Anonymous: Not So Headless or Immune to Insider Threats
by Scot Terban, infosecisland.comMay 10th 2011
Hello, My name is Hubris...
Well, it seems that the leaderless hive was actually co-opted by a small band of ‘leaders’ who were, by the account of one of their own (Ryan) power and fame hungry.
You don’t say!
Owen -> SmilingDevil: we lost a numbe rof servers last night
SmilingDevil -> owen: :P we need some more security.
Owen -> SmilingDevil: dude
Owen -> SmilingDevil: it forcved level3 to stop announing a /24
Owen -> SmilingDevil: it was in the gbps range
Owen -> SmilingDevil: doom alone got hit with 1 gb
SmilingDevil -> owen: gigabit or gigabyte?
Owen -> SmilingDevil: all leafs went down
Owen -> SmilingDevil: add it all up
Owen -> SmilingDevil: yeah huge
SmilingDevil -> owen: :P we need a hidden irc server for the admins.
SmilingDevil -> owen: that only they know about
Owen -> SmilingDevil: um thats called the hub
Owen -> SmilingDevil: :)
SmilingDevil -> owen: did they take that too?
Owen -> SmilingDevil: but anyhow
Owen -> SmilingDevil: we suffered alot of damage
The events that transpired last weekend with the ‘coup de tat’ as Anonymous called it, do not surprise me whatsoever. Ryan’s taking over of the servers with a small band of followers just proves out my theories about Anonymous not being a truly headless organisation.
In fact, the further fact that a small group has in fact taken over, shows that no action, whether it be militant or social can be carried out effectively by a disparate group of individuals. Every putsch needs a set of leaders and followers.
Anonymous and those who run it either are too naive to understand this, or, they just want to deny it to get people to buy into the propaganda that they are truly an autonomous swarm and are self empowered.
The truth of the matter seems to be playing itself out now for the world to see with this takeover. As the articles out there state, and I have said in the past, there will always be people with keys to the kingdom such as Ryan. An operations manager or admin has to run the systems and maintain them.
These people and those who they work with/for are definitely the biggest insider threats as Ryan has shown. In his case though, he leveraged his knowledge and access he had to overtake other systems, lock them, and effectively damage the Anon network from operating.
It seems that the actual hacks on Sony and the general tone of late from the “collective” (i.e. the core group who pulled off the HBGary hack) had become too much for Ryan and thus he pulled the plug. Frankly, I too have felt that Anonymous had become too big for its own britches of late and was waiting for more federal warrants to ‘van’ the kiddies.
In the end though, it took one of their own to bring them down... Which, seems to me I said before that all it will take is one of the core group to be ‘vanned’ and then become a CI for the Feds to bring the rest of them down. I mean, no one really looks forward to a federal case against them and perhaps pound me in the ass prison do they?
Given the choices, I am sure someone would easily go turncoat and give up names and data to save their own bacon. Perhaps its just a testament to the ineptness on the part of the Feds to not have gotten someone in the box and sweated it out of 'em.
The King is dead! Long live the King!
So, here we are, Anonymous has declared a DOX war on Ryan as of today and Ryan has effectively locked them out and shown them that no one should be trusted with the keys to the kingdom. The insider threat is the highest one.
Always.
While Anonymous’ core group re-groups, one wonders what will happen to this new splinter group that Ryan is setting up. Odds are in my book, that they too will also fall into the same behaviour eventually that Ryan and his pal’s decided they did not like. After all, most of these people are still kids.
Kids with powerful tools and ideas that certainly have changed the game in many ways for corporations and individuals the world over. However, as kids, they lack the experience to adroitly handle all this power that they wield. They take on childish manners and slang, act out, and eventually start the backbiting as seen this weekend.
So how long will it be before thinq_ goes down the same path as Darth Vader as well?
Social Dynamics:
This is all a grand social experiment that is being played out on the Internet for all to see. No matter how many times the groups and their leaders may claim that they are leaderless and a collective, Anonymous will by their very human and social natures, gravitate toward a leadership modality.
We are social animals who for thousands of years have had kings, strong men, and others who lead us. Hell, look at our society today, half the world just went ape over the marriage of royalty in Britain. Clearly, we have some inherent need or desire to be lead. Look as well as the cult of celebrity today. These people are ‘leaders’ if not by thought (because many are dullards) but by style or cool factors (perceived)
Hell, for that matter, we still have a ‘president’ here in the states. A king by any other name really. Sure there are limits to their power, but just take a look at what GWB did during his 8 years and tell me that wasn’t mighty king like. He was after all, “The Decider” Nope, no matter how many times you beat your collective chests and bleat out that you are a swarm, you are all still subject to human nature.
Face it kids.
Wash, Rinse, Repeat:
In the end, I predict that more ‘autonomous’ groups will arise. Each will be a faction unto themselves with de facto leaders that will either start the trend or will emerge later on. Thought leaders, action leaders, charismatic leaders. All of them will have their own agenda’s and eventually, will fall like every king or queen throughout history.
More will rise.. and then fall…
Cross-posted from Krypt3ia
Original Page: https://www.infosecisland.com/blogview/13661-Anonymous-Not-So-Headless-or-Immune-to-Insider-Threats.html
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