FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE SPY VS. SCI: ANONYMOUS CHALLENGES SCIENTOLOGY'S INTELLIGENCE DIVISION THE OSA On July 12th, 2008, at 11:00 am local time, in cities all around the world, Anonymous intends to don its best tux, order ‘shaken not stirred’ cocktails for everyone and bring the activities of the Church of Scientology’s intelligence agency, known as the Office of Special Affairs (or 'OSA'), to wider attention and greater scrutiny. Last month's protest was pirate themed, in order to parody and expose the abuses that occur within Scientology's private navy, the Sea Org, but now it’s ‘Spy vs Sci’ as Anonymous asks the question: “Why does something that describes itself as a religion need an intelligence agency that aggressively persecutes critics?" The OSA is a highly organised sub-division of the Church of Scientology that has a license to gather intelligence and administer ‘justice and punishment’ to its perceived foes. It also provides the agents that carry out the ‘Fair Game’ policy, by which critics of the Church of Scientology are targeted, harassed, threatened and intimidated in an attempt to silence or punish them. Most Scientologists are unaware of the functions of the OSA and accept what their leaders tell them about it. However, there is a growing body of evidence that OSA agents operate to attack perceived enemies by using infiltration, bribery, burglary, and blackmail, in addition to threats, intimidation, assaults and worse. A well-documented example of the illegal actions of the OSA was 'Operation Snow White', a wide scale and sophisticated infiltration of the U.S. Government itself. Another example was 'Operation Freakout', a long campaign of harassment and intimidation against Paulette Cooper (writer of the book 'The Scandal of Scientology'), which involved distributing false propaganda about her as well as fabricating evidence in an attempt to frame her for making bomb threats. Anonymous can also point to many other examples and if required can back all these up with facts, testimonies and evidence. Who and what is Anonymous? We are a collection of individuals united by ideas. Anonymous chose Scientology as a campaign target because of the events surrounding the now infamous Tom Cruise Scientology video; whilst the video itself was not enough to spark interest (although it was amusing), the aggressive actions that the Church of Scientology attempted to take to remove it did get our attention. When Anonymous found out even more about the crimes and abuses of the Church of Scientology, action became inevitable. Anonymous is the voice of the body politic and the consciousness of the Internet that has stepped offline and into the real world. Since its campaign began, Anonymous has uncovered or brought to the public eye many of the illegal actions, fraudulent activities, and human rights violations perpetrated by the Church of Scientology. Although described as ‘terrorists’ by the Church of Scientology, Anonymous' methods have been peaceful. Conversely, there have been several incidents of assaults on Anonymous members by Scientologists, mostly as attempts to unmask and identify them so that the OSA can target them for harassment. But instead of being scared off, these incidents have strengthened our resolve and add more credence to one of Anonymous' core messages: that the Church of Scientology is both willing and prepared to go to any lengths to silence those who would speak out against them. However, Anonymous is not intimidated, because the nature of Anonymous is irrepressible. We are Anonymous We are legion We do not forgive We do not forget Expect us For more information http://whyweprotest.net http://exscientologykids.com http://www.enturbulation.org http://xenu.net http://whyaretheydead.net ###