re: #2 Sergey Romanov

Note that if the claim is true - and it’s hard to see how otherwise the attacks would have been possible - Anon does not simply attack sites (one could argue about the justifications or lack thereof in this case), they actually using the unwitting users’ computers to do it - without the users’ permission.

It’s not possible to stage a DDOS attack against a modern website (like Visa’s or Mastercard’s) without using some kind of botnet. You can’t just get a couple dozen friends to help — that won’t generate anywhere near the kind of high-volume rapid-fire requests you need for a successful DDOS against a distributed server setup.

You’ve identified something that bothers me about these attacks as well. I believe Barrett when he says the people he knows are opposed to using zombie computers and botnets, but I don’t know of any way these attacks could work without using large networks of coordinated computers.