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Gay Nigger Association of America
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"GNAA" redirects here. For other uses, see GNAA (disambiguation).
The Gay Nigger Association of America (GNAA) was an
Trolling
6 languages
Gay Nigger Association of America
internet trolling group. They targeted several prominent
2000s
websites and internet personalities including Slashdot,
Wikipedia, CNN, Barack Obama, Alex Jones, and prominent
2010s
Goatse Security
References
members of the blogosphere. They also released software
Abbreviation
GNAA
products, and leaked screenshots and information about
Formation
2002; 21 years ago[1]
upcoming operating systems. In addition, they maintained a
Type
Internet trolls
software repository and a wiki-based site dedicated to internet
Purpose
Trolling
commentary.
Affiliations
Goatse Security[2][3][4]
Members of the GNAA also founded Goatse Security, a grey
Website
www.gnaa.eu (defunct)
[5][6]
hat information security group. Members of Goatse Security
released information in June 2010 about email addresses on AT&T's website from people who had
subscribed to mobile data service using the iPad. After the vulnerability was disclosed, the then-president of
the GNAA, weev, and a GNAA member, "JacksonBrown", were arrested.[7]
Origins, known members and name
The group was run by a president.[4] New media researcher Andrew Lih stated that it was unclear whether or
not there was initially a clearly defined group of GNAA members, or if founding and early members of the
GNAA were online troublemakers united under the name in order to disrupt websites.[8] However, professor
Jodi Dean and Ross Cisneros claimed that they were an organized group of anti-blogging trolls.[5][9]
Reporters also referred to the GNAA as a group.[10][11][12]
In her 2017 book Troll Hunting, Australian journalist Ginger Gorman identified the president of the GNAA as
an individual from Colorado known as "Meepsheep."[13] Known former presidents of the GNAA were security
researcher Jaime "asshurtmacfags" Cochran, who also co-founded the hacking group "Rustle League,"[14]
and "timecop," founder of the anime fansub group "Dattebayo." Cochran is also the only known woman
member of GNAA.[13][15] Other members included former president Andrew "weev" Auernheimer, Daniel
"JacksonBrown" Spitler,[7][16] and former spokesman Leon Kaiser.[17] GNAA has also been documented as
having been loosely affiliated with the satirical wiki Encyclopedia Dramatica.[13]
The group's name incited controversy and was described as "causing immediate alarm in anyone with a
semblance of good taste," "intentionally offensive,"[8] and "spectacularly offensive."[10] The group denied
allegations of racism and homophobia, explaining that the name was intended to sow disruption on the
internet and challenge social norms (claiming it was derived from the 1992 Danish satirical blaxploitation film
Gayniggers from Outer Space).[5]
Trolling
The GNAA used many different methods of trolling. One was to simply "crapflood" a weblog's comment form
with text consisting of repeated words and phrases.[5][10] On Wikipedia, members of the group created an
article about the group, while adhering to Wikipedia's rules and policies; a process Andrew Lih says
"essentially [used] the system against itself."[8] Another method included attacking many Internet Relay Chat
channels and networks using different IRC flooding techniques.[18]
The GNAA also produced shock sites containing malware.[5][19] One such site, "Last Measure," contained
embedded malware that opened up "an endless cascade of pop-up windows displaying pornography or
horrific medical pictures."[19][20] They also performed proof of concept demonstrations.[18][21] These actions
occasionally interrupted the normal operation of popular websites.
2000s
In July 2004, two GNAA members submitted leaked screenshots of the upcoming operating system Mac OS
X v10.4[22] to the popular Macintosh news website MacRumors, resulting in a post which read "With WWDC
just days away, the first Tiger information and screenshots appears to have been leaked. According to
sources, Apple will reportedly provide developers with a Mac OS X 10.4 preview copy at WWDC on Monday.
