Florida State University Libraries Electronic Theses, Treatises and Dissertations The Graduate School 2013 Examining Hacktivism as Performance Through the Electronic Disturbance Theater and Anonymous Shannon Hurst Follow this and additional works at the FSU Digital Library. For more information, please contact [email protected] FLORIDA STATE UNIVERSITY COLLEGE OF VISUAL ARTS, THEATRE & DANCE EXAMINING HACKTIVISM AS PERFORMANCE THROUGH THE ELECTRONIC DISTURBANCE THEATER AND ANONYMOUS By SHANNON HURST A Thesis submitted to the School of Theatre in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Master of Arts Degree Awarded: Fall Semester, 2013 Shannon Hurst defended this thesis on October 30, 2013. The members of the supervisory committee were: Mary Karen Dahl Professor Directing Thesis Krzystof Salata Committee Member George McConnell Committee Member The Graduate School has verified and approved the above-named committee members, and certifies that the thesis has been approved in accordance with university requirements. ii TABLE OF CONTENTS Abstract .......................................................................................................................................... iv 1. INTRODUCTION ......................................................................................................................1 Background ..........................................................................................................................1 H/ac(k)tivism .......................................................................................................................4 Literature Review and Methodologies ...............................................................................11 Chapter Outlines ................................................................................................................18 2. PERFORMING H/AC(K)TIVISM ...........................................................................................22 Virtual Activism and Protest ..............................................................................................22 [Electronic] Civil Disobedience .........................................................................................24 ECD, Hacktivism, and Performance ..................................................................................33 3. THE ELECTRONIC DISTURBANCE THEATER .................................................................41 Electronic Civil Disobedience in Action ...........................................................................41 A History of the Electronic Disturbance Theater ..............................................................46 The SWARM Project .........................................................................................................50 EDT 2.0: The Transborder Immigrant Tool .....................................................................57 Post-ECD ...........................................................................................................................64 4. ANONYMOUS.........................................................................................................................66 Merging the Virtual and the Physical in Protest ................................................................66 A History of Anonymous ...................................................................................................73 Project Chanology ..............................................................................................................78 Anonymous Occupies Occupy ...........................................................................................86 5. CONCLUSIONS.......................................................................................................................92 APPENDIX A: ANONYMOUS—PROJECT CHANOLOGY VIDEO TRANSCRIPTS ..........94 Message to Scientology .....................................................................................................94 Call to Action .....................................................................................................................95 Code of Conduct ................................................................................................................95 BIBLIOGRAPHY ..........................................................................................................................99 BIOGRAPHICAL SKETCH .......................................................................................................112 iii ABSTRACT In this thesis, I examine how two activist groups--the Electronic Disturbance Theater and Anonymous--have transposed Thoreauvian Civil Disobedience for the virtual realm to explore how this shift of performance space also shifts traditional notions of performance. I further consider how these hacktivists, or hacker-activists, use the dynamic dimensions of cyberspace in a way that allows for interesting intersections of actors and spectators while calling attention to the ethical implications and sociopolitical impacts of their actions. The thesis begins by situating technology in a brief timeline of non-violent activism, establishing the internet as a necessary and useful site of political resistance able to provoke and incite change. Before turning to my objects of study, I take time to distinguish malicious hacking acts from sociopolitical hacktivism acts to highlight the moral and legal ambiguity between the two. To then provide an example of early hacktivist methods, I discuss how the Electronic Disturbance Theater has used technology and the internet in their performances of resistance, the ramifications of their actions, and how hacktivism might evolve alongside the increasing sophistication and complexity of the internet. Finally, I introduce the hacktivist collective known as Anonymous to explore how they have propelled and redefined online activism by incorporating simultaneous physical activism in their performances. iv CHAPTER ONE INTRODUCTION Background My exposure to and fascination with online communities began around the mid-1990s as soon as my family registered for internet service—the kind that used a phone line, the kind that made interesting noises as it connected the computer with some unseen series of tubes, the kind that would take what seemed like an hour to load a website. The first virtual spaces I remember encountering were archives of varying information, from encyclopedias to telephone directories, seemingly dominated by the technologically savvy. Since that time, I have experienced the palpable transfiguration of the internet from an interface used to store and search for data to a powerful tool that is frequently employed by its users to alter both virtual and physical spaces. A substantial increase in its users and their ability to communicate instantaneously has shifted what was once a predominantly textual interface to become a spatialized site with interconnection and interaction previously found only in the physical realm. The internet has become a space that allows not only for text and audience, but for actors as well—and the collaboration of all three. While some may still use the internet only as an archive to store and retrieve data, many artists and activists have increasingly embraced its capabilities for interactivity, utilizing the internet as another site of performance. Some of these artists and activists have since expanded their virtual performance spaces to once again include physical performance spaces and actions, allowing for the inclusion of all the fundamental elements of performance: actors, spectators, text, space, and liveness. Using the internet in this way has permitted it to become a site of performance capable of producing significant real world effects, each holding distinct ethical and 1 political consequences. With the proliferation of virtual and physical communities now using the web as an apparatus to collectively and actively engage in democracy through performances aimed at raising awareness for numerous social justice issues, it is crucial that we shift our understanding of the internet as an archive to include how it is also used as a dynamic performance space capable of both affecting and effecting the physical world. I began visiting one such interactive online community in late 2007. It was not necessarily a place for artists, for activists, or for anyone in particular. Designed and launched in 2003 by fifteen-year-old Christopher Poole, 4chan.org is an image board-type forum where users can visit any of the 591 themed boards—ranging in topic from Papercraft & Origami to Weapons to High Resolution Images—and post their own topic or image for discussion, participate in an active thread (the discussion of a topic in progress), or browse through threads without interacting. All of the activity occurring on 4chan remains anonymous: there is no registration to the site, and its contents and visitor information are not archived or stored.2 Providing a place for visitors with varying interests to engage with each other anonymously is perhaps one of the site‘s most attractive attributes, as they have over seven million monthly users who provide 700,000 posts per day.3 4chan remains in a constant state of flux as threads in each board are simultaneously being introduced, discussed, and forgotten; one study found that the median life of a thread4 on its most popular board, ―Random,‖ 5 lasted only 3.9 minutes.6 Any discussion 1 As of November 2012. 2 Poole, Christopher.