Operation Payback

Operation: Payback is was an ongoing campaign by members of Anonymous against major anti-piracy groups. Staged as a retaliation to many of their ongoing bully-tactic campaigns, they are most well known for staging successful DDoS raids against many large firms including RIAA, MPAA, ACS Law, AFACT, GMLegal, Ministry of Sound, AiPlex, and Gene Simmons.

History

Once upon a time, The Pirate Bay came into existence, and there was good. At last, there was a reason to actually pay for Broadband. Then came along the evil Jew-run copyright firms, and there was war. The RIAA decided to hire the wicked group of knights, AiPlex, to DDoS attack our beloved Pirate Bay. By using the interweb's own weapons against them, the battle lines were drawn. And so came to be Operation: Payback. They drafted this resolution and distributed it across the interwebs.

	“	Anonymous is sick and tired of these corporations seeking to control the internet in their pursuit of profit. Anonymous cannot sit by and do nothing while these organizations stifle the spread of ideas and attack those who wish to exercise their rights to share with others. Anonymous will not just watch while others are attacked. Their servers have been shut down and they will remain so for as long as there is no true freedom of information and data.	„
	— An Open Letter from Anonymous

First Blood

Using LOIC, IRC, and the power of 4chan and Anonymous, Operation:Payback was able to bring the RIAA down for about a day. ‎ This success carried over from the RIAA to MPAA and AiPlex, all suffering heavy downtime as a result of large scale DDOSing, using Hivemind mode LOIC to launch synchronized attacks. Soon after, with the added support gained from their original success, they attacked ACS Law and Daven Portlyons, AFACT, BPI, WebSheriff, DGLegal, and other anti-piracy firms around the globe.

The Raping of ACS Law

The largest casualty of the operation was ACS Law, the law firm responsible for sending out scare letters to Britfags who had their IP addresses mined from various torrent sites... or wherever the shitastic Logistep software (which has been known and proven by the US government to often detect false positives) that they use decided to get them from at that particular time of day. Thanks to the fact that the leet hackers running their website hadn't brushed up on their Computer Science in a while, the group accidentally provided unrestricted access to 3 months worth of email messages, IP lists, and financial statements when they finally managed to poke their heads out of the pile of shit that the LOICs dumped on their servers. All are now freely available on the tubes, in both torrent and direct link form, for your reading pleasure.

Not surprisingly, the emails reveal that the firm's only registered lawyer and main partner, Andrew Crossley, is a greedy douche who couldn't care less about the poor defenseless artists and filmmakers that he claims to protect and is more interested in threatening to sue people almost at random to get the firm out of debt, buying himself a luxury car (a Jeep is fine too), threatening human rights and charity organization Which? with baseless lawsuits for "slander", firing any female employees that wouldn't suck his tiny dick, and arguing with his basement-dwelling ex-wife. Not surprising considering the Solicitors Regulation Authority has come down on his ass twice for "unbefitting conduct" and is about to hand his ass to him a 3rd time at the time of this writing.

(Interesting Fact: The firm does not send letters to people who get their tubes access from TalkTalk and Virgin Media. They wouldn't cooperate with the firm and drop their customers' dox.)

Shortly after, Privacy International, a human rights group that smelled the blood in the water, released a statement saying that it is seeking to pursue legal action against the firm for the numerous breaches of privacy due to the email leaks and the fact that the internet now has a list of a couple thousand people who supposedly use torrent sites to download granny porn. Considering that the only court cases the cockmunchers have won are ones where the defendant failed to appear and even people in the music industry and the House of Lords think they are a bunch of blackmailing scumbags, this doesn't bode well for the firm or Andrew Crossley's bank account. Still don't care now, Crossley?

This backlash also brought Operation:Payback into the global media spotlight.

Successor of ACS: Law? Bring it on!

After the Gallant Macmillan Law firm decided to go the same route as ACS: Law in demanding the disclosure of suspected pirates' identities from ISPs, those involved with Operation: Payback wrote and delivered a public message in the form of a speech on October 2nd, 2010. “ The Gallant Macmillan Law firm has committed many crimes recently, all of them ignored; ignored by everyone except us. We, the people, will not allow this to continue. They have declared themselves our enemies by sending out thousands of blackmailing letters against innocents, seeking compensation for copyright infringements that don't exist.

