Anonymous Is Back
“We are Anonymous, we are legion, we do not forgive, we do not forget. Expect us.”
A group claiming to be affiliated with hacker collective “Anonymous” calls out the Minneapolis Police Department.
Amid the turmoil of the past week, a powerful and feared group has resurfaced – Anonymous. The hacker collective had been relatively quiet since 2016, but they are speaking out once again after the death of George Floyd and the protests that have followed.
At the height of their hacking, Anonymous attacked government agencies, multibillion-dollar corporations, and even ISIS.
In terms of domestic police brutality, the group has leaked the personal information of officers on multiple occasions. After the shooting of Tamir Rice, a 12-year-old boy with a BB gun in a Cleveland Park, Anonymous shut down the Cleveland city website and released personal details of the officer responsible. A year earlier, similar measures were taken after police killed 2 people by firing 137 bullets at their car, also in Cleveland.
Now, Anonymous has emerged from years of relative silence ready to take action. In the wake of the death of George Floyd at the hands of police, they have attacked the MPD stating, “Unfortunately, we do not trust your organization to carry out justice, so we will be exposing your many crimes to the world.” Anonymous was allegedly involved in the process of taking down the Minneapolis PD’s website on May 30th and has vowed to continue their cyber-attacks if change doesn’t come soon.
The group has targeted Donald Trump, Jeffery Epstein, and other high profile figures by posting and reposting information to expose them. Over Twitter, they released documents that proved Trump and Epstein were involved in a lawsuit regarding child rape and sex trafficking.
The collective tweeted, “What does Epstein have to do with Black Lives Matter? it’s a testament to the impunity given to those in power that believe that we are property they can sell & destroy as they please. Their impunity is why they murder black people and traffick children. We can all stop them.”
They also released information that blames The Royal Family for being involved with the death of Princess Diana.
Many of the tweets where they are “exposing” different powerful individuals appear to have been deleted, but most of them have been screenshotted and spread around the internet. As of currently, none of the people that they have exposed have acknowledged the collective of hackers.
The action that Anonymous takes in instances where they see injustice is certainly impactful, but there is one confusing aspect of the “organization”. It is not an organization at all. They have been very clear that they are a decentralized group of hackers with no true leadership, simply an ideology. This may minimize some of the credibility of the group, as anyone can claim to be them and act out in their name. It is impossible to tell how many people are active members of Anonymous, but their crowd of voices demands to be heard.
It will be interesting to see what this group will be able to accomplish in the future. Only time will tell whether or not the information that they expose will help to further the movement against systemic racism and certain powerful figures. As of now, seemingly no one knows what the collective is truly capable of.
Emma Scott is in 10th grade and this is her first year writing for NAEye. Outside of school, she likes arguing with people at speech and debate tournaments...
Quinn Volpe is a sophomore and this is her first year on the NAEye Staff. She likes music, political activism, volunteering, writing, cheese ravioli, and...