The domains of war have expanded over time from land, sea, air, and even to space. In 1995, the United States (U.S.) military added cyber as the fifth dimension of military operations. Insurgent groups operate in all or some of these domains, but with the increasing capabilities of technology enhancing the way humans interact with one another and with the world, a new phenomenon is occurring. The cyber domain has the capacity to affect all other domains. This new domain has caused a change in the way insurgent groups operate. The Islamic State of Iraq and Syria (ISIS) has formed a formidable “media conglomerate” utilizing online social networking systems and Houthi rebels are taking advantage of drone technology. Cyberspace has also allowed for the creation of a new type of insurgent group, a cyber insurgency, which has similar objectives to traditional insurgencies but differ in nature and means of success.
“Anonymous” is a hacktivist group that has disrupted the internet operations of businesses, governments and social groups since they began in 2006. For example, in 2010, Wikileaks released U.S. diplomatic cables, and as a result, the U.S. government pressured Amazon, MasterCard, and Paypal to disrupt the financial operations of Wikileaks. Anonymous defended Wikileaks by initiating a series of distributed denial-of-service (DDoS) attacks under the name “Operation Payback.” The group has also targeted the Swedish, Zimbabwean and Tunisian governments in an effort to promote free speech and open internet borders. On another occasion, Anonymous retaliated against the Tunisian government in early 2011 under the name #OpTunisia in opposition to the president Zine al-Abidine Ben Ali’s censorship of Wikileaks and Tunileaks. In addition to business and government, Anonymous has targeted the Church of Scientology and the Westboro Baptist Church by taking over their websites and phone systems and executing DDoS attacks to disrupt access to their resources. Anonymous is a non-state actor that disrupts operations and seeks to promote the central ideology of an open and free internet. The attacks seek to undermine the legitimacy of various government and business platforms as a response to censorship. The question then remains, is Anonymous an insurgent group?
An insurgency is a political movement by a non-state actor that aims to achieve legitimacy. Insurgent groups work outside of the political system in order to bring about change to the system within a state or region. Bard O’Neill defines insurgency as “a struggle between a non-ruling group and the ruling authorities in which the non-ruling group consciously uses political resources and violence to destroy, reformulate, or sustain the basis of legitimacy.” Anonymous is a movement by a non-ruling group that concentrates around the struggle to achieve a free internet. They are an insurgent group especially because they operate outside of the political system and use political resources specific to cyber to sustain their non-state persona that maintains legitimacy on the internet. Furthermore, although Anonymous does not assert any explicit political goals due to the lack of central governance, their overall aim can be described as the promotion of minimal governance on the web. Their stance towards the government demonstrates that “rather than the overthrow of a government, they seek, in their own words, independence from those governments. But, in truth, that independence is premised on weakening political authority over the cyber domain that Anonymous inhabits.” Paul Rosenweig assesses that the opposition to government interference is a type of political aim which categorizes insurgents. Although Rosenweig’s overall assessments are arguably outdated, he makes a notable point in that cyberspace limits Anonymous. Due to this, Anonymous does not perfectly fit within the definition of insurgency because of the restrictions cyberspace presents when adopting traditional techniques that insurgents employ in the kinetic world.
Anonymous’ techniques demonstrate that cyberspace confines this group but can also share similarities with insurgencies. When Anonymous wants to initiate an attack, unlike most insurgencies, they cannot command an action at will. They follow a three-step cycle to execute a cyberattack. The initiating Anons first recruit people to their cause using an online campaign. The organizers will use communication channels such as Facebook, YouTube and other platforms to rally support for a specific cause. Similar to the recruiting techniques of ISIS, Anonymous posts videos calling people to action and systematically forms networks of online activists to contribute to the attack. After recruitment, the group members initiate the “reconnaissance and application attack phase” in which they gather intelligence on the source and employ software to compromise data stored on end systems implementing methods such as SQL injection attacks or cross site scripting. These methods allow hackers to compromise data on a computer to gather stored information. After the perpetrators harvest the data, the final phase is the DDoS attack stage by employing help from people sympathetic to their cause. Each individual downloads the attack software and begins the coordinated DDoS. Much like a terrorist group, Anonymous uses spectacle as a means to meet their goals. The techniques adopted by Anonymous elucidate the political resources used through the internet to sustain and reformulate the idea of a free internet by attacking any entity that limits this internet ideology.
The question of violence is one attribute that calls into question Anonymous' candidacy for insurgency. Although Anonymous does not pursue traditional violent means, their actions are normatively aggressive in the scope of the domain. When situated within electrical networks, the traditional kinetic violence does not exist. Violence is separate or set apart from other phenomenon as Hannah Arendt expresses, and it is intentional destructive harm to gain. It is separate because those who carry out violence and those who experience it have certain repercussions or safeguards that the government affords them due to the government’s traditional role of a monopoly on violence. Because violence constitutes destructive harming, cyber-attacks are violent when the perpetrator intends to produce harm within the frame of the attack. Anonymous acts in a manner to impair any forces that go against their open internet ideology which encompasses the notion of destructive harming. The agency behind Anonymous’ attacks constitutes violence but not in the traditional sense due to the cyber frame.
Anonymous cannot be completely described as an insurgent group, but this hacktivist group still merits attention because of the damage they can inflict on business and government operations; therefore, a new term is necessary. Anonymous is the old made new; it is a cyber-insurgency. Anonymous uses traditional mechanisms within the scope of its attack domain to achieve political goals. Although it does not go beyond its domain, within the internet, it coordinates attacks and creates chaos as all insurgencies do. The goals of this hacktivist entity are situated in a free internet, so they may not merit the “insurgency” title in the traditional sense, but Anonymous is more than just a cyber threat, this group is a new brand of insurgency namely, a cyber insurgency.