Operation Earl Grey

"Anonymous" soccer mom

In late July 2010, a picture depicting a well-known Anonymous slogan being used by the Oregon Tea Party appeared on reddit. The slogan was the classic "We are Anonymous, We are Legion, We do not forgive, We do not forget" line. Soon afterwards, Oregon soccer mom tea party members were seen bearing signs emblazoned with the slogan.

While it's ironic that a group of irate conservative American NORPS would even want to be associated with a slogan that carries with it a stigma of cyber bullies, the phrase happened to be valuable intellectual property of Anonymous, some of whom were offended enough to attack the Oregon Tea Party in retaliation, running raids dubbed "Operation Earl Grey" and "Operation Teabag."

Conspiracy?

Some have claimed that this is a clever Tea Party attempt at turning channers into a political activism machine. However, the July 22nd Google Cache of the Oregon Tea Party profile on teapartypatriots clearly shows otherwise. They also admitted to stealing the slogan and tried to placate the angry mob by straight up brown-nosing, praising Anon's tactics and resourcefulness, as shown: "Anonymous: we appreciate your resources and admire your tactics. You have taught us more than you know. As you requested, we are no longer using the Anonymous quote."

Victory Through Spam

Partyvan.info were the first to attack the tea partiers. The primary strategy consisted of spamming "DESU" all over the Oregon Tea Party's Facebook page. In response, the Oregon Tea Party went invite only and effectively killed Anonymous' ability to do any attacks or trolling on Facebook. Recognizing their own success, the tea partiers went friends-only across the board, on every website and profile that could have anything to do with them.

The Story in Pictures

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  After claiming responsibility...
• 
  ...DESU bombing begins...
• 
  ...the Tea Party declare war on Anon...
• 
  ...before backtracking.

What Anonymous Wanted

The main goal of Operation Earl Grey was nothing more unusual than to get the tea party members to screw up and do funny stuff. Anonymous claimed with the usual highfalutin bravado that it was on a holy mission to punish the Oregon Tea Party for copyright theft and breach of "rules one and two."

Real Results in 90 Days or Less: Dox

Somehow, the trolls managed to get the personal information for a public figure. Geoff Ludt is the "organizer" of the Oregon Tea Party, and as such is the main target for Anonymous' hatred. They found his email addresses ([email protected], [email protected]), personal website, full name (Geoffrey Lewis Ludt), phone numbers ((503) 329-6932 (work), 503-320-4399, 503-320-8458, 301-302-4539 (tea party official)), home address (231 88th Ave., Portland, OR 97216), place of business (Ludt Violin Co., 10244 SW Taylor St. Portland, OR 97225-7058), date of birth (1973-11-12), and history of donations to Presidential candidates ($220 to Mike Huckabee in 2008).

Past History

• • Systems and Accounting at My Smilin' Violin
  • Internet Sales Manager at Thomason Toyota
  • Investment Management Analyst - Consulting Group at Smith Barney

• Education
  • Portland State University - School of Business BS , Business - Finance , 2000 — 2003
  • Portland State University BS , History , 1992 — 1998
  • Tau Kappa Epsilon, ASPSU, Student Resource Center, The Daily Vanguard

• Current projects:

1. snosseL.com -- snosseL's mission is to create and distribute the most useful education service support systems in the world. In short, snosseL is “business, for teachers”.
2. Ludt Violin Co. dba My Smilin' Violin -- Ongoing marketing, systems integration, and accounting.
3. flashcards -- my oldest daughter needs to work on math.

• Past projects (1-3 years ago):

1. MySmilinViolin.com -- Registration and transaction processor development.
2. Ludt Violin Co. dba My Smilin' Violin -- Implementation of accounting software, design and implementation of stakeholder database.

• Past projects (3+ years ago)

1. Smith Barney -- automation of "Investment Management Analysis" reporting.

Geoffrey Ludt’s Specialties:

1. Business planning, process flow, wire-framing, out-sourcing, home-sourcing, finance and accounting.

Tom Cox (Oregon Tea Party media liaison)

Dox

• Name: Tom Cox
• Phone: 503-616-2865
• Email: [email protected]
• Website: http://anonym.to/http://www.mysmilinviolin.com

Quotes

“	Does anyone else find it disturbing that the Tea Party, which bills itself as a legitimate voice of conservative political dissent in the United States, "admires" the tactics of Anonymous?	„
—Andy Chalk

“	We will not be intimidated by you basement dwellers. The logo stays and we will deal with you here and on on our other websites if need be and will prevail in the end.	„
—Tea Party Oregon

Gallery

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  Anonymous' ruse to direct tea partiers to "truthier" sites

See Also

• Tea Party

External Links

• Partyvan: Operation Teabag
• 711chan raid thread
• Story: Tea Party Rips Off 4chan
• Anon Punishes Oregon Tea Party
• Teabaggers stealing slogans for the lulz
• Portland Tea Party
• Oregon Tea Party
• Geoffrey Ludt at Tea Party Patriots
• Oregon Tea Party twitter
• New Facebook!

Operation Earl Grey is part of a series on Chans Visit the Chans Portal for complete coverage.

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

Featured article August 8, 2010
Preceded by Spaghettios	Operation Earl Grey	Succeeded by Inception