IRC Hackers Set Date For Anti-Scientology Protests

www.nbc11.com...

SAN FRANCISCO -- Hackers who launched a massive online attack against the Church of Scientology are now turning to real-world protests to draw attention to what they call a "vast moneymaking scheme under the guise of 'religion."'

The loosely organized group of hackers, who meet up and coordinate attacks through Internet Relay Chat channels, have set Feb. 10 for a wave of protests at Scientology locations worldwide.

In anonymous postings on the group's Web site, organizers said they are trying to raise awareness about the threats to free speech posed by the church's lawyers, who, the group claims, aggressively try to silence critics by threatening lawsuits. The church said its lawyers follow standard procedures for protecting copyrighted materials.

first of all, I have mixed opinions on this. I don't condone going after any one particular religion, however I LOVE the angle they are using. Scientology is known for character assassinations... so now what do they do when they are being attacked by anonymous sources?

This will be interesting to follow. I bet Scientology has a team of hackers trying to figure out the source of all this info.

ahhhhh.... it all fits into place.

Where was tom cruise when the first of the undersea cables were cut?

This message will self destruct in 5...........

ill get my coat

I don't get why some group of hackers are so upset at Scientology. Whether people want to dump change in a bowl, hand over their life savings to some space lord or cut their balls off and drink poison to ride a comet who cares?

It's a free world and people are free to be stupid and other people are free to profit from it. Hell, for all we know the guys who cut their balls off for the comet will get the last laugh.

What does any of this have to do with some hackers? Seems like a ridiculously random thing. Almost cartoonish.

Its good to see someone (or a group of someones) standing up to the CoS, but im concerned that this will give them the angle of a martyr which the will exploit to their full advantage.

Should be interesting to see the CoS' reaction to these protests, if indeed, they are as big as suggested.

we won't have to wait long to see their reaction (as well as their reaction to WHAT!?).

It does give them an out in the context of martyrdom, but it also removes the aggressive defense they are so used to employing.

i don't like how Anonymous is being called a group of "hackers"

it's not really...

in fact, here's a message from Anonymous to clear things up

well seeing how "anonymous" also launched a DoS attack on their servers, it seems reasonable to call them hackers, but whatever.

Besides, this article was about IRC users, not just "anonymous" people. It's also important to point out that the biggest thorns in the side of scientology have been torrents, newsgroup users, youtube videos and other forms of anonymous, online media sharing.

Wouldn't it be great if they would turn their considerable skilz toward something with tangible results?

Like, maybe destroying all the spam bots networks, or pw3ning all the terrorizt websites?

It would be cool to wake up to the headlines:

Legion taps al Zawahiri's sat phone. Posts his GPS location and conversations on live feed over internet.