	“	To make matters worse, they mock the people! They have belittled our previous efforts against ACS: Law in spite of our ability to deliver TRUE justice against them for their crimes! If they desire so much to be the successor to ACS: Law, LET US MAKE THEM SO!	„
	— The People Are Standing Up

Unlike ACS Law's crack team of hackers, GMLegal's web monkeys actually took advantage of the advanced warning and took the main website off of the server before the attack was set to begin. An hour before the LOICs were set to fire, GM's DNS records were changed to point to 127.0.0.1. This was interpreted as an act of surrender and Anonymous continued its reign of packets minutes later with the Ministry of Sound's (GMLegal's client) website.

Ministry of Sound

Ministry of Sound is an independent UK music label that has declared war on file-sharing, working with law firm Gallant Macmillan to mess with the intertubes.

	“	In an apparent effort to stem falling music sales, a fact of life virtually all music producers are dealing with, the MoS focused its energy on the file-sharing community. Did they start an educational program? No. Did they reach out to the community? No. Did they decide to follow the ACS:Law playbook? Yes they did.	„
	—Slyck News

On October 4, Anonymous fought back.

	“	Once the guns started blazing the firm's website went down faster than a crack whore's knickers.	„
	—David Rowley, on Facebook

Needless to say, the Ministry of Sound lost some revenue that day. Moreover, curious fans encountering the downtime discovered that this record label would sooner plug their intertubes with smegma than lose profits.

SGAE SAGE

English-speaking countries are not the only ones beset by evil copyright-touting profit whores. In Spain, the Ministry of Culture and Sociedad General de Autores y Editores decided to get in on the action. Anonymous, being the heroes of justice they are, decided to teach them a lesson. On October 7, 2010, sgae.es came down on its knees a full two hours ahead of schedule, much like a loli in desperate need of a deep dicking.

	“	Paying the government for digital media is ridiculous... The SGAE has as slogan “Believe in culture”, while they restrict new creativity by preventing that creativity is shared. They lobbied this Canon Law, which states that suspected piracy websites can be taken down without a court order.	„
	—Anonymous

In an ensuing shitfit of angst, the Spanish media rickrolled their viewers:

Gene Simmons

Moar info: Gene Simmons

Ironically, while everybody knows him for KISS, Gene Simmons (Real Name: Chaim Witz) is also the supporting father who defended major Bleach plagiarist Nick Simmons. Not to mention a niggerjew.

D-D-D-Dox

You know what to do.

ACS:Law dox

Andrew Jonathan Crossley
Office:
20 Hanover Square
London
W1S 1JY
Phone: +44 20 7193 2493
Fax: +44 20 7990 9099

Source: http://www.acs-law.org.uk/index.php?option=com_contact&view=contact&id=1

Home address and number removed as INCORRECT ANDREW CROSSLEY Thanks

Aiplex dox

Office
Company name: Aiplex Software Pvt. Ltd.
Address: No. 2943/E, 1st floor, Opp Maruthi Mandir,
Service Road, Vijayanagar,
Bangalore - 560 040,
Tel: +91 80 2330 5411/12/13
Mobile: +91 98451 28280
Email: [email protected]
Email: [email protected]
Yellow Pages  listed email: [email protected]
Yellow Pages listed website: http://www.aiplexsoft.com

Sources:

• www.aiplex.com
• http://yellowpages.sulekha.com/bangalore/aiplex-software-pvt-ltd-vijaya-nagar-bangalore_contact-address.htm
• http://www.indianjobtalks.com/forum/showthread.php?t=23028

Facebook : http://www.facebook.com/people/Aiplex-Bangalore-Seo/100000217960163

CEO: Girish Kumar
DOB: 11 December
Age: 37

Hi5: http://www.hi5.com/friend/p356270965--Profile--html
Name Source: http://www.allheadlinenews.com/articles/7019847397?Anti-Piracy%20Company%27s%20Big%20Gun%20Is%20%22Denial%20of%20Service%22%20Attack

Unsorted Related Phone Numbers (either Girish or Aiplex)
91 98 451 28280 (mobile, matches Chronoms info above)
91 97 393 68832 (office, matches Chronoms info above)
91 95 386 66666 (what is this?)

http://www.localindya.com/showmessage/adid/180761.htm

BREIN dox

Managing Director: Tim J Kuik
Siriusdreef 28, Hoofddorp, 2132 WT
Home phone: +31-(0)23 799 7870
Cell phone: +31-(0)6-20395800
Fax number: 31-(0)23-7997720 (business)

• 
  Tim Kuik.
• 
  "LOL WUT"
• 
  Adfail Tim.