The screenshots provided reportedly come from this upcoming developer preview."[23]
In June 2005, the GNAA announced that it had created a Mac OS X Tiger release for Intel x86 processors
which caught media attention from various sources.[24][25][26] The next day, the supposed leak was mentioned
on the G4 television show Attack of the Show.[27] The ISO image released via BitTorrent merely booted a
shock image[27][28] instead of the leaked operating system.[29]
On February 3, 2007, the GNAA successfully managed to convince CNN reporter Paula Zahn that "one in
three Americans" believe that the September 11, 2001, terror attacks were carried out by Israeli agents.[30]
CNN subsequently ran a story erroneously reporting this, involving a round-table discussion regarding
antisemitism and an interview with the father of a Jewish 9/11 victim.[31] The GNAA-owned website said that
"over 4,000" Jews were absent from work at the World Trade Center on 9/11.[31]
On February 11, 2007, an attack was launched on the website of US presidential candidate (and future US
president) Barack Obama, where the group's name was caused to appear on the website's front page.[32]
2010s
In late January 2010, the GNAA used a then-obscure phenomenon known as cross-protocol scripting (a
combination of cross-site scripting and inter-protocol exploitation) to cause users of the Freenode IRC
network to unknowingly flood IRC channels after visiting websites containing inter-protocol exploits.[11] They
also have used a combination of inter-protocol, cross-site, and integer overflow bugs in both the Firefox and
Safari web browsers to flood IRC channels.[12]
On October 30, the GNAA began a trolling campaign in the aftermath of Hurricane Sandy on the US East
Coast, spreading fake photographs and tweets of alleged looters in action. After the GNAA published a pressrelease detailing the incident,[33] mainstream media outlets began detailing how the prank was carried out.[34]
[35]
On December 3, the GNAA was identified as being responsible for a cross-site scripting attack on Tumblr that
resulted in thousands of Tumblr blogs being defaced with a pro-GNAA message.[36]
In January 2013, the GNAA collaborated with users on the imageboard 4chan to start a "#cut4bieber" trend
on Twitter, encouraging fans of Canadian pop singer Justin Bieber to practice self-harm.[37][38]
From 2014 into 2015, GNAA members began playing an active role in the Gamergate controversy,
sabotaging efforts made by pro-Gamergate parties. Several GNAA members were able to gain administrative
access to 8chan's (an imageboard associated with Gamergate) primary Gamergate board, which they
disrupted and ultimately closed. The GNAA also claimed responsibility for releasing private information
related to many pro-Gamergate activists.[39]
On October 13, 2016, GNAA member Meepsheep vandalized Wikipedia to cause the entries for Bill and
Hillary Clinton to be overlapped with pornographic images and a message endorsing Republican presidential
candidate Donald Trump.[40]
In August 2017, GNAA was named as having been involved in a feud between employees of the popular
dating app Bumble, and tenants of the apartment building in Austin, Texas where the company was, at the
time, illegally headquartered.[41] Joseph Bernstein of BuzzFeed News reported that one of the building's
residents contacted GNAA to "fight back" against Bumble after multiple complaints regarding the company's
activities were ignored. The dispute resulted in Bumble choosing to relocate from the building, which GNAA
claimed credit for in a press release the group spammed across several major websites via clickjacking.[41]
Goatse Security
Main article: Goatse Security
Several members of the GNAA with expertise in grey hat[42]
computer security research began releasing information about
several software vulnerabilities under the name "Goatse Security."
The group chose to publish their work under a separate name
because they thought that they would not be taken seriously.[16]
In June 2010, Goatse Security attracted mainstream media attention
for their discovery of at least 114,000 unsecured email addresses[43]
registered to Apple iPad devices for early adopters of Apple's 3G
iPad service.[3][44] The data was aggregated from AT&T's own
Goatse Security's logo and name are
taken from the infamous shock site
Goatse.cx.
servers by feeding a publicly available script with HTTP requests
containing randomly generated ICC-IDs, which would then return the
associated email address. The FBI soon investigated the incident.
