Bad Week for Monsanto

Mike Barrett
Activist Post

It seems that Monsanto may be having a rough week.

Not only was the company hit by a press release declaring them the worst company of 2011, but a group of Anonymous hackers claim to have actually completely disrupted the operations of a PR firm which manages Monsanto’s own PR.

The hackers infiltrated the PR firm, known as The Bivings Group, citing “15+years of running marketing campaigns and helping some of the most corrupt corporations on the planet, as well as several governmental agencies, cover up their dirt.”

The hackers claimed to have succeeded in bringing down The Bivings Group on December 5th.

Going by information released by Anonymous, Bivings Group shut down all of their servers and liquidated their assets after the infiltration, while former employees moved on to start ‘The Brick Factory’, a new PR firm. The hackers actions are obviously driven by the PR firm’s decision to help run marketing campaigns for corrupt corporations like Monsanto.

One week after the hackers infiltrated their system, The Bivings Group reportedly stated:

Our Cyber Infrastructure has recently been put under attack. We are evaluating the extent of the intrusion, and apologise for any downtime and issues this may cause you. It is not yet determined what the motives behind the attack are, or what, if any data has been compromised. We will continue to keep you up to date, and sicerely apologise for any inconvenience.

Are the hackers in the right to take down a firm which helps corrupt corporations, even though done illegally and mischievously?

Sometimes it is hard to see what is wrong and what is right, though it is quite apparent that Monsanto is a corporation with no regard for human health or the planet. This isn’t the only example of resistance against corrupt companies like Monsanto, and it certainly won’t be the last.

Regardless of whether or not the attack will be considered to be in the right by some anti-Monsanto activists, one thing is clear: Monsanto’s own crimes against public health and the environment trump any form of cyber attack in terms of wrongdoing.