Security types like LulzSec because they’re proving what a mess we’re in. They’re pointing at the elephant in the room and saying “LOOK AT THE GIGANTIC FUCKING ELEPHANT IN THE ROOM ZOMG WHY CAN’T YOU SEE IT??? ITS TRUNK IS IN YR COFFEE FFS!!!”

There is no security, there will be no security. The horse has bolted, and it’s not going to be the infrastructure that’s going to change, it’s going to be us.

What about privacy? Oh, well that’s out the window too. Did you hear Facebook has facial recognition now? Great, huh? Plus the bloatware that is Facebook’s Web application is full of bugs anyway, so we really do just have to assume all our Facebook accounts are pwnt. Our telcos are owned, our mobile devices track us, as the iPhone/Android tracking scandal showed us. Privacy is dead.

So why do we like LulzSec?

“I told you so.”

That’s why.

Anonymous is its own separate thing, an anarchic and brilliant thing, but the wider concept of anonymity itself as a political statement - whether online or offline - is gaining more and more ground as a way of rebelling against a political culture that not only seeks to root out unsavory elements with surveillance but which mandates individuality as a form of rigid conformity.

Think about it: it you grow up being commanded to self-actualise, to be the best individual you can be, to define yourself by buying things, to be yourself and find your special centre and compete with your neighbors and colleagues, then choosing to be anonymous is an inherently revolutionary act, quite apart from the organising possibilities the phenomenon offers.

Plus, there’s a growing sense that there is a great deal of power in the collective, in sharing a sense of solidarity, symmetry and protection in anonymity. The internet doesn’t change that, it just makes it all a hell of a lot easier to do.