- Anonymous is a decentralized international activist and hacktivist collective and movement that promotes anonymous social engagement by direct action. It is known for its various cyberattacks against several governments, government institutions and government agencies, corporations and the Church of Scientology. It originated in 2003 on the imageboard 4chan, representing the concept of many online and offline community users simultaneously existing as an anarchic, digitized global brain. It strongly opposes Internet censorship and surveillance, and has hacked various government websites. In 2012, Time named Anonymous as one of the most influential groups in the world.