The Coming Swarm

This book is available as open access through the Bloomsbury Open Access programme and is available on bloomsburycollections. What is Hacktivism? In The Coming Swarm rising star Molly Sauter examines the history development theory and practice of distributed denial of service actions as a tactic of political activism. The internet is a vital arena of communication self expression and interpersonal organizing. When there is a message to convey words to get out or people to unify many will turn to the internet as a theater for that activity. As familiar and widely accepted activist toolspetitions fundraisers mass letter-writing call-in campaigns and othersfind equivalent practices in the online space is there also room for the tactics of disruption and civil disobedience that are equally familiar from the realm of street marches occupations and sit-ins? With a historically grounded analysis and a focus on early deployments of activist DDOS as well as modern instances to trace its development over time The Coming Swarm uses activist DDOS actions as the foundation of a larger analysis of the practice of disruptive civil disobedience on the internet.