Anonymous

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October 18, 2011 | 5:30 PM | By

Hacktivist participation in Occupy protests draw federal attention

Ali Winston

Two demonstrators in Anonymous' favored Guy Fawkes masks speak with a passerby in Downtown San Francisco on August 15, 2011

It’s not just San Francisco and Oakland law enforcement that are interested in the nationwide spin-off protests of Occupy Wall Street. Since demonstrators fed up with financial mismanagement, perceived corporate greed and socioeconomic inequality set up camp in Lower Manhattan on September 17, similar encampments have been set up with varying degrees of success in over eleven hundred cities.

Reports unearthed by the open source website Public Intelligence reveal that the FBI and the Department of Homeland Security are carefully studying the role of the loose-knit hacktivist group Anonymous in the nationwide Occupation movement. Continue reading →

FILED UNDER: Politics, Anonymous, Department of Homeland Security, Federal Bureau of Investigation, Occupy Together, Occupy Wall Street
September 2, 2011 | 3:49 PM | By

AntiSec targets Texas law enforcement as hackers deny Paypal attack

Ali Winston

A pair of medics wearing Guy Fawkes at the August 23rd OpBart protest in San Francisco

On the same day that fourteen alleged members of the hackivist group Anonymous plead not guilty in a San Jose courtroom to a December 2010 attack against Paypal, another closely affiliated group on online hackers claims to have stolen reams of classified police documents from Texas law enforcement agencies as retaliation for the prosecution.

The alleged Anonymous hackers were arrested by the Federal Bureau of Investigation in July under suspicion of participating in a “Denial of Service” attack on Paypal after the online payment site stopped accepting funds for Wikileaks under pressure from the U.S. State Department.

During today’s court hearing, another hacktivist group, AntiSec (short for anti-security), defaced the Association of Texas Police Chiefs’ website and disclosed reams of classified law enforcement information, including the home addresses, telephone numbers, emails and passwords of several police chiefs, warrants, counter-terrorism and narcotics intelligence reports, departmental rosters, information about the Secure Communities program and financial information on law enforcement.

The website for the Association of Texas Police Chiefs was off-line as of 2:15 PM Pacific Time this afternoon.

In a statement included in full after the jump, AntiSec claimed they are acting in the tradition of WikiLeaks by attacking what they claim are racist, anti-immigrant Texas law enforcement agencies. Voicing solidarity with month’s OpBART protests in San Francisco and other recent cyber-attacks on law enforcement, AntiSec called on hackers around the world to “make 2011 the year of hacks and revolutions” by targeting governments, law enforcement, corporate and military targets.

Continue reading →

FILED UNDER: Courts, Anonymous, AntiSec, hacking, Paypal, San Jose, Texas, WikiLeaks
August 30, 2011 | 4:43 PM | By

Justice Department, Homeland Security personnel at #OpBART protests

Geoff King

Officers from a Department of Homeland Security Visible Intermodal Prevention and Response unit in the Civic Center BART station on August 29, 2011.

Amongst the dozens of riot gear-clad San Francisco and BART police officers that have packed Downtown San Francisco streets during the OpBART protests for the past three Mondays, you may have spotted some officers wearing khaki slacks and bulletproof vests, a far cry from the heavy duty helmets and body armor worn by officers from other agencies.

Those lightly-clad officers were part of a Department of Homeland Security Visible Intermodal Prevention and Response (VIPR) unit, an anti-terror unit charged with protecting transportation infrastructure from potential acts of terrorism. VIPR units are run by the Transportation Security Administration. According to the TSA’s website, VIPR teams are terrorism deterrents that “a random, announced, high-visibility surge into a transit agency, in addition to enhancing agency resources during special events.” VIPR teams have been deployed more than 50 times since the program began in 2005, and regularly patrol New York’s Metro North and Long Island Railroad commuter systems. Continue reading →

FILED UNDER: Police, #OpBART, Anonymous, San Francisco, Transportation Security Administration, U.S. Department of Justice, VIPR
August 30, 2011 | 11:25 AM | By

Latest BART protest brings dialogue

Casey Miner

Police block fare gates at Embarcadero station.

By Casey Miner

Last night’s protests against BART police, now in their third week, caused far less disruption than the previous two demonstrations. In its place was what one might call dialogue – at least in isolated pockets.

