Police Arrest Five Over Anonymous Attacks

nk497 writes "Five people have been arrested in the UK, accused of taking part in Anonymous' DDOS attacks in support of WikiLeaks. The five men — aged from 15 to 26 — are still being held by police for questioning. Met Police said the investigation was a collaborative effort between forces in the UK, EU and the US."

Re:5 people..,

[YrWrstNtmr]

1. If they run a botnet or two, yes it might
2. And where does it say these 5 were all of them?

Well Duh

[abigsmurf]

The protection this tool offered was designed around the fact that so many people were using it, it'd be impossible to arrest them all. This kinda falls down when there may be 500 Americans on it but just 10 Brits and you're one of the 10.

Also kinda ironic attacking people's freedom to do business with who they want in the name of protecting free speech.

Lame

[MrL0G1C]

So they sit on there arses while billions of pounds of financial cybercrimes are committed, trillions of spam sent, and then arrest some 15 year old for hurling a few packets in the name of free speech - fucking lame.

Re:Lame

[abigsmurf]

Using a tool designed to silence people you disagree with or dislike cannot be described as doing something 'in the name of free speech'.

Re:5 people..,

[CharlyFoxtrot]

They're just kids. Counting the 16 year old they arrested in Holland this makes 6. It's disgusting, there are real crimes being committed out there and here the police are chasing down some misguided pranksters/activivsts.

Re:5 people..,

[RazzleFrog]

Tell the small mom and pop site that uses PayPal to do its business that losing a day or two of income is just a "prank" and not a serious crime.

Age doesn't determine the drawing line between crime and prank.

And there is more than one type of cop in the world. Some go after murderers, some go after embezzlers and some go after cybercriminals.

Re:Well Duh

[thePowerOfGrayskull]

Also kinda ironic attacking people's freedom to do business with who they want in the name of protecting free speech.

The word for that isn't irony, it's hypocrisy.

Re:Well Duh

[HungryHobo]

"Also kinda ironic attacking people's freedom to do business with who they want in the name of protecting free speech."

some people also protest against companies which help repressive governments with things like the censorship in iran and the great firewall of china.
There's no particular irony here.

It disrupts their freedom to do buisness with who they want no more than picketing the entrance to a store disrupts their freedom to do buisness with who they want.

Re:Well Duh

[serviscope_minor]

oh, yes, isn't it so "ironic" that they're attacking business who are complicit in the government's attempt to circumvent the first amendment by pressuring businesses to "voluntarily" do the censorship for them.

Next, you'll be complaining it's kinda ironic that they're attaching the freedom of the government to ride roughshod over the consitition.

My god, the freedom! Where will it ever end!

A DDoS is not helpful

[Sarten-X]

Perhaps with enough publicity from this case, the "members" of Anonymous will realize that throwing a tantrum is not useful activism. Unfortunately, it's more likely that the various police involved will be targeted next, along with their supporters, families, and barbers.

Re:5 people..,

[HungryHobo]

oh the poooooor mom and pop stores.
perhaps they'll be more inclined to instead do buisness with companies which don't attract such... oh hey there's the point of the protest like any other.

any kind of protest will disrupt buisnesses in the local area or which rely on those which are being disrupted.
Think they don't?
tell that to the poor mom and pop store off a road blocked during any big protest.

Re:A sit-in is not helpful

[Obyron]

Perhaps with enough publicity from this case, the "members" of the NAACP will realize that throwing a tantrum is not useful activism. Unfortunately, it's more likely that the various police involved will be targeted next, along with their supporters, families, and barbers.

Re:Well Duh

[abigsmurf]

The businesses did not perform censorship. They have the right to do business with who they want (except if they're covered by discrimination laws). Wikileaks haven't been prevented from saying anything by them.

If I'm a shop keeper and I refuse to put a pro-life or a pro-abortion poster in my window am I engaging in censorship?

Wikileaks can still leak all they want, Visa can come out and say they don't like wikileaks and/or refuse to deal with them.

Re:Lame

[symes]

It was a protest. Short lived, fairly effective (in that it raised awareness of their issue) and no one got hurt. If these same people took to the streets with megaphones, stood outside Barclays and shouted their message out as loudly as they could, most likely the police would turn up and ask them to move along and that would be that. We worry that kids are not engaging in politics and then arrest them when they voice concern - pffft, it is a crazy world.

Re:Well Duh

[HungryHobo]

oh absolutely.
It's not a very effective form of protest unless it gets lots and lots of media attention.

I just get sick of all the idiots in this thread comparing it to firebombing/ram raiding the store because they want to make it sound scary.

it's a poor form of political protest but it is political protest non the less and an utterly non-violent form as no people or property are harmed in any way.

Comment removed

[account_deleted]

Comment removed based on user account deletion

Re:Well Duh

[ToasterMonkey]

"Also kinda ironic attacking people's freedom to do business with who they want in the name of protecting free speech."

some people also protest against companies which help repressive governments with things like the censorship in iran and the great firewall of china.
There's no particular irony here.

It disrupts their freedom to do buisness with who they want no more than picketing the entrance to a store disrupts their freedom to do buisness with who they want.

Except it's illegal to block the entrance/exits.
You've really got to have a screw loose to see DDoS as picketing.

Re:A sit-in is not helpful

[Obyron]

Are you trying to say that transparency of government is not an important enough topic to protest?