Anonymous

He wears a white, standard Guy Fawkes mask. He is dressed in a black hoodie that covers his head, loose, ripped pants, and fingerless gloves.

Anonymous is an international network of activists and hacktivists, the individual nodes of which are loosely connected to each other.
They are a decentralized group. Their activities include: online community, hacking, online activism, and anti-internet censorship.
Founded: 2003

The name "Anonymous" itself was inspired by the ability to anonymously comment and perform other actions online, without registration or fear of being identified. This ability was later idealized by imageboards, where users could freely express their opinions without fear of discrimination based on age, gender, or any other characteristics, thanks to anonymity. Since all such comments and messages were tagged with the "anonymous" tag, a humorous interpretation emerged, as if the anonymous person were a real person, which subsequently led to the creation of the meme itself and its initial interpretation as a collective mind.

The concept of "Anonymous" broadly represents the idea of ​​each individual and all together as a nameless collective. It is often noted that the concept is difficult to capture in a definition, but is better described through an aphoristic description of the perceived characteristics of this phenomenon.

Anonymous is the first internet-based superconsciousness. Anonymous is a group in the same sense that a flock of birds is a group. Why do we consider it a group? They're flying in the same direction. At any given moment, some birds may join the flock, leave it, or fly in a completely different direction.

Anonymous is a hacktivist group. One Anonymous representative, who goes by the name "Coldblood," explained his views and the movement's philosophy to The Guardian.

There is an Anonymous motto that has become famous on the internet:

"We are Anonymous. We are Legion. We do not forgive. We do not forget. Wait for us."

Commentators point to parallels between "We are Legion" and the demonic response "My name is Legion" in the New Testament.

Anonymous has no leaders or governing party, but relies on the collective power of individual participants acting in such a way that the combined effect benefits everyone.

"Anyone who wants to can be Anonymous and work toward a specific set of goals... We have a program we all agree on, and we all coordinate our actions, but we all act independently and without any desire for recognition. We simply want to get things done that we feel are important..."

Anonymous is largely composed of users of various imageboards and online forums. Additionally, there are a number of wikis and IRC networks created to overcome some of the limitations of imageboards. These modes of communication are the means by which Anonymous participating in Project Chanology communicates and organizes protests. The "broad coalition of internet dwellers" is connected via the internet and sites such as 4chan, 711chan, Encyclopædia Dramatica, IRC channels, and YouTube. Social networks such as Facebook are used to create groups that mobilize people for real-world protests. Additionally, there are certain resources that help Anonymous coordinate upcoming protests and circumvent some of the restrictions of imageboards.

According to some sources, Anonymous originated on the imageboard 4chan. The movement's historical roots can be traced back to early hacktivist groups such as the Cult of the Dead Cow and Electronic Disturbance Theater.

In January 2011, five hackers from a group called Anonymous were arrested in the UK.

On June 21, 2011, a merger with the hacker group LulzSec was announced, and on July 4, a close affiliation with hackers from The Script Kiddies was announced.

On January 20, 2012, the Slamdance Film Festival in Utah, USA, hosted the premiere of the 93-minute documentary film "We Are Legion: The History of Hacktivism," produced by the American film company Luminant Media. The film tells the story of the creation and current activities of the Anonymous group.

In response to Russia's invasion of Ukraine, the leading international hacker network, Anonymous, declared cyberwar on the Russian government on its Twitter page. They claimed responsibility for DDoS attacks on the website of the Russia Today television channel. The National Coordination Center for Computer Incidents assessed the threat level to Russia's information resources as critical in its bulletin. "On February 28, the websites of major news agencies were hacked. The websites of TASS, Kommersant, Izvestia, Fontanka, and Forbes published appeals to Russian citizens asking them to stop the war in Ukraine.

Project Chanology is a protest organized by Anonymous against the activities of the Church of Scientology.

A protest against anti-piracy and copyright; an attempt to create a "fault-tolerant and open platform for publicly accessible music"; a protest against internet censorship; hacking and DDOS attacks on government servers to protest the closure of Ukraine's largest file-sharing service, EX.UA; the hacking and publication of 5,000 online accounts of members of the Islamic State terrorist group as part of Operation Paris.

Shortly after the Russian invasion of Ukraine began, the group declared cyberwar on Vladimir Putin. Massive attacks were launched on Russian television channels, during which broadcasts were replaced with documentaries showing the bombing of Ukrainian cities.

On March 24, Anonymous reported that the websites of Auchan, Leroy Merlin, and Decathlon, retail chains that had decided not to leave the Russian market following Russia's invasion of Ukraine, had been hacked.