Some members of the hactivist collective Anonymous announced late Thursday on Twitter that they’re adding a new tool to their online arsenal.
The new tool, simply called #Ref#Ref, alludes to the way that the script works. It exploits a vulnerability in servers that causes the servers to refresh over and over again in rapid succession until the server freezes or crashes.
One Anonymous member described it this way: “Imagine giving a large beast a simple carrot, [and then] watching the beast choke itself to death.”
The group has already said that it’s tested the script against a number of targets, including Wikileaks and programming code-storage site Pastebin to prove to themselves that it works, and apparently it does.
The group has been talking about it for months, and the Department of Homeland Security has issued a warning about its imminent release.
The release of the tool is timed to coincide with a sit-in this Saturday on Wall Street and in other cities around the country and around the world to protest the government’s domination by “big banks” and big business.
Members of the collective want 20,000 people to show up on Wall Street and to camp out until President Obama forms a commission to examine the influence of money in Washington.
The group says that it’s taking its inspiration from the protestors and participants in the Middle East, and elsewhere.
“Like our brothers and sisters in Egypt, Greece, Spain, and Iceland, we plan to use the revolutionary Arab Spring tactic of mass occupation to restore democracy in America. We also encourage the use of nonviolence to achieve our ends and maximize the safety of all participants,” reads the organizers’ copy on its web site.
