comScore
Uncategorized Thursday, January 19th 2012 at 5:01 pm

Universal, RIAA, FBI, MPAA and Department of Justice Sites Go Down, Anonymous Claims Responsibility

By ( ) Comments

After a noteworthy lack of action on during the SOPA blackouts on January 18th, it seems that Anonymous is springing back into action in response to the federal takedown of MegaUpload and the subsequent arrest and likely extradition of Kim Dotcom. Just hours after the news that the U.S. federal government took down MegaUpload alongside an indictment on piracy charges, Universal.com and Justice.gov have gone down, and a prominent Anonymous affiliated Twitter account is claiming responsibility.

Knowing Anonymous, there is probably more to come both in the way of DDOS attacks and threats toward the federal government, SOPA supporters, and other organizations that have spearheaded copyright infringement lawsuits. More as the story develops.

5:17 P.M. Update: RIAA.org is now down.

5:28 Update 2: and MPAA.org.

5:55 Update 3: Tweets indicate there may be more attacks to come this evening.

7:47 Update 4: Anonymous is reporting FBI.gov as down. Some people report being able to get through, but the site is clearly under a lot of stress.

8:19 Update 5: Now it’s definitely down. FBI.gov, that is. MPAA and RIAA sites are back now though.

Filed Under | • • • • •
  • Alexis from Paris

    Fuuuuuuuuuck them all !

  • drewerd

    it is good to see anon doing something than just messing with people, act more like the internet police defending the rights of the internet

  • http://geekvariety.tumblr.com/ GeekVariety

    Brilliant! 

    Chris Dodd and the rest of his double talking old ass bastard friends can eat a dick! 

  • John Lennon

    Good.

    Censorship is the greatest evil.

  • gmng24

    Ok, now the U.S. government is just trying to piss off as many groups of people as possible…

  • Infernoman1970

    i call bullshit.

  • http://www.facebook.com/people/Joshua-Stephens/1794307346 Joshua Stephens

    This is going to far…. they had no reason to pull mega upload from the internet.
    its about time for change. its OUR VOICES that put them there and i’ll be damn they they think they can do what they want when they want. If they keep pulling stupid tricks like this. there going to be Removed. If they cant Do it right then they should not Do it at all. 

    im tired of our government. im tired of them acting like they Own everything. we have been in the Dark for to long. There afraid why else would they pull a stupid stunt like this. its about time our government realized. We are the voices. we are the ones that do the deciding. There only there because there are to many of us. 

    If they don’t quit acting like a bunch of little Children they don’t deserve to be in charge of our voice. either fix the mistakes and move on to something actually worthy of our cause. naming the fact this time could have been spent on helping us find jobs instead of wasting money on 2 bills that are aimed to hurt us even more.

    If they cant do a better job than this. i say they should be Pulled from there Position.
    there asking for a war. and it will fallow. i see it all to well. they think there safe but they wont be. if they keep acting the way they are

  • Qwertyuiop

    They were just annoying before, but now they’re like a digital Robin Hood and his Merrie Men.

  • Reality

    So the website the government shut down made $175,000,000 in profit by illegally hosting other people’s intellectual property and you see this as a free speech issue.

    You, good sir, are a fucking moron.

  • bigboy2

    I absolutely love it. Censorship is evil.

  • Further Thinking

    There shouldn’t be restrictions on art. Welcome that reality.

  • Jlv2000

    i agree maninstresam media are all liars. If it wasent for the internet i would still be blind. I can now see through the bs.

  • Asreal

    I was beginning to wonder where the hell 4chan were with all this going on.

    Well done folks :D

  • GO GO GO !!!

    Go go go !!

  • Flo

    It’s not art anymore, It’s a business. That’s why it is called the ENTERNTAINMENT INDUSTRY

  • drewerd

    people that get things off the internet arent getting it cause they can they are doing it cause theydont have the funds i remeber when i was ten and borrowed my friends vhs of aladdin youre saying i should be arrested for not paying for my own copy it is the same thing with the internet i live in cali now and i want to share a movie i bought with a friend in florida so i would put it on megaupload to give it to my friend get it now

  • Andrés Bouchez Toríz

    They’re not just hosting other people’s intellectual property or illegal stuff for that matter. There was also the cloud hosting (backups mostly… have you heard about the cloud storage?). You are the moron if you think that a hosting site is only for sharing illegal files.

  • Andrés Bouchez Toríz

    And just because of that particular industry a whole service (it’s not just some other page… this thing is setting a precedent) has to be taken down… Let’s call it business when they start taking down youtube for holding illegal clips or twitter for the illegal links shared… even the url shortener (in some way the store those links too).

