Anonymous

One of the largest and well known groups of hidden identities goes by “Anonymous”. The group is known for hacking and shutting down multiple websites, relating to the government, major corporations, and religious groups. They do do not have any set guidelines, they do whatever they want and whenever they want, whether it’s hacking into accounts to steal money or rebeling against the governtment propoganda. They began in 2003 and did mediocre pranks that got them large critism from the media. But in 2008 they caught the medias attention by campaigning against the Church of Scientology. They had multiple DDoS attacks on the Church’s website and sent black faxes to waste all their ink catidges. [ i ] In 2010, they attacked multiple websites of large companies like VISA, Mastercard, and Amazon. The anonymous group claims that they do whatever they want whether the public views it as good or bad, but they always have a reason for their actions. Anonymous has grown into such a large group that they have even more groups associated with them such as LulzSec and Operation AntiSec which have also targeted the government and specific media groups. Since the groups power has been recognized and they gained large numbers, they started holding rallies (in person) around the world for protesting and are well known to wear the iconic Guy Fawkes mask to keep their identity hidden. Anonymous takes their hidden identity very seriously, for instance when an Internet security company named HPGary threatened to disclose the members of the group to the FBI, they took action immedieatly. After hacking the firms website, they proceeded by retaining thousands of private e-amils and posting a message on the company website. [ ii ] The group has gained the most admirers from it’s campaign against ISIS.  They hacked and actively took down websites relating to the spread of propoganda with terrorism, the group claims that they are against injustice. Most recently, the group has involved itself in taking down the Trump Towers website after Donald Trumps remarks on Muslim immigrants in the USA. The group has been involved in many contriversal situations with members from all over the world. In 2012, Anonymous was claimed as one of the “100 most influential people” in the world by Time news magazine. Most catfish situations are looked at negatively but Anonymous  has done some good for the use of false identities.

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[i] Raza, Ali (January 25, 2016). The Anonymous Group: What is it and How big is it. Retrieved from https://www.hackread.com/anonymous-group-what-is-it-and-how-big-is-it/

[ii]Sands, Geneva (March 19, 2016). What to Know About the Worldwide Hacker Group ‘Anonymous’. Retrieved from http://abcnews.go.com/US/worldwide-hacker-group-anonymous/story?id=37761302

Psychological Reasons Behind Catfishing

To generally go over the psychological reasons behind catfishing, many people often wonder the reasons why someone would catfish another person. Catfishing is very manipulative and often times the catfish feels guilty emotions later on for using lies to trick another person into such a vulnerable position. There are many reasons that stem into the idea of deciding to make a fake identity, one of them being just out of loneliness. Someone may be really self-conscious but seeking a form of human connection that they believe they can’t get unless they pose as someone else. They may not be confident in their appearance and use a better looking person as bait to attract.  Social anxiety is another common issue associated with catfishing, the person may feel more comfortable with hiding behind a screen and using a mask to socialize with others. Another reason why someone may catifish is wanting to contact someone they already know to see how they would react to talking to a new person. This has be done for instance to test if their boyfriend/girlfriend is loyal or to stay connected with someone that is distancing himself or herself away from the real person. Of course from an outside perspective this is pointless behavior because a relationship without trust is unhealthy and if someone does not want to associate with you anymore you shouldn’t force a connection. But to a catfish this is not comprehendible with their selfish needs to please themselves. Negative emotions such as anger from being rejected may be associated as well for the reason people catfish. Many feel the need to seek revenge on someone that may have done them wrong so they create a fake profile in order to mess with them on an emotional basis or seek materialistic things. The non-typical reason why someone would be a catfish is out of boredom. They created a fake account just as a form of entertainment because it brings them excitement to see how someone would talk to them thinking that they’re someone else or this may be the case of being a pathological liar. Once it gets to a certain point where the receiver wants to meet up, they feel uncomfortable admitting that they aren’t the person that they acted as. There have been many serious cases of making fake profiles used to cyber bully. An example of this was the John Doe case. Four Illinois teenagers from his high school created a Facebook Profile used to impersonate him. They used many of his pictures on the profile and added a lot of friends from school to make it seem legit. The students that were running this page made very vulgar and racist posts to make John look bad. This page was so believable that even a football recruiter for a college that was considering him raised concern about this page. Doe suffered from sever emotional distress and since then the profile has been removed and law charges have been made. [ i ] Catfishing has been taken more seriously over the years and laws have been enforced on those that take is lightly.

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[i] Liebelt, Jim (Sepetember 29, 2009). Cypberbullying: Four Teens Sued for Creating Fake Facebook Profile. Retrieved from http://www.crosswalk.com/blogs/liebelt/cyberbullying-four-teens-sued-for-creating-fake-facebook-profile-11609103.html

Catfishing Used for Scamming

When people hear the word “catfish” the first thing they often associate it with is online dating, but there are many more reasons why people create a false identity. For instance, it is used for scamming such as the well known “Nigerian Prince” scam. This scam has been e-mailed around thousands of times, since the first years of when e-mail existed.  In fact, it is highly likely that you received some variation of the e-mail at a point unless it went straight to your spam folder. The sender impersonates himself as a wealthy ambassador or member of foreign royalty. After making a formal introduction, he offers a big reward if you help move millions of dollars from his homeland into your bank account. Word play is used to deceive the reader to feel convinced and encouraged to believe the deception. He proceeds by asking to send your banking info as quickly as possible to pressure the recipient even more. This may seem like something hard to believe that someone can fall for but it happens quite often, just as much as people fall for online-dating profiles. Of course over the years, we are more educated and informed of such frauds and therefore are less gullible to such lies. This scam is also now known as “419” or the “Advance Fee Fraud” scheme and millions of e-mails are sent each year. [ i ] Another common scam is called the “Russian Brides Scam” where someone impersonates living in Russia and is looking to marry someone from America. After talking and romancing the other for a decent amount of time, they proceed to ask for favours regarding money. In some cases they contact you and then once they feel the receiver is hooked and has caught feelings, they will disappear. Not long after they disappear, they reappear only to tell you that they’ve been in a accident and are in desperate need of financial help. There have been countless situations that someone popular on the web has been contacted by multiple people that claim their images were used to impersonate them and that they sent money to them. People can be very manipulated when it comes to emotional play of words. Both of these scam examples are related to guilt tripping and psychologically manipulating the receiver to trust the sender. Catfishing is commonly used to gain something from someone. It is important to never trust someone with your banking info until you have met them in person or they provide sufficient evidence that they are real.

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[i] O'Neil, Lauren (November 7, 2013). 'Nigerian Prince' email scam actually 200 years old. Retrieved from http://www.cbc.ca/newsblogs/yourcommunity/2013/11/nigerian-prince-email-scam-actually-200-years-old.html