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The Internet Defense League aims to mobilize the Web on legislative issues.

STORY HIGHLIGHTS

(CNN) -- Remember earlier this year when Wikipedia went black in protest of anti-piracy legislation moving through the U.S. Congress?

Yeah, well, that may be nothing compared to this.

A group called the Internet Defense League, borrowing a page from Batman, is trying to create a "bat signal" for mobilizing open-Internet activists against similar legislation.

The group's tagline: "Make sure the Internet never loses. Ever."

Technically, it's more of a "cat signal," since the group's website, which launched a couple weeks ago, features a picture of a cat's face being broadcast into the sky.

"It's a cat signal because we see the cat as the symbol of the Internet," said Tiffiniy Cheng, co-director of the nonprofit Fight for the Future, which helped organize recent piracy legislation protests and is behind the new site. "There's this academic theory ... that talks about if you ban the ability of people to share cat photos, they'll start protesting en masse."

She added: "The idea is we're building the infrastructure to put up this cat signal or this bat signal all over the Internet at a moment's notice, with the click of a button."

The Internet went haywire in January when Congress was considering two pieces of legislation -- nicknamed SOPA and PIPA -- that aimed to help the government crack down on the online distribution of pirated content.

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A 'bat signal' to defend open Internet