MPAA dox

CEO: Anthony Robert Pisano office
Contact Info Los Angeles 15301 Ventura Blvd. 
Building E Sherman Oaks, CA 91403
Phone Number (818) 995-6600

CEO: Anthony Robert "Bob" Pisano home
526 Amalfi Dr Pacific Palisades, CA 90272
Mobile: Possibly (310) 459-6419
Undergraduate: San Jose State Univ
Graduate School: UC Berkeley SOL Boalt Hall, Berkeley CA
Member, California State Bar        1969-Current

Sources:

• http://www.legalforce.com/directory/profile.aspx?mid=6813c837-0a82-4ed8-861c-03c840648b2c
• http://www.linkedin.com/pub/bob-pisano/7/90a/313

Family:
Carolyn J Pisano (Leonard?)
Relationship: wife
Residence: 526 Amalfi Dr Pacific Palisades, CA 90272
Email: [email protected]

Possible facebook: http://www.facebook.com/people/Carolyn-Pisano/100000627795218

Entirely unconfirmed:
Saint John's Leadership

Carolyn J. Pisano: http://www.stjohns.org/body.cfm?id=207 http://www.faqs.org/copyright/concurrent-validity-of-the-leader-behavior-description/

Robert T Pisano
Residence: 26 Amalfi Dr, Pacific Palisades, CA 90272 *unconfirmed
Ph: (310) 459-6419 confirmed
Spouse: Susie Reitman *unconfirmed
Marriage Country: Clark
Marriage date: 1956-2005

• http://search.ancestry.com/cgi-bin/sse.dll?gl=allgs&gsfn=Susie&gsln=Reitman&gss=seo&ghc=20
• http://www.addresses.com/people/Roberto%20Pisano/8
• http://white-pages.phonebook.com/results.php?ReportType=33&aid=6000&refer=1342&qnpa=310&qnpanxx=310459&qnpanxx7=3104596&qnxx=459&qp=4596419&qstation=9641

House:
 * Year Built: 1952
 * Last sold on 2/2/1983 
 * Last assessed at $846,005 on 2009 

1

RIAA dox

We are located at 1025 F ST N.W., 10th Floor, Washington, D.C. 20004. You can contact us at 202/775-0101. [Source: riaa.com]

CEO: Mitchell B Bainwol

• Name Source: http://www.businessinsider.com/2008/8/riaa-ceo-mitch-bainwol-paid-1-5m-a-year-to-sue-crap-out-of-music

$2 million / year salary

Salary Source: http://www.digitalmusicnews.com/stories/070910riaa
Professional History Source: http://www.nndb.com/people/378/000159898/

Wife: Susan J Bainwol

• http://wink.com/p/Mitch-Bainwol-w:11D5517F62
• http://www.123people.co.uk/s/mitch+bainwol/united+states
• http://www.intelius.com/results.php?ReportType=1&searchform=name

Age: 50-54
Office:
1025 F St NW, Fl 10
Washington, DC 20004-1433
(202) 775-0101
Home:
8455 Lee Alan Dr
Fairfax Station, VA 22039-2643
Household: Susan J Bainwol (wife)
(571) 278-8840

Apparently a consultant at CLARK & WEINSTOCK? http://www.clarkandweinstock.com/

Gallery

• 
  Operation's Logo
• 
  Operation:Payback (Limewire)Promotional Flier.
• 
  Operation:Payback Promotional Flier.
• 
  ACS-Law Poster
• 
  First Operation Payback Poster
• 
  Operation Payback DGLegal.com
• 
  Most recent Poster
• 
• 
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• 
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• 
• 

Wikileaks Saga

The Poster

When Anonymous heard the news that Julian Assange was getting buttraped by the FBI and big corporations for releasing their dirty secrets, they couldn't resist giving a hand. Paypal, Amazon and Mastercard soon became a target for canceling Julian's accounts and freezing his money.

Sony

Hacker Geohots hacked the ps3, and Sony got butthurt over it and decided to sue him for over 9000 dollars. Anonymous, being the heroes that they are, decided to stand up for this young lad by taking down Major Sony websites. On the 16th of April, a worldwide protest was held, and Sony shat themselves over it.

See Also

• Wikileaks
• Gene Simmons
• Operations
• RIAA
• Pirate Bay
• Mercedes Haefer

External Links

• 4chan users organize DDoS against MPAA
• ACS:Law could face £500,000 fine for porn list leak
• Op. Payback on TOW

Operation Payback is part of a series on Trolls Visit the Trolls Portal for complete coverage.

Article of the Nao May 13, 2011
Preceded by Faux News	Operation Payback	Succeeded by Rusty Ray