Anonymous - pro-Wikileaks hacker on Radio 4's Today
Steve Bowbrick
Head of Interactive, Radio 3
A rare voice from the internet underground on Today this morning. Cold Blood is a member of the informal alliance of hackers that goes by the name Anonymous. The loosely-coordinated group came together to attack the Church of Scientology's web site in 2008 and is now taking credit for 'Operation Payback' - the attacks on the web sites of organisations withdrawing their services from Wikileaks.
Cold Blood is a twenty two year-old software engineer and, when asked who he admired, named Kevin Mitnick (jailed hacker legend) and Linus Torvalds (originator of the Linux operating system). When asked about his politics, he professed not to know. An intriguing insight into the mind of thecounterculture that supports Wikileaks.
Steve Bowbrick is editor of the Radio 4 blog
- The clip is from this morning's Today programme. Listen to the programme on the Radio 4 web site, follow @R4Today on Twitter and download daily highlights.
- The picture shows members of the anonymous group at an anti-Scientology protest in 2008. It's from the Wikimedia Commons.
- On the BBC News web site, Wikileaks spokesman Kristin Hrafnsson is questioned about the attacks on Mastercard.com and other sites.
- The Guardian's page of Wikileaks coverage and The Telegraph's story about 'Operation Payback'.
