Monday the Internet hacktivist collective known as Anonymous launched a DDoS attack against the U.S. Chamber of Commerce in protest of the Protect IP act, legislation that some fear would impose a new censorship upon the Internet.
As part of #OperationPayback Anonymous is engaged in a cyber campaign protesting proposed federal legislation aimed at preventing copyright infringement. Anonymous fears that the federal powers associated with the Protect IP act could be abused, and used to censor Internet users.
The Protect IP act is backed by movie studios and other large copyright holders. The act would allow the U.S. government to censor Internet content without due process. Not only would the U.S. government be given the direct right of censorship, commercial entities would be allowed to censor content as well.
Anonymous has a history of protesting attempts to censor the Internet by legislation. Anonymous DDoS (distributed denial of service) attacks are conducted via a network of Low Orbit Ion Canons (LOICs). Such attacks constitute an orchestrated attempt to make a computer resource unavailable to its intended user.
The U.S. Chamber of Commerce is a Washington-based, big business lobby. The RIAA, MPAA and other content-heavy businesses are U.S. Chamber of Commerce clients and previous Anonymous targets.
The Anonymous DDoS attacks on the United States Chamber of Commerce are acts of civil disobedience in protest of a potentially draconian bill could allow the Federal government to force ISPs and search engines to censor websites under the guise of "copyright protection."
Anonymous objects to all attempts to censor the Internet.
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