by Nicholas DykeOperation Payback also known as 'Operation: Payback is a B*tch' was a long series of DDoS (distributed denial-of-service) attack organized mostly by the users of the image board 4chan using the moniker Anonymous. This had two main sections to it, started during September 2010 and the other in December 2010.
A bit of background information of the source of all this first though, 4chan the website all this started on is an extremely well known image board, which works a lot like an internet forum. All users are anonymous which is also the name they typically give the users as a whole, due to this anonymity the website is known for being full of trolls, griefers, etc. who hold the general view that nothing is a taboo target for insults and attack (besides perhaps cats). This is especially true of /b/ the random board in the site who have also earned themselves a bit of a reputation as internet vigilantes.
The movement was in response to the DDos attack carried out by an Indian company by the name of Aiplex Software, hired by various large media companies to attempt to take down torrenting sites such as 'The Pirate Bay'. After learning of this attack 4chan users began to set up their own plans of attack, using the image board, IRC, twitter, and its own website with Aiplex itself and the 'Motion Picture Association of America' as targets. The attack on the sites was successful with both sites down for about a day.
After this first success the movement decided to continue, taking down websites they disagree with as well as other culprits attacking the Pirate Bay. Targets include; MPAA again, Aiplex again, RIAA, the 'British Phonographic Industry, MPAA yet again, and ACS Law. Early November they attacked the 'United States Copyright Office' as an attack against copyright in general, this move lead into an FBI investigation.
Operation Payback eventually lead into 'Operation Avenge Assange' after the US government crack down on wikileaks and pressureing several companies to stop all dealings with them, mostly major banks as well as Paypal and Amazon, who was hosting them. This lead to the December attacks on the various companies including some swiss banks, Visa, Mastercard, Paypal, Amazon, and Sarah Palin's website. This move was quickly followed by several arrests within the US and the Uk in January 2011 and again in July with some arrests and raids by the FBI towards those involved.
How distributed denial-of-service attacks work, well basically it works by trying to keep other people from reaching the site by sending an uncountable number of requests to the site, more than it can actually handle, forcing it to either reset or consume all its resources trying. This leads to the site itself being completly unviewable since it can't tell the attack from an actual request. How did the group manage to set up all this? Well it was really quite simple due to a program dubbed the 'Low Orbit Ion Cannon' which when given an IP address would cause the computer to churn out requests as quickly as it can. Images were sent around to give people their target during the attacks.
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