This investigation led to the arrest of then-GNAA President,[45] Andrew 'weev' Auernheimer, on unrelated drug
charges[46] resulting from an FBI search of his home.[16][47]
In January 2011, the Department of Justice announced that Auernheimer would be charged with one count of
conspiracy to access a computer without authorization and one count of fraud.[48] A co-defendant, Daniel
Spitler, was released on bail.[49][50] In June 2011, Spitler pleaded guilty on both counts after reaching a plea
agreement with US attorneys.[51] On November 20, 2012, Auernheimer was found guilty of one count of
identity fraud and one count of conspiracy to access a computer without authorization.[52] These convictions
were overturned[why?] on April 11, 2014, and Auernheimer was subsequently released from prison.[53]
References
1. ^ "About" . GNAA. Archived from the original
on July 20, 2011. Retrieved June 10, 2011.
2. ^ Emspak, Jesse (January 19, 2011). "The Case Against The iPad Hackers" . International Business Times.
Archived from the original
on January 25, 2011. Retrieved March 19, 2011.
3. ^ a b Chokshi, Niraj (June 10, 2010). "Meet One of the Hackers Who Exposed the iPad Security Leak" . The
Atlantic. Atlantic Media Company. Retrieved February 25, 2011.
4. ^ a b Rohr, Altieres (June 11, 2010). "Saiba como ocorreu falha que expôs e-mails de 114 mil usuários do
iPad"
[Know how failure exposing 114 thousand iPad user email addresses happened]. Rede Globo (in
Portuguese). Retrieved September 13, 2010.
5. ^ a b c d e Dean, Jodi (2010). Blog Theory: Feedback and Capture in the Circuits of Drive . Cambridge, UK:
Polity Press. ISBN 978-0-7456-4970-2. Retrieved August 27, 2010.
6. ^ "FreeNode, allarme sicurezza" . PuntoInformatico (in Italian). June 28, 2006. Retrieved August 26, 2011.
7. ^ a b Bilton, Nick; Wortham, Jenna (January 19, 2011). "Two Are Charged With Fraud in iPad Security
Breach" . The New York Times. p. 4.
8. ^ a b c Lih, Andrew (March 17, 2009). The Wikipedia Revolution: How a Bunch of Nobodies Created the World's
Greatest Encyclopedia. Cambridge, UK: Hyperion. pp. 170–71 . ISBN 978-1-4001-1076-6.
9. ^ Cisneros, Ross B (2005). Regarding Evil (SM). Massachusetts Institute of Technology.
10. ^ a b c Kirkpatrick, Stewart (November 22, 2005). "Lazy Guide to Net Culture: Dark side of the rainbow" . The
Scotsman. Retrieved March 20, 2011.
11. ^ a b Constantin, Lucian (January 30, 2010). "Firefox Bug Used to Harass Entire IRC Network" . Softpedia.
Retrieved March 17, 2011.
12. ^ a b van der Meijs, Sander (February 1, 2010). "Bug in Firefox gebruikt tegen IRC netwerk" . Webwereld (in
Dutch). IDG Netherlands. Archived from the original
on July 22, 2012. Retrieved March 17, 2011.
13. ^ a b c Gorman, Ginger (April 16, 2019). Troll Hunting: Inside the World of Online Hate and its Human Fallout.
Hardie Grant. pp. 185–194. ISBN 978-1743794357.
14. ^ "Meet the Mysterious Hacking Collective Who Love Trolling Anonymous" . Vice. February 22, 2013.
Retrieved January 17, 2022.
15. ^ Eordogh, Fruzsina. "Meet the Mysterious Hacking Collective Who Love Trolling Anonymous" .
www.vice.com. Retrieved September 6, 2022.
16. ^ a b c Kaiser, Leon (January 19, 2011). "Interview: Goatse Security on FBI Charges Following AT&T iPad
Breach" . DailyTech (Interview: transcript). Interviewed by Mick, Jason. Archived from the original
on March
31, 2014. Retrieved January 21, 2011.
