Nov 17, 2015

Anonymous can take down 5,000 ISIS twitter accounts – but Twitter can’t?

from RT

Hacktivist group Anonymous has reported that more than 5,500 Twitter accounts belonging to Islamic State have been taken down. It comes after the collective declared a “total war” on the militant group following the Paris attacks.

Tweeting from its #OpParis account, Anonymous stated: “We report that more than 5500 Twitter account (sic) of #ISIS are now #down! #OpParis #Anonymous #ExpectUS.”

[….]

ISIS responded to Anonymous’ video on Monday, calling the hacktivist group “idiots” and offering guidance of ISIS supporters to protect against cyber-attacks.

However, as of Monday, 900 ISIS-related Twitter accounts had already been suspended after Anonymous posted a list of them online.

On Monday, Anonymous said in its video that “the French people are strong than you and will come out of this atrocity even stronger.”

This is not the first time Anonymous has used its skills against ISIS. This year, the group has dismantled some 149 ISIS-linked websites, according to a recent report in Foreign Policy.

The article doesn’t ask why Twitter can’t do what Anonymous alleges it is doing. Or how ISIS has any active social media accounts at all. Maybe RT should remind itself of its own tagline. As Corbyn is pilloried for merely expressing reservation over a domestic “shoot-to-kill” policy against “terrorists” (no one else of course, just them), and as Cameron predictably asks for approval for more airstrike against “ISIS”, there never was there greater need to “question more.”

The talk of western co-operation with Russia over ISIS might be assuaging some doubts right now, but we’d be fools to imagine this is much more than temporary expediency. Once “our boys” are in there in even greater numbers, maybe even including troops on the ground, it’s anyone’s guess what turn events could take. Let’s hope Putin isn’t too lulled by the new “spirit of co-operation.” These are dangerous times.