Anonymous Declares War on the City of Orlando for "Food Terrorists"

Anonymous, an online community of anarchist hackers, is taking on its new hacktivist cause -- an apparent "war" on the City of Orlando for the recent arrests of "food terrorists."

The group Food Not Bombs -- which has recently been sharing food with people in parks across Florida -- says 21 people have been arrested thus far in Orlando's Lake Eola Park.

Now a news release believed to be from Anonymous issues "a declaration of war."

"The City of Orlando has ignored our warnings, and our generous offer of a cease fire," Anonymous allegedly writes. "On Wednesday last you not only arrested two more people for feeding but you arrested the worldwide President of Food Not Bombs Keith McHenry. This is a declaration of war.

"Henceforth there will be no more cease fires, no more attempts to get you to resolve this issue with human decency. We will now treat you like the human rights abusers that you are."

Anonymous hasn't allegedly mentioned other cities around Florida becoming the next victims of distributed denial of service (DDoS) attacks, but a member of the Fort Lauderdale Food Not Bombs group has said they're being harassed in Fort Lauderdale too.

"The city does want to kick us out of Fort Lauderdale," Phillip Johnson told New Times last week. "The police have been harsher lately -- there's been a lot more harassment of the homeless."

Johnson pointed out a police surveillance tower that was recently installed in Stranahan Park and said police are trying to prohibit people from giving away food, except for a lone Salvation Army truck.

Food Not Bombs has been planning statewide "camp-ins" for July 1 since before the alleged Anonymous attack was revealed, but from the looks of the news release, Orlando is the main concern.

"Anonymous will now begin a massive campaign against you and your city web assets. Everyday we will launch a new DDoS attack on a different Target," it says. "We will continue to E-Mail millions of people in 50 countries with the Boycott Orlando campaign message."

According to a Twitter account dedicated to "Operation Orlando," it looks like they're aware of what's going on in Fort Lauderdale too.

"FINALLY we have confirmation from FNB South Florida Chapter that there were three arrests wednesday," one post says, as well as another post retweeting that Food Not Bombs will be sharing food at Fort Lauderdale's Stranahan Park at 5:30 p.m. today.

The first target of the attack, orlandofloridaguide.com, is currently down at the time of this post.