world to join our efforts in Tunisia, other campaigns, such as those taking place in Algeria and Egypt - both of which have seen government websites taken down and/or replaced by Anonymous, more must be done before the movement takes the next step towards a worldwide network capable of perpetual engagement against those who are comfortable with tyranny.
The revolution will be broadcast
Whatever effort is required, such a goal is not only possible, but rather unambitious.
There is a reason, after all, that those of us who have seen the movement up close have dedicated our lives to what it stands for, and have even violated the modern Western taboo of believing in something.
I have been involved with Anonymous in some capacity or another for about six years.
Looking back at my writing over that time, I have found that my predictions, while always enthusiastic, nonetheless turned out to have been conservative; when Australia became the first state to come under attack by this remarkable force, I proposed that we would someday see such allegedly inevitable institutions begin to crumble in the face of their growing irrelevance.
Someday turned out to be this year.
Today, I predict that Anonymous and entities like it will become far more significant over the next few years than is expected by most of our similarly irrelevant pundits - and this will, no doubt, turn out to be just as much of an understatement as anything else that has been written on the subject.
The fact is that the technological infrastructure that allows these movements has been in place for well under a decade - but phenomena such as WikiLeaks and Anonymous have already appeared, expanded, and even become players within the geopolitical environment; others have come about since.
This is the future, whether one approves or not, and the failure on the part of governments and media alike to understand, and contend with the rapid change now afoot, ought to remind everyone concerned why it is that this movement is necessary in the first place."
Anonymous
Al-Jazeera
".....When a release by WikiLeaks revealed the depravity of just how corrupt and horrid the Tunisian government really was, it prompted Tunisians to step up active dissent and take to the streets en masse for the first time.
In response, a loose network of participants within the international Anonymous protest organisation attacked non-essential government websites - those not providing direct services to Tunisians - at the prompting of our contacts.
Several such sites were replaced with a message of support to the Tunisian people, while others were pushed offline via distributed denial of service (DDoS) attacks, involving thousands of computer users who request large amounts of data from a website simultaneously, overwhelming it.
Other assistance programmes followed, even after the deposed Ben Ali fled the nation that reviled him, with Anonymous and other parties working with Tunisians - both in-country and abroad - to provide the nation's people with the tools and information resources they needed to begin building up new, reasonable political institutions capable of ensuring a freer civic life.
Our "Guide to Protecting the Tunisian Revolution" series - a collaboration between hundreds of veterans of traditional revolutionary movements as well as practitioners of "new activism" - were disseminated both online and in print; aside from tips on safety during confrontation and the like, these also explain how to establish secure yet accessible networks and communications for Tunisians, as well as instructions on establishing neighbourhood syndicates capable of uniting in common cause.
Already, such organisations are being established across Tunisia, just as they will be established elsewhere as the movement proceeds.
The seeds of cyber revolution
Anonymous is a means by which people across the globe can assist in the hard work being performed by the Tunisian people ......
Although we have made great progress in convincing individuals from across the world to join our efforts in Tunisia, other campaigns, such as those taking place in Algeria and Egypt - both of which have seen government websites taken down and/or replaced by Anonymous, more must be done before the movement takes the next step towards a worldwide network capable of perpetual engagement against those who are comfortable with tyranny.
The revolution will be broadcast
Whatever effort is required, such a goal is not only possible, but rather unambitious.
There is a reason, after all, that those of us who have seen the movement up close have dedicated our lives to what it stands for, and have even violated the modern Western taboo of believing in something.
I have been involved with Anonymous in some capacity or another for about six years.
Looking back at my writing over that time, I have found that my predictions, while always enthusiastic, nonetheless turned out to have been conservative; when Australia became the first state to come under attack by this remarkable force, I proposed that we would someday see such allegedly inevitable institutions begin to crumble in the face of their growing irrelevance.
Someday turned out to be this year.
Today, I predict that Anonymous and entities like it will become far more significant over the next few years than is expected by most of our similarly irrelevant pundits - and this will, no doubt, turn out to be just as much of an understatement as anything else that has been written on the subject.
The fact is that the technological infrastructure that allows these movements has been in place for well under a decade - but phenomena such as WikiLeaks and Anonymous have already appeared, expanded, and even become players within the geopolitical environment; others have come about since.
This is the future, whether one approves or not, and the failure on the part of governments and media alike to understand, and contend with the rapid change now afoot, ought to remind everyone concerned why it is that this movement is necessary in the first place."
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