“An eye for an eye.”The day after hundreds of websites voluntarily blacked out in protest of the proposed SOPA and PIPA bills, the U.S. government shut down one of the world’s largest file sharing websites, Megaupload.com due to the site allowing online pirates to swap copyrighted files and cheat the entertainment industry out of a whopping $500 million.
In the crackdown, houses were raided, assets were seized, and four Megaupload employees were arrested and charged with conspiracy to commit racketeering and criminal copyright infringement. Among the group arrested was the founder of Megaupload, Kim Schmitz (aka Kim Dotcom). Authorities are still on the hunt for 3 additional Megaupload employees.
Shortly after word hit that the feds knocked Megaupload offline and passed out handcuffs, Anonymous unleashed a whirlwind of DDoS attacks that killed the sites for the U.S. Justice Department, Motion Picture Association of America (MPAA), Recording Industry Association of American (RIAA), Universal Music Group, and others.
Never shy about their activities, Anonymous posted a series of tweets on Twitter, outlining every step of the DDoS attack and subsequent website failures as they were happening:
Anonymous posted a statement regarding the attacks on Pastebin.
The FBI’s press release related to the takedown of Megaupload can be seen here.
On a side note, if you’re one to follow Anonymous and their controversial activities, Graham Cluley of Sophos warns you to be cautious of clicking links posted by Anonymous on Twitter. While the links may appear to be innocuous, if you follow a link and you have Javascript enabled, you may very well be [unknowingly] participating in a DDoS attack. So, click with caution!
Way to keep things interesting, Anonymous!
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