The hacker group that calls itself Anonymous posted a warning message to Zynga and Facebook today.
The message says it will take Facebook down on November 5 and release Zynga games to the public on that day for free if Zynga doesn't stop its alleged plans for massive layoffs and offshoring of jobs.
Anonymous says that it has obtained secret documents about Zynga's strategy which includes a "massive layoff of a thousand people."
The hacker group is ticked off about the jobs. "With a billion dollars cash sitting in a bank we do believe that such actions are an insult to the population and the behaviour of corporations like Zynga must change," it said.
Last week, Zynga reported that it has $1.6 billion in cash, equivalents and marketable securities and confirmed that it laid off 150 people. As for rumors of bigger layoffs, these have been circulating for a while.
But it's entirely possible that this planned attack is nothing more than a hoax and that the group does not have access to confidential Zynga plans or its games.
We have reached out to Zynga for comment and will update this story when we hear back.
Here's the full warning message about the planned attack, posted to AnnonNews.org. a forum for Anonymous's press releases.
Zynga customers and Facebook users , We are anonymous . During the last few days anonymous has been targeting Zynga for the outrageous treatment of their employees and their actions against many developers .
We have come to believe that this actions of Zynga will result in massive layoff of a thousand people and legal actions against everyone that speaks to the public about this plan.
It will also come to end of the US game market as we know it as all this jobs will be replaced in other more convenient financial countries.
With a billion dollars cash sitting in a bank we do believe that such actions are an insult to the population and the behaviour of corporations like Zynga must change.
Anonymous could not allow this to happen so it's starting to release confidential documents we have leaked on this plan
As we speak we are planning to release also all the games we've taken from their servers for free.
That being said we will stop the idea of the distribution of such games if Zynga will cease immediately the plan.
Anonymous claims that this is one of confidential documents it obtained from Zynga.
The leaked strategy of Zynga , transcript:
Following the preliminary announced of this week the final strategy for the next two quarters has been successfully set to delivery by november 23 an additional but of 800 jobs with further raising of new capital from the market to support businesses.
We've identified our global gambling strategy with bwin.party and as we speak discussions are progressing with a partner to cover the US market.
Work is focused and on-going to completely outsource our development teams in our offices in Bangalore , India to hedge our position in the long term.
We've identified key new products from third parties such as Lovers in a Dangerous Spacetime , Shove Prod and Music Invaders in which we are starting business contacts to buy these IP for transaction value of approximately 20 million.
We strongly believe we will conclude these deals this month and compete with this titles against mobile competitors with ease.
Our business continues to evolve and we must evolve with it. We operate in a exciting and challenging industry and I am very pleased that our senior leadership team continue to strengthen and develop with us.
Here's our live blog from Zynga's conference call with analysts.
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