Anonymous Attacked from Within

AnonOps, Anonymous' primary coordination platform, has been attacked by a cell of prominent members who don't agree with how it is currently being administered.

AnonOps consists of an IRC network and some additional services which Anonymous supporters use to communicate with each other and organize operations.

It isn't the only communication channel used by the hacktivist collective, but has been the most used one in recent months, during a time when Anonymous captured the biggest media and public attention since its inception.

A former AnonOps network operator going by the online handle of Ryan, together with several other prominent members have split off from the system's administration seizing some important assets in the process.

The splinter group claims that Anonymous, a self-described leaderless organization, has become too centralised. That central point is AnonOps and the people who run it.

According to Ryan, there are around ten people who pull the strings and decide what gets targeted and when from a secret AnonOps IRC chat room. "There is a hierarchy. All the power, all the DDoS - it's in that channel," he told thinq_.

Ryan and his supporters managed to gain control of AnonOps.ru and AnonOps.net, the network's primary domain names, and DDoSed its IRC servers in order to keep it offline.

Ryan believes that AnonOps should be dismantled and people should find new groups and causes within Anonymous, instead of concentrating in a single place. To convince users to leave he leaked their IP addresses claiming the platform is insecure.

The remaining AnonOps admins don't consider themselves leaders but mere users who have the knowledge and willingness to get involved. "Ryan seems to be mistaking 'leadership' with people who actually get of their ass and do stuff (and not just treating other users with contempt)," they write over at anonops.in, a domain still under their control.

According to the AnonOps administration, some of the network's functionality will probably be restored during the next twelve hours, but there are no details about its extent.