Tuesday, May 22, 2012

Anonymous at it again

One of my earlier posts dealt with thepiratebay.org being shut down in the UK and now the hacker group known as Anonymous is aiming its efforts at India's government for shutting down several torrent sites.  according to BBC , Anonymous has attacked several of India's government websites including their supreme court and websites for political parties by overloading them with data.  They also attack a site belonging to a an anti piracy company that blocked sites like Vimeo.  With the current trend of government attempts to control the internet in our own country with bills such as SOPA and CISPA, there is a very real danger that these attempts to control the internet will continue to grow.
It is groups like Anonymous that have been bringing attention to these particular issues and the dangers of government attempts to silence and censor the people.  The idea of censorship affects media since it has existed and with new forms of media such as the internet the question of who owns media and who controls it has become more relevant then ever with copyrighted materials being used millions of times a day to create new things.

1 comment:

  1. Anonymous is certainly an important part of digital journalism, since it not only is an aspect of digital culture that journalists cover but a force that actually shapes what online readers perceive as news and publicizes stories about technology, finance, and government regulation that were previously under-covered. You could make this story about hacktivism more effective, however, by organizing story elements more and focusing on telling the details of the India story in ways that engage the reader with description, narrative, or commentary.

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