ANONYMOUS issue a warning

I'm not sure that I find a group like ANONYMOUS just as scary as the terrorists. ANONYMOUS answer to nobody, they decide their own targets based on unknown ideals.

Heaven help us

I understood Anonymous's objective to be to take down jihadist websites. Sounds to me as if that might not be a bad idea.

On the other hand, I can't really argue for freedom of speech if I say that.

That is just one of their objectives. Which at this moment may seem a good thing. They are however a guerilla group not controlled by any government and do not comply to any laws. They alone decide who are the wrong doers and who they wish to attack.
If you read their history you will see that they have attacked government and companies in most countries, including the UK, just because they decided it was justified. I seem to remember us fighting world wars to prevent such dictatorships.

Problem is that if they take down the websites it would make it harder for the security services to track the terrorists.

Wouldn't it be good if we could leave the jihadists and the anonymice to hack it out between them and leave the rest of us in peace?

Thank you for the info, pompa. I had never heard of Anonymous until yesterday and the plan to hack into and take down jihadist websites is all I heard. From what you say, they are the same as the jihadists, a law unto themselves, with the one difference (correct me if I am wrong) being that Anonymous isn't going around killing and raping.

I don't know anything about Anonymous but I do know that jihadist websites are full of incitement to hatred and, indeed, murder, so approval of their dismantling doesn't contradict anyone's support of free speech.

That's good. Thanks, absent.

The way they "take down" a site is to flood it with data so that it collapses, the site still exists.

How do you feel when their attacks are closer to home :-

"Working in conjunction with other members of cyber attack group Anonymous, Birchall targeted online payment website Paypal, as well as Mastercard and Visa. One strike against Paypal alone cost the site £3.5 million pounds."

How I feel is that they should be stopped, if possible, from doing illegal things. Just as jihadists should be stopped for illegal incitement to hatred.

I would much prefer that the cyber warfare was under the control of the official security services (not that I trust them to stay within the law, but at least they are accountable to someone)

Yes, that would be ideal. Wish official security services would get on with stopping jihadist death cults from spreading!

Oh God no! Not another wild uncontrollable group on the loose. That is such a bad idea.

I like the idea the USA now have of recruiting hackers.
I know what they do is illegal, and wrong. But they are not going to stop so they may as well be on the Governments' side. Hopefully.
I think that this should have happened decades ago.

Recruiting poachers to be gamekeepers?

Yes
regretable but better than the alternative

Looks like the USA Government could do with a few tips from ANOMYMOUS on how to guard their own websites and social media!

Quite.
Not to mention their defence systems.
But how far do you trust them?
I guess some of them will turn gamekeepers. I dont know how many would.

Hackers are generally very young when they start - even early teens.
And as the world teaches more computers skills in schools from a yonger and younger age, this problem is only going to get worse.

The US government were stupid to threaten Gary McKinnon with imprisonment - they should have offered him a job testing their systems.

He would probably have taken the job as well.

I know someone who is about to go from "bad guy" to "good guy".
I find it a bit mind boggling. Difficult to get my head around it.
But it is best to get these people [mainly guys in my experience] to go legit. And as early as possible.
And if they know they are going to be welcomed as legit, it may stop them getting too "bad" or illegal in the first instance.

The trouble is they mainly start when they are teenagers. And we all know what some teenagers can be like.

Well, if the US consider that man who made the comments about Birmingham and London to be a "terrorist expert", I have little confidence in their ability to make this world a safe place (but then, to be honest, I never did).

After the recent outburst from Anonymous, I don't have any confidence in them either.

I believe we need to behave in a calm and measured way and not rush around hysterically making threats and hurling insults.

In the future I think there is a real danger that hackers will hire themselves out to the highest bidder. Given that so many vital services are run by sophisticated computer programmes, we could increasingly be experiencing "tit-for-tat" cyber attacks that could have devastating effects.

They may hire themselves out to the highest bidder.
Though not sure that other criteria such as the ability of doing it, and even peer admiration mean more to them than money at least in the early stages of them hacking.