In an attempt to punish Scientology for abusing copyright laws and brainwashing of its members, Anonymous launched a series of DDoS attacks to remove the Church from the Internet. It seems, however, like this this is only the beginning.
“We will continue our efforts to bring down Scientology, but we need the help and support of another Freedom fighting community, the pirates.” one of Anonymous’ members told TorrentFreak, and the group gave us the opportunity to ask a couple of more questions.
TorrentFreak: Can you briefly describe what “Project Chanology” is?
Anonymous: Project Chanology is the project to bring down Scientology. Nothing more, nothing less. Why that name? Well, we’re working from IRC ‘Channels’ against ‘Scientology’. Mix those words together and add the project in front, and you have it.
TorrentFreak: How did Anonymous start? and how many people take part in it?
Anonymous: Anonymous is an old group of friends. I don’t exactly know the date, but it has been raised by some friends who wanted to test out their hacking skills. Since then, they created Anonymous, and let it be open for anyone who wants to join. That made it into a new kind of hackers-group. It consists of two spheres. The outer sphere is for new people. They mostly are low-skilled and are “scriptkiddies”. Since they have a very good contact with the inner sphere (we’re all friends fast and easily), anyone is allowed to join the inner sphere of high-level hackers. This is a loose representation since it doesn’t fit always. But, this made it for sure into a group of scriptkiddies with the right tools and high-level hackers with the right skills.
TorrentFreak: What is your main motivation to ban Scientology from the Internet?
Anonymous: Scientology is a malicious organization. Here’s a YouTube clip that proves more. Also, they’re frequently taking off content from the Internet. Like a clip in which Cruise promotes Scientology too much, criticizing health science, etc… it would have brought Scientology in a bad situation. So they took it off all sites with an army of lawyers. This is censoring. This is bad. This is against Net Neutrality. This is taking away our freedom and our right to fight for that freedom.
TorrentFreak: Don’t you think your actions violate the freedom of speech?
Anonymous: It does violate the freedom of speech. Of course, we know that. But there should be a refinement. Anonymous fights for freedom of speech in a way they have always used, but a little bit rougher however. For a greater sake.
TorrentFreak: Do you see any parallels between your fight against Scientology and the conflicts between pirates and the entertainment industry?
Anonymous: Yes. Most of us are pirates too. We have no big money to start lawsuits. But the enemy, the MAFIAA and Scientology are both big companies. They misguide the law, they change the law. Scientology members have infiltrated in many governments. Just like the MAFIAA.
TorrentFreak: What is your ultimate goal for “Operation Chanology”?
Anonymous: Our ultimate goal is to let Scientology say in public that they are misleading many people. And that they are destroying the futures of many people.
TorrentFreak: How do you plan to accomplish this goal, apart from the DDoS attacks?
Anonymous: We have IRL raids in planning stage, we have real life protests and demonstrations coming up. We are infiltrating their networks with zip bombs. We are sentencing them.
TorrentFreak: You told us that you wanted the pirates to help you to free the Internet, how can people help?
Anonymous: People can help Anonymous by joining the IRC, get one of the DDoS tools and start firing the DoS. IRC is at irc.partyvan.org. Channels are #Target , #Lazer and #Xenu. There are also many local channels. They can also help us by joining protests, by telling other people about this, by telling their media, etc… The force of humanity will save many lives.
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Update: As many already argued, it turns out that the person interviewed here is an Anonymous member from the “outer sphere”, who is not as informed as he appeared to be. Sorry.
“I know that I’m not as informed as the inner sphere. However, I had a source which I thought was from there, providing me many answers. He faked his status.
But we do not have one spokesperson. We do not have a leader.
We unite as one, divided by none.
Together, we will bring them down in their glory.
We are Anonymous.
We are Legion.
We do not forgive.
We do not forget.
Expect us.”