As promised, a small groups of demonstrators took up posts outside Civic Center station just before 5pm, some wearing their signature Guy Fawkes masks, others kneeling on the ground writing signs with Sharpies.

By 5:30 the demonstration had become a march down Market Street towards the other downtown BART stations. Meanwhile, at Civic Center, several demonstrators lingered to debate with counterprotesters supporting BART police.

Continue reading →

FILED UNDER: Police, Anonymous, BART, BART police
August 29, 2011 | 3:30 PM | By

Roundup: State of the BART vs. Anonymous showdown

dantc

Monday protests at the Civic Center BART continue this week, as Anonymous–the hacker group known for taking on governmental and corporate power–has announced not only a protest this week during tonight’s commute, but next Monday as well. This week, a “counter-protest” of angry commuters is apparently in the works as well. That said, here’s a brief roundup of today’s #OpBART news.

Stay on message.

Trying to wrangle protesters under a manageable banner, Anonymous today asked participants to stay on message–specifically, that these protests began to draw attention to the shooting death of Charles Hill.

Continue reading →

FILED UNDER: Community, Anonymous, BART, BART police
August 26, 2011 | 9:55 AM | By

Protest Mondays? More BART demonstrations in store

Casey Miner

By Casey Miner

Monday night’s anti-BART protests closed two downtown stations during rush hour, for the second week in a row. Yesterday, the BART board took up the issue at a special meeting. “Instead of fixing the situation, we have escalated it to the point of, we don’t know how we’re ever going to get rid of the protestors, because they’re protesting for the right reason,” said BART director Lynette Sweet. “We’re not talking to folks the right way, and we’ve gotta fix that.” KALW’s transportation editor Casey Miner spoke with host Ben Trefny about the latest.

Continue reading →

FILED UNDER: Police, Anonymous, BART, BART police
August 23, 2011 | 11:47 AM | By

Second Anonymous protest closes 2 BART stations, 45 arrested

As promised, the hacktivist group Anonymous returned to Civic Center yesterday for a second rush-hour protest against officer-involved shootings by BART police and the transit agency’s decision to cut cellphone service in Downtown San Francisco stations on August 11th. Last Monday, approximately 200 demonstrators forced BART to close the Embarcadero, Montgomery, Powell and Civic Center Stations for two hours, snarling the evening commute.

Though only Powell and Civic Center stations were shuttered during yesterday’s action, police took a distinctly sterner tone with the protests, arresting four people on the platform of the Civic Center station before declaring an unlawful assembly and forcing roughly 40 protesters and journalists up to the street. The San Francisco Bay Guardian posted video of BART police arresting a woman on the platform of the Civic Center Station. Three more people were arrested in the station for chanting slogans critical of BART and holding a banner.

BART Deputy Police Chief Dan Hartwig said the arrests were made over concerns for public safety and the ability of people to move freely through BART stations.

“That platform is not designed for anything besides waiting for public transportation,” Hartwig said.”We’ve gone out of our way to be accommodating, probably flexible to a fault. It’s our responsibility to maintain a safe environment within this system. We can’t afford to have this be a weekly occurrence.”

Continue reading →

FILED UNDER: Community, #OpBART, Anonymous, BART, BART police, San Francisco, San Francisco Police Department
August 16, 2011 | 5:19 PM | By

Anonymous # OpBART protest closes Downtown San Francisco BART stations

Ali Winston

BART tactical police confront protesters at the entrance of the Embarcadero Station on August 15, 2011

Four downtown BART transit stations were closed during rush hour yesterday by a protest decrying the Bay Area Rapid Transit Authority’s decision to shut down cellphone service last Thursday to avert a potential protest over the July 3rd fatal shooting of Charles Hill by rookie BART Police Officer James Crowell. Dozens of BART and San Francisco Police officers were deployed in riot gear and on motorcycles to keep tabs on the protest, but save from a few baton shoves and a great deal of invective, yesterday’s protest was free of violence.

The protest was called by Anonymous, a loose-knit, transnational hacker collective responsible which has aligned itself with pro-democracy demonstrators in the Middle East and the controversial whistle-blowing website WikiLeaks. Anonymous labeled Monday’s actions #OpBART, sparking a flurry of traffic on the social networking website Twitter.

Continue reading →

FILED UNDER: Community, #OpBART, Anonymous, BART, BART police, Charles Hill, Officer-involved shootings, San Francisco