'Hacktivist' group Anonymous goes after child porn websites

After targeting big corporations and government websites in past months, hacktivist group Anonymous is shifting from the "political to moral" hacking activities, and now is crossing paths with child porn websites. The group claimed credit for taking offline some 40 websites used for sharing pedophilia, and posting online the names and data some 1,500 alleged pedophiles using the sites. But it also said it will soon target all firms hosting, promoting or supporting child pornography. "Our demands are simple. Remove all child pornography content from your servers. Refuse to provide hosting services to any website dealing with child pornography. This statement is not just aimed at Freedom Hosting, but everyone on the Internet. It does not matter who you are, if we find you to be hosting, promoting, or supporting child pornography, you will become a target," it said. In a post on Pastebin.com, Anonymous said it noticed a section in "Hidden Wiki" called "Hard Candy," which was dedicated to links to child pornography. "We then removed all links on the website, within five minutes the links were edited back in by an admin," it said. Anonymous also noticed 95 percent of the child pornography listed on the Hidden Wiki shared a digital fingerprint with the shared hosting server at Freedom Hosting. It said Freedom Hosting turned out to be the host of the largest collection of child pornography on the Internet. When warning to remove the illegal content from their server went unheeded, the group "infiltrated" he shared hosting server of Freedom Hosting and shut down services to all clients "due to their lack of action to remove child pornography from their server." The next day, Freedom Hosting installed their backups and restored services to their child pornography clients. It also refused to heed new warnings from Anonymous to stop the activities. "Despite new security features, we once again infiltrated the shared hosting server at Freedom Hosting and stopped service to all clients," it said. Anonymous said the owners and operators at Freedom Hosting are openly supporting child pornography and enabling pedophiles to view innocent children, fueling their issues and putting children at risk of abduction, molestation, rape, and death. "For this, Freedom Hosting has been declared #OpDarknet Enemy Number One," it said. It said taking down Freedom Hosting has eliminated 40+ child pornography websites, including Lolita City, one of the largest child pornography websites to date containing more than 100GB of child pornography. "We will continue to not only crash Freedom Hosting's server, but any other server we find to contain, promote, or support child pornography," it said. Moral outrage A separate article on ZDNet said it has been within Anonymous’ character to go after targets that provoke its ire. "Yet in this instance the group is highlighting a moral sense of outrage and horror most people will relate to – the evil crime of child sexual abuse – while revealing an internet underworld that many will be terrified to learn about for the first time," it said. ZDNet also noted commenters on various forums have remarked that Anonymous’ attacks on Freedom Hosting’s sever are sophisticated in comparison to previous Anonymous campaigns. It said Anonymous then singled out another Hidden Wiki listing, a file-swapping site used by pedophiles called “Lolita City" from which 1,589 names were extracted and published on Pastebin. But ZDNet also noted concerns may emerge about possible interference with law enforcement activity that might already be in place. — LBG, GMA News