'Anonymous' - Who are they?

An image commonly associated with Anonymous.
The "suit without a head" represents leaderless organization and anonymity.

-Anonymous is an online hackivist group which largely consists of users from multiple image boards and internet forums.

-In 2003, user of an English-language imageboard website called 4chan began using the term anonymous when refering to themselves as a collective. User registration on this site is not required and users who do not identify themselves are given the label anonymous. In 2004 a 4chan administration manipulated the site to force every user to being displayed as 'Anonymous'.

-There is no 'official' way to 'join' Anonymous other than to simply want to join as there is no leadership, no ranking, and no single means of communication.

-The Guy Fawkes mask has become a well known symbol for Anonymous. The character developed as an internet meme called 'Epic Fail Guy'. Protests against the church of scientology in 2008 were done by Anonymous wearing these masks to protect their identities from church. The character was then adopted for it's wider protests against authority.

-Alan Moore is a novelist who wrote 'V for Vendetta' which is illustrated by David Lloyd. It's a story set in a dystopian future in the UK from the 1980's to about the 1990's. A mysterious masked revolutionary who calls himself 'V' works to destroy the totalitarian government, profoundly affecting the people he encounters. 'V', an anarchist revolutionary dressed in a Guy Fawkes mask begins an elaborate, violent and intentionally theatrical campaign to murder his former captors, bringing down the government, and convince the people to rule themselves.

-When thinking up a persona and image for 'V', Alan Moore said: ''Why don't we portray him as a resurrected Guy Fawkes, complete with one of those Papier-mâché masks, in a cape and a conical hat? He'd look really bizarre and it would give Guy Fawkes the image he's deserved all these years. We shouldn't burn the chap every Nov 5th but celebrate his attempt to blow up Parliament.''

-Anonymous have protested and acted on many things just as internet censorship, scientology and government corruption. In April 2012 in protests against government extradition and surveillance policies, Anonymous took down government websites in the UK and left a message on Twitter saying: ''It was for your draconian surveillance proposals.''

-''We anonymous just happen to be a group of people on the internet who need - just kind of an outlet to do as we wish, that we wouldn't be able to do in regular society...That's more or less the point of it. Do as you wish...There's a common phrase. ''We are doing it for the lulz.'' - Trent Peacock, The face of 'Anonymous'