The hacktivist collective Anonymous has vowed to retaliate against the makers of Call of Duty: Black Ops 2 after the group was portrayed as terrorists in a trailer for the video game.
A person claiming to speak for Anonymous released a video response to the trailer that was uploaded to YouTube by user ALEXIUS ANON last week, stating that it “will need to take action against [the] company and online servers.”
Anonymous has since posted the personal information of Activision’s CEO Eric Hirshberg on text-sharing website AnonPaste. The group left a small note with the information that begins, “so Activision Why you done goofed? We are not the enemy but, well you want it you got it.”
The leaked information was not overly sensitive, however, containing only contact details and compensation.
The video-game preview briefly shows a person in a Guy Fawkes while a narrator states that hackers could take over the military’s servers and turn the drones against the government and the U.S. civilian population.
“The enemy can be anywhere and can be anyone,” the narrator continues.
The Guy Fawkes mask, which has become a signature of Anonymous, appears at 1:35 in the video below.
While the group itself might not see the contradiction of responding to allegations of terrorism by threatening “damage of millions of dollars” to Activision through server takedowns, the irony was not lost on many YouTube users.
“Wow. Do any of you see how these people are bullies? If someone does something they don’t like, they cause damage to those people,” commented YouTube user IndieSlashFilms2011 on the video. “Appararantly [sic] they don’t like it when people have freedom of the press.”
“Just because you feel misrepresented gives you the right to create a fuss?,” sickness324 added. “I mean, I supported anonymous in the beginning, but now I see that you’re fighting for freedom by opressing the opressors [sic]. But in the end it just creates more oppression. What’s the point? You’re attacking a video game.”
YourAnonNews, the Twitter account that has become a defacto mouthpiece for the group, took the trailer a little less seriously.
“COD Black Ops 2 – If #Anonymous are the bad guys,” the Twitter handle @anonymous tweeted, “it’ll really ruin our gaming experience if we have to shoot ourselves.”
YourAnonNews later added, “If #Anonymous are the bad guys in CoD how will it be an FPS(first person shooter) anymore? We do nawt fight with gunz. We haz lazerz 4 dat.”
Several other Twitter users tied to Anonymous started tweeting with the hashtag #OpPirateAllActivision, a clear call for gamers and hackers to pirate Activision’s products.
Photo by soozafone