17. ^ "DailyTech - Interview: Goatse Security on FBI Charges Following AT&T iPad Breach" . Archived from the
original
on March 31, 2014. Retrieved January 31, 2011.
18. ^ a b "Firefox-based attack wreaks havoc on IRC users" , The Register, January 30, 2010, retrieved
August 27, 2010
19. ^ a b Attwood, Feona (2010). Porn.com: making sense of online pornography . Peter Lang. ISBN 978-1-43310207-3. Retrieved March 20, 2011.
20. ^ Jones, Dr. Steve (2011). "Horrorporn/Pornhorror: The Problematic Communities and Contexts of Online
Shock Imagery"
(PDF). Archived from the original
(PDF) on March 18, 2014. Retrieved August 26, 2012.
21. ^ Very Ugly Bug at BarackObama.com . TechCrunch. Accessed August 27, 2010.
22. ^ "Wie typisch" . Mac news (in German). DE: Giga. June 28, 2004. Archived from the original
on August 2,
2012. Retrieved August 26, 2011.
23. ^ "Mac OS X 10.4 (Tiger) Screenshots?" , MacRumors, June 26, 2004, retrieved August 27, 2010
24. ^ "Apple Mac OS X 10.4.1 for Intel hits piracy sites" , Mac daily news (report), June 11, 2005, retrieved
September 6, 2010
25. ^ "OS X for x86 already in the wild?" , Engadget, June 12, 2005, retrieved September 6, 2010
26. ^ "Mac Hacks Allow OS X on PCs" , Wired, August 2005, archived from the original
on July 27, 2010,
retrieved September 8, 2010
27. ^ a b "Attack of the Show!". Attack of the Show!. June 2005. G4.
28. ^ "MacInDell Part Quatre – The Ruby Goldmine" , Gizmodo, June 15, 2005, retrieved August 27, 2010
29. ^ Jumping on the bandwagon: OS X on x86! OMG! , TUAW, August 12, 2005, retrieved September 7, 2010
30. ^ Welaratna, Deepthi (April 6, 2007). "Terror! Conspiracy! Hoax!" . KQED Arts. KQED. Archived from the
original
on September 22, 2011. Retrieved March 18, 2011.
31. ^ a b "Paula Zahn Now" . Transcripts. February 3, 2007. CNN.
32. ^ "Very Ugly Bug at BarackObama.com" , Tech crunch, February 11, 2007
33. ^ Kaiser, Leon. "GNAA Fabricates "Sandy Loot Crew", Media Bites" . GNAA. Archived from the original on
November 3, 2012. Retrieved November 2, 2012.
34. ^ Grubb, Ben. "Twitter works up a storm over looting images" . Sydney Morning Herald. Retrieved
November 2, 2012.
35. ^ Dillon, Kit. "Less Looting, More Trolling: Daily Mail, Drudge Get Pwnd By Twitter Pranksters
#SandyLootCrew" . Betabeat. Retrieved November 2, 2012.
36. ^ Hepburn, Ned (December 3, 2012). "Tumblr just got massively hacked" . Deathandtaxesmag.com.
Retrieved March 19, 2013.
37. ^ "Internet Trolls Start Sick Trend To Encourage Justin Bieber Fans To Self-Harm" . stereoboard.com.
January 8, 2013. Retrieved April 16, 2013.
38. ^ "Justin Bieber fans draw shock, outrage with gruesome 'Cut4Bieber' trending topic" . NY Daily News.
39. ^ Bernstein, Joseph (December 4, 2014). "GamerGate's Headquarters Has Been Destroyed By Trolls" .
BuzzFeed. Retrieved April 25, 2015.
40. ^ O'Connor, Brendan (October 13, 2016). "Internet Trolls Vandalize Hillary and Bill Clinton's Wikipedia Pages in
Extremely NSFW Way" . Retrieved October 13, 2016.
