It came on a day that Anonymous, a loosely affiliated hacktivist collective, had designated an online “trolling day” against the Islamist fundamentalist group. According to reports from Maryland-based SITE Intelligence Group, social media accounts tied to the pro-IS (Daesh) hacking group, Cyber Caliphate, leaked names and addresses of enlisted US Army and Marines on December 11 and claimed to possess information on 700 more military personnel. Previously, the ICA had released a statement calling Anonymous “idiots” for its declaration of war against the Islamic State. Many of the leaked personal information point to data concerning numerous mid-level military officials, with at least one French lieutenant general, a handful of French colonels, as well as a communications officer for the U.S. Strategic Command (STRATCOM).
Social media users were encouraged to spam Twitter accounts belonging to IS sympathisers with images of goats. In the wake of the November terror attacks in Paris, Anonymous declared “war” on IS and claims to have taken down thousands of social media accounts linked to the jihadist group and the “main messaging forum” used by ISIS, forcing many of its members and supporters into the Deep Web. This release is part of an escalating cyber “war” between Anonymous and ISIS-affiliated hackers, which has mostly taken the form of small spats and defacements. In the mean time, Anonymous has claimed responsibility for taking down the website of US presidential hopeful Donald Trump’s iconic New York City skyscraper. The website for the 68-storey Trump Towers went down for at least an hour on December 11, with the hacking collective saying it was retaliation for his anti-Muslim comments. In the wake of the deadly shootings in San Bernardino, California, the leading candidate for the Republican party’s nomination, Trump called for a blanket ban on Muslims entering the U.S. last week. “Donald Trump, it has come to our attention that you want to ban all Muslims from entering the United States. This policy is going to have a huge impact,” an Anonymous member said in a video posted on YouTube earlier this week. “This is what Isis wants. The more Muslims feel sad, the more Isis feels they can recruit them. “The more the United States appears to be targeting Muslims, not just radical Muslims you can be sure Isis will be putting that on their social media campaign Officials from the U.S. Department of Defense and the French Ministry of Defense have not yet commented on the database release.