  • http://twitter.com/acidragdoll Bel

    MU responds to takedown requests and removes copyrighted material – not as quickly as others might like, but they do it.  Moreover, the peopel arrested were not arrested on US soil.  The issues involved are delicate and complex with far-reaching consequences.  As far as I’m concerned, arresting them and taking the servers down when the service is absolutely NOT exclusively for pirating is definitely an issue of freedom.

  • Maximilian Von Spee

    It would be a different story if they were peddling copyrighted works and charging people money to download them. No, they were allowing people to pay for subscriptions to have faster access to their servers. They didn’t monitor what people were uploading on their servers, and most pirates on the site didn’t pay for access.
    Put that in your pipe and smoke it, you smug bastard.

  • Jackbondnj16

    Fuck anonymous.

  • Jackbondnj16

    Agreed. There must be SOME order in this country.

  • Anonymous

    Even though it was inevitable, is anyone else growing concerned by anons sudden involvement?

    Yesterday’s blackouts were a peaceful if un-subtle protest committed by very reputable and respected sites like Google and Wikipedia. These are the sorts of representations we WANT for “our side” of the argument here – calm voices firmly making statements, spreading awareness and pointing it directly at the people responsible for SOPA and PIPA in an attempt to speak to their senses of logic and practicality.

    Anon performing DDOS takedowns of sites belonging to infamously paranoid companies like Universal, MPAA and the FBI is sending the message to techno-illiterate Judges and lawmakers that SOPA and PIPA are more essential than EVER to stop these ‘cyber-terrorists.’ 

    In this battle of wits between consumer, corporation and federal government, “our side” of the issue is damaged by the actions of anon, even if their hearts are in the right places. 

    Yes, there may come a time for an all out internet war, but now is not the time.
    I know this is the internet and time travels faster here, but going from peaceful protest to all out terrorism (corporation-aimed or otherwise) within the space of only 24 hours is alarming.

    Is anyone else concerned about this, or is it just me?

  • Realitylulz

    @ Reality: Arresting employees for sending links to each other asking for links to pirated content on the site, fine, but in no way should the entire website itself be taken down by the gov. Think if google had to be held responsible for every site it linked to that had pirated content. Just think about if they had to spend the manpower to constantly police this fact. Do you think google would be able to stay afloat? They do what they can right now to cut down links to pirated sources they know of but I believe you are aware of the sheer scale of the internet and how many sites they wouyld have to manually comb through just search for illegal content they linked to. What about social sites for that matter? Facebook, Twitter, Youtube, and Myspace? How many of those do you use on a daily basis btw? Now what if it was the ISPs? What do you think would happen? They DO NOT have the resources to monitor and police everyone that uses their services. Why should they be held responsible if they have a great track record and suddenly they slip up on one or two and compromise everything they had done so far? If you enjoy the internet being a place where you can have a voice and freely share information then look at this for what it really is. Bullshit. Don’t and see the internet degrade to the way North Korea treats its populous…

  • Jonasbroz4eva

    fuck u

  • Jaacam

    This is how it starts mate, they take your rights away little by little, and when you realize what they’re doing, its too late because its been a gradual process going on for months or years

  • Jonasbroz4eva

    There are 175,000,000 people in the world and 1,000,000 of them might be murderers.

    Should we kill all 175,000,000 people to stop the 1,000,000?

    IF you are too dumb to understand the analogy:

    Yes, there was illegal content on Megalupload. They did not put it there, their users did. Megaupload complied with all DMCA and related laws, these fuckers could report the violations to Megaupload and they would be removed in a timely fashion.

    Megaupload was doing what they were supposed to do, given the industry they are involved with. ALL file upload sites function the same way! Will the US shut the all down?

    FUCK THE USA

  • JimTheStripper

    battle for the internet has begun

  • breecherZ0R

    if u dont fuckin like it mofo stop USING THE FUCKIN internet and go
    support SOPA so u cant even express ur own thoughts in the internet without violating copyrights.

    You, good sir, are a victim of propaganda

  • Dragon

    Can Anon also do something about the phone scam form Rachel at card member services?  Now shutting that operation down would be awesome.

  • Athanae

    SOPA supporter spotted.

  • Pornbox1976

    Reality check : theu United states government announced today you do it there way or they will arrest you and biolate all your rights at will. well come to the USSA.

  • Asdf

    suck a dick

  • anonymous

    In LuLz We Trust