41. ^ a b Bernstein, Joseph (August 1, 2017). "Bumble's Former Neighbors Say It Was Using A Luxury Apartment
Building As Its Personal Playground" . BuzzFeed News. Retrieved January 17, 2022.
42. ^ Apple's iPad security breach reveals vulnerability of mobile devices . Washington Post. Accessed
September 2, 2010.
43. ^ Apple's iPad Breach Raises Alarms . NPR. Accessed September 6, 2010.
44. ^ "Falha de segurança que expõe donos do iPad investigada pelo FBI"
[Security failure exposing iPad
owners investigated by the FBI]. Tek (in Portuguese). PT: Sapo.pt. June 11, 2010. Archived from the original
on July 23, 2011. Retrieved March 17, 2011.
45. ^ United States District Court — District Court of New Jersey, Docket: MAG 11-4022 (CCC). Filed with the
court January 13, 2011
46. ^ Torrenzano, Richard; Davis, Mark W (2011). Digital Assassination: Protecting Your Reputation, Brand, Or
Business . Macmillan. p. 116. ISBN 978-0-312-61791-2.
47. ^ Hacker in AT&T-iPad security case arrested on drug charges
Archived
August 10, 2011, at the Wayback
Machine. CNET. Accessed September 1, 2010.
48. ^ McMillan, Robert; Jackson, Joab (January 18, 2011). "Criminal charges filed against AT&T iPad attackers" .
Computerworld.
49. ^ Voigt, Kurt (January 21, 2011). "No bail for 2nd iPad e-mail address theft suspect" . MSNBC. NBC News.
Associated Press. Retrieved February 15, 2011.
50. ^ Porter, David (February 28, 2011). "Suspect in iPad Data Theft Released on Bail in NJ" . ABC News.
Associated Press. Retrieved March 2, 2011.
51. ^ Smith, Catharine (June 23, 2011). "Daniel Spitler Pleads Guilty To iPad Hack, Email Address Theft" .
Huffington Post.
52. ^ Zetter, Kim (November 20, 2012). "Hacker Found Guilty of Breaching AT&T Site to Obtain iPad Customer
Data" . Wired.com.
53. ^ Voreacos, David (April 14, 2014). "AT&T Hacker 'Weev' Parties and Tweets as Case Still Looms" .
Bloomberg. Retrieved April 14, 2014.
Hacking in the 2010s
V·T·E
← 2000s
[hide]
2020s →
Timeline
Major incidents
2010
Operation Aurora · Australian cyberattacks · Operation Olympic Games ·
Operation ShadowNet · Operation Payback
2011
DigiNotar · DNSChanger · HBGary Federal · Operation AntiSec · Operation Tunisia ·
PlayStation network outage · RSA SecurID compromise
2012
LinkedIn hack · Stratfor email leak · Operation High Roller
2013
South Korea cyberattack · Snapchat hack · Cyberterrorism Attack of June 25 ·
2013 Yahoo! data breach · Singapore cyberattacks
2014
Anthem medical data breach · Operation Tovar · 2014 celebrity nude photo leak ·
2014 JPMorgan Chase data breach · Sony Pictures hack ·
Russian hacker password theft · 2014 Yahoo! data breach
2015
Office of Personnel Management data breach · Hacking Team ·
Ashley Madison data breach · VTech data breach · Ukrainian Power Grid Cyberattack ·
SWIFT banking hack
2016
Bangladesh Bank robbery · Hollywood Presbyterian Medical Center ransomware incident
· Commission on Elections data breach · Democratic National Committee cyber attacks ·
Vietnam Airport Hacks · DCCC cyber attacks · Indian Bank data breaches · Surkov leaks
