Anonymous and Craigslist: Proof that Scientology Knows It’s Under Attack

We’ve been meaning to come back to the subject of Scientology and Craigslist since our story of September 22 seemed to kick off some interesting and frenetic activity in that sector.

Since 2009, folks at Project Chanology, the Anonymous collective that watches Scientology like a hawk, have been making efforts to curb the church’s use of deceptive ads at Craigslist. This “Clear Craig” program was coordinated at WhyWeProtest.net, but had slowed down in recent months, as one would expect after several years of effort.

Then, a reader sent us a previously secret manual that Scientology was using to train its “cyber dissemination” people to post ads on Craigslist from locations around the country.

And that’s when things got interesting.

We published portions of the manual, showing how Scientology orgs are taught how to lure people in by looking for people who are depressed or have anxiety. It’s not until they make a call that people answering the ads learn that the “group” they wanted to join was really the Scientology mission in their neighborhood.

Outraged at the deception, a number of our readers vowed to do something about it, and in our comments section they began comparing notes as they flagged Scientology ads on Craigslist pages in their area. Our readers also reached out to WWP, and the Clear Craig program there was revived and is now the nexus of the ongoing activity.

Besides flagging ads for being deceptive, the clever folks at Anonymous also began putting up ads of their own that mocked Scientology, and when one of our readers brought that to the attention of the Business Insider, the publication bit. And so did a number of other publications.

But did the campaign really affect Scientology and its Craigslist effort? Evidence suggests that it has.

Not only are we seeing more reports that flagged ads are down, but we’re seeing reports that some cities now have no deceptive ads at all.

And an e-mail forwarded to us by a tipster suggests that Scientology is feeling the heat — but vows to fight on. Here it is…

Date: Thu, 3 Oct 2013 21:02:51
From:
To: Cyber Dissemination
Subject: Urgent message regarding Craigslist

You may or may not have ran into some suppression on Craigslist. If not, good for you. If you did, here is the solution.

Account Being Put on Hold?

I’ve just received a few reports yesterday and today that some of our Cyber Dissemination members’ Craigslist accounts were being put on hold. This is not a big problem. We can easily solve this.

Basically there is an SP saying we are running scams or crimes on Craigslist in some cities, which caused some of our accounts getting shut down. This false reporting doesn’t happen to us much at all, but it could happen once in a while, as it is now. Craigslist management has only about 30 staff members, and they manage millions of ads each day, so basically if they get complaints or scams, they might shut down the ads or accounts without investigation.

It’s definitely a “sign of success.”

Fortunately, the solution is simple. It’s simpler than trying to get Craiglist management to reverse the accounts from being shut down. Simply create more accounts and post more ads than ever before. That’s the solution. Use www.pvaspot.com to get more phone numbers if you need more phone numbers to verify accounts.

Create more accounts than you had before. Post more ads than you did before. You will reach more people and flourish and prosper.

If your Craigslist account for Scientology ads are intact, make sure to IMMEDIATELY back up your ads, just in case the accounts get shut down due to this problem. (Some SP’s are on the loose right now.) This way you won’t lose any ads you’ve created.

An SP is Posting A Lot of Entheta Ads on Craigslist in Your Area?

If an SP is posting a lot of entheta ads on Craigslist, you can get the SP’s ads being taken down by reporting them to Craigslist management. Use this link: http://www.craigslist.org/about/help/abuse

You will see this:

Harassment, publication of personal information
If your personal information has been posted on craigslits:

Use our online form to report the issue.
Choose “harassment / flagging” option.
Choose an appropriate option for what type of harassment issue you are experiencing.
Put 911 in the subject field.
Provide as much information as possible, including the posting ID number, keywords that might appear in the posting, and the specific craigslist city and category in which your personal information appears.

Do the 911 thing like it says. List the URL’s of the entheta posts in the report. The entheta posts will be taken down within hours.

I hope this helps.

Let me know if you have any questions.

We will win!

The enthusiasm is infectious, isn’t it?

For the record, we just want to point out that the Underground Bunker has merely revealed the existence of a Scientology manual for spamming Craigslist, and we’ve now published evidence that Scientology is aware that Anonymous is making efforts to flag ads. The Bunker is not involved in any activity regarding Craigslist, and does not condone or endorse any activism that may have been expressed in our comments section. (Hey, we have lawyers, too, and sometimes they need reassuring.)

 
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Posted by Tony Ortega on October 9, 2013 at 08:45

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