Tag Archive for: #OpParis

“Who’s ISIS?” Anonymous’ #OpParis campaign against Islamic State goes awry

The Twitter account of Anonymous’ #OpParis anti-ISIS operation has made some extraordinary claims about its impact—many of which are now being questioned or outright discredited.

A group associated with the Anonymous hacktivist movement launched what they claimed was a “total war” against the Islamic State (also known as ISIS or Daesh), encouraging people to join in an effort allegedly targeting social media accounts associated with the terror organization in response to the attacks in Paris a week ago. Multiple “ops” have been launched in an attempt to crowdsource efforts to disrupt ISIS social media and even hack its members. But there has also been a rash of accusations between those associated with different operations, and it’s not clear that any of them are achieving anything other than drawing attention to Anonymous again.

Seriously, after #OpISIS there have been too many fame whores. It’s not about the follows or RTs. It’s about the truth. Have some integrity.

— Anonymous (@GroupAnon) November 22, 2015

In a video release, self-proclaimed members of #OpParis announced that they had taken down 20,000 Twitter accounts associated with ISIS. Individuals associated with the operation also claim to have alerted law enforcement to planned ISIS attacks in the US and Paris.

However, many of the accounts targeted by an automated Twitter reporting script that the group has distributed via links from its chat channel have nothing to do with the Islamic State. And the FBI has discounted that information, releasing a statement that “we do not have specific or credible information of an attack at this time.” The US attack claimed to have been uncovered by Anonymous members was allegedly targeting a WWE wrestling event in Atlanta tonight.

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