Westboro Baptist hacked for planned Sandy Hook protests
Twitter has suspended an account linked to Westboro Baptist Church, either for messages detailing the group’s plan to picket the funerals of those killed Friday in the Connecticut school shootings or because the account has been hacked by the group Anonymous.
The URL for Westboro’s Twitter feed only says the account of church spokesman Shirley Phelps-Roper has been suspended.
Phelps-Roper, hours after the shootings in Newtown, Conn., tweeted “‘Westboro will picket Sandy Hook Elementary School to sing praise to God for the glory of his work in executing his judgment.”
Westboro Baptist, which has just a handful of members in Topeka, Kan., has been in the news before, of course. It first gained notoriety for anti-gay protests at the funerals of U.S. soldiers.
Anonymous hackers must have been displeased, reports are the group hacked the church’s website — godhatesfags.com — and took control of Phelps-Roper’s @DearShirley Twitter account.
Examiner.com reports the hack is the work of a 15-year-old who goes by the name CosmoTheGod. The California teen is already on probation for hacking NASDAQ, so he might want to enjoy the online accolades while he’s still allowed to look at a computer screen.
The hacking group had recently published private emails, home addresses, phone numbers and social security numbers of Westboro members.
The hackers also want the White House to declare Westboro a hate group. An online petition has 183,000 signatures in four days.
Slate says the urge to cheer for Anonymous should be contained.
“Westboro may be the closest thing to an embodiment of evil that we have handy,” writes Will Oremus, but the tiny church is “best ignored.”
Meanwhile, residents of Newtown, Conn., many of whom are preparing for the funerals of 20 children and six adults, have created a Facebook page where they are making plans to block church members from picketing near mourners.
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51 comments Add your comment
Class of '98
December 18th, 2012
1:36 pm
The only thing that “God’s judgment” had to do with the Sandy Creek massacre was that He gave human beings the gift of free will. The rest was done by a deranged loser.
PoopStain
December 18th, 2012
1:51 pm
You might want to check your facts before writing nonsense you buffoon, CosmoTheGod is not responsible for this hack….do you honestly thing he would use the same handle if he was>????? Ignorant media n00bs always rushing out stories without verifying things…..
Turkey
December 18th, 2012
1:59 pm
Way to go George Mathis, you blew the breaking story by scrambling the facts as usual. I wish you bozo’s over at AJC had an XBox or something to play with over there to keep you occupied. Why not go out on the street and find something productive to do with your life?
roger
December 18th, 2012
1:59 pm
@poop stain. um I think class ‘98 read the entire article more closely than you did. God’s judgement is clearly what westboro claims to bring. The hackers name was cosmothegod. what is this buffoonery, sir?
Northof 100
December 18th, 2012
2:02 pm
God gives free will???
What do you call prayer??? Are you not asking God to change the course of events to suit your desires and wishes? By answering your prayer, God undeniably changes the course of natural events thus altering someone else’s ability to choose freely? Try praying for no more massacres and tell me how that works out. Your God and all Gods are impotent. So, continue to pray to God who didn’t act, can’t ac, or doesn’t exist. Billions of non-Christians do good works daily. Being good (or bad) is exclusive of any deity. Try being good for goodness sake, not for some reward in the sky you see fit to come your way when you die.
AtlantaTruth
December 18th, 2012
2:02 pm
@PoopStain —– check yourself darling. The writer DOES have the facts correct and this delinquent CosmoTheGod idiot IS responsible for the illegal hacking. Ignorant blogsters rushing to post without knowing what they are talking about.
MANGLER
December 18th, 2012
2:07 pm
I’ve never had the unfortunate luck to run across those protesters at a funeral before. I know that if I did, I would likely not reply to them in a peaceful, federally protected manner (a squirrel jumped out in front of my car Officer). So if anonymous puts their collective knowledge to use in smacking these people down a peg or two, then all I want to know is how I can donate to help them do it.
vcorrilo
December 18th, 2012
2:12 pm
Something needs to be done so this nasty group can shut up, and go away!
Sheila Woods
December 18th, 2012
2:20 pm
Only someone who is either diranged or pure evil would show up at what is proably the most horiffic day of their lives for these parents and spouse and family of those slained to protest. They should be arrested as soon as they begin to proceed. Please let these parents and other buried their love ones in peace. As a Christian I belive those children and educators went straight to heaven. Could it be that this happen to open our eyes to gun control or gun out of control people.
Foncused
December 18th, 2012
2:32 pm
@poopstain, Mr. Mathis was reporting what Examiner.com is reporting . . . no where in the article does he try to take credit for cosmoisgod . . so before you rail, you might want to read and more importantly think