Anonymous Indonesia set to attack Australia again, gets warned by Australian Anonymous

(Update: Indonesian hackers have brought down Australia Secret Intelligence Service’s (ASIS) website. The hackers originally targeted Australian Security Intelligence Organisation (ASIO), but changed their target to ASIS instead.

ASIS focuses on monitoring and gathering intelligence outside Australia while ASIO does the same thing but within Australia.

It’s been about a week after Anonymous Indonesia’s massive cyber attack on Australia happened. The attack – which is done to protest Australia’s alleged spying effort on Indonesia – targeted and defaced over 170 random Australian sites. No Australian government sites reportedly got taken down during that incident.

Indonesian citizens’ responses towards this action has been mixed. Furthermore, several additional developments are shedding light on Anonymous’ grassroots, almost chaotic nature.

Dissension within Indonesian hackers

The Anonymous sub-collective in Indonesia – together with Anonymous groups in other countries – tried to hold a mass gathering of hackers on November 5 during Guy Fawkes Day. Though it had some setbacks, the stunt got the attention of a local TV channel, and it got a hacker group called “Java Cyber Army” to talk on televison.

However, other local hackers didn’t seem to like that somebody claiming to be part of Anonymous appearing “non-anonymously” on TV, and received popularity because of it. Java Cyber Army’s website then got hacked and is still down at the time of writing.

Indonesian hackers get criticism from fellow citizens, Anonymous Australia for hacking innocents

Among the 170 Australian sites hacked last week, there are NGOs like Children’s Tumour Foundation of Australia and The Freedom Project that also got into the cross-fire. This drew criticisms from Indonesian citizens who urged the hackers to direct their rage to the responsible parties: the Australian government and spy agency ASIO.

Anonymous Australia, which started the #OpAustralia hashtag, reached out to Indonesian hackers with a video. The former asked Indonesian hackers to leave innocent people alone and fight the Australian government together. If Indonesian hackers still persist on hacking citizen sites, Anonymous Australia says they will “feel the full wrath of our fellow legion.”