· Dyn cyberattack · Russian interference in the 2016 U.S. elections · 2016 Bitfinex hack
2017
SHAttered · 2017 Macron e-mail leaks · WannaCry ransomware attack ·
Westminster data breach · Petya and NotPetya (2017 Ukraine ransomware attacks) ·
Vault7 data breach · Equifax data breach · Deloitte breach · Disqus breach
2018
Trustico · Atlanta cyberattack · SingHealth data breach
2019
Sri Lanka cyberattack · Baltimore ransomware attack · Bulgarian revenue agency hack ·
WhatsApp snooping scandal · Jeff Bezos phone hacking incident
Hacktivism
Anonymous (associated events) · CyberBerkut · GNAA · Goatse Security · Lizard Squad · LulzRaft
· LulzSec · New World Hackers · NullCrew · OurMine · PayPal 14 · RedHack · Teamp0ison · TDO ·
UGNazi · Ukrainian Cyber Alliance
Advanced
persistent threats
Bureau 121 · Charming Kitten · Cozy Bear · Dark Basin · DarkMatter · Elfin Team · Equation Group
· Fancy Bear · GOSSIPGIRL (confederation) · Guccifer 2.0 · Hacking Team · Helix Kitten ·
Iranian Cyber Army · Lazarus Group (BlueNorOff) (AndAriel) · NSO Group · Numbered Panda ·
PLA Unit 61398 · PLA Unit 61486 · PLATINUM · Pranknet · Red Apollo · Rocket Kitten ·
Stealth Falcon · Syrian Electronic Army · Tailored Access Operations · The Shadow Brokers ·
Yemen Cyber Army
Individuals
Major vulnerabilities
publicly disclosed
George Hotz · Guccifer · Jeremy Hammond · Junaid Hussain · Kristoffer von Hassel ·
Mustafa Al-Bassam · MLT · Ryan Ackroyd · Sabu · Topiary · Track2 · The Jester
Evercookie (2010) · iSeeYou (2013) · Heartbleed (2014) · Shellshock (2014) · POODLE (2014) ·
Rootpipe (2014) · Row hammer (2014) · SS7 vulnerabilities (2014) · JASBUG (2015) · Stagefright
(2015) · DROWN (2016) · Badlock (2016) · Dirty COW (2016) · Cloudbleed (2017) ·
Broadcom Wi-Fi (2017) · EternalBlue (2017) · DoublePulsar (2017) · Silent Bob is Silent (2017) ·
KRACK (2017) · ROCA vulnerability (2017) · BlueBorne (2017) · Meltdown (2018) · Spectre (2018)
· EFAIL (2018) · Exactis (2018) · Speculative Store Bypass (2018) · Lazy FP state restore (2018) ·
TLBleed (2018) · SigSpoof (2018) · Foreshadow (2018) · Dragonblood (2019) ·
Microarchitectural Data Sampling (2019) · BlueKeep (2019) · Kr00k (2019)
2010
Bad Rabbit · Black Energy 2 · SpyEye · Stuxnet
2011
Coreflood · Alureon · Duqu · Kelihos · Metulji botnet · Stars
2012
Carna · Dexter · FBI · Flame · Mahdi · Red October · Shamoon
2013
CryptoLocker · DarkSeoul
2014
Brambul · Black Energy 3 · Carbanak · Careto · DarkHotel · Duqu 2.0 · FinFisher ·
Gameover ZeuS · Regin
2015
Dridex · Hidden Tear · Rombertik · TeslaCrypt
2016
Hitler · Jigsaw · KeRanger · MEMZ · Mirai · Pegasus · Petya and NotPetya · X-Agent
2017
BrickerBot · Kirk · LogicLocker · Rensenware · Triton · WannaCry · XafeCopy
2018
VPNFilter
2019
Grum · Joanap · NetTraveler · R2D2 · Tinba · Titanium · ZeroAccess botnet
Malware
Categories: 2002 establishments in the United States
Internet culture
Internet trolling
Cyberattack gangs
Online obscenity controversies
Hacker groups
Slashdot
Underground computer groups
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