Akatsuki

    Akatsuki is a small organization, at any given point, the group has at most ten members and a unknown number of agents. Though they seem to have a decent network of agents in the villages, these individuals are usually under some form of mind-control. A notable exception is Tobi, who only orders to Zetsu before being promoted. The members of Akatsuki are all S-class criminals, the most dangerous men in the Naruto universe.
Little is known about how to join the infamous Akatsuki, but extraordinary fighting ability and ruthlessness seem to be compolsure. Unique traits (genetic or otherwise) also seem to be a common factor among its members. Two of the more prominent members so far, Itachi and Sasori, both undertook some sort of challenging task at the time of their entering the group. Sasori mentions during his fight with Chiyo and Sakura Haruno that "he hadn't had this much difficulty since joining Akatsuki." Itachi was responsible for murdering his whole clan exept for hes little brother sasuke uchiha. Around the time he is believed to have entered, but it can't be said for sure that the two events were linked.
Goal
Akatsuki's overall goal is to control all the 5 shinobi villages. To achieve that goal, the leader has set up a three-step process to work their way to it. First, they plan to obtain a large amount of money to support their organization. Second, they plan to set up a mercenary group loyal to no village. To build their reputation, they plan to accept any mission below the usual cost, which is covered by the excess amount of funds earned in the first part of their plan. Because there haven't been any wars in some time, the established shinobi villages can't afford to charge such low prices, leading the smaller countries to hire Akatsuki over the more expensive shinobi villages. By using the tailed beasts, Akatsuki can start wars and then immediately quell them, solidifying their reputation and convincing every country to depend on them, thus cornering the market in shinobi labor. Without any business, the other shinobi villages will collapse due to a lack of funds. Finally, after Akatsuki is the only major group of shinobi in existence, they can easily conquer the other countries.
As a large part of their plan, they actively hunt the tailed beasts and their hosts. Once a tailed beast or its host is captured, they seal them in a large statue for use at a later time. Akatsuki possesses six tailed beasts: the one-tailed Shukaku, the two-tailed demon cat, the three-tailed demon, and three other unknown demons.


Teams
Akatsuki members usually work in teams of two. Teams are built to complement each other's abilities and talents to create a formidable duo. For example, Kakuzu uses Hidan's immortality to their advantage by using large-scale attacks on those Hidan has pinned down; being immortal, Hidan survives what is normally fatal to his opponent. Due to Orochimaru's defection, their numbers are now uneven, so one or more members appear to be working alone. Currently, Zetsu, the leader, and the unnamed member are not known to be on any team. Each member thus far has shown at least a working loyalty to each other and their mysterious leader, and they have excellent working relationships. On a personal level, however, many of the team members exhibit outright animosity towards one another, though they do not let it get in the way of their missions.

Tailed beast extraction
Whenever an Akatsuki member captures a tailed beast or its host, it is taken to their hidout. Once there, the Akatsuki leader summons a giant statue of a humanoid monster. The leader doesn't need to be there to summon the statue, nether do Akatsuki members need to be physically present for the statue to activate. Any Akatsuki members unable to reach the statue can use astral projection to appear at the statue. The statue itself seems to symbolize restriction or sealing. The creature's hands are bound, its eyes are blindfolded, and a bit is in its mouth, which falls out when the Akatsuki members are sealing a tailed beast. On the creature's blindfold are nine closed eyes (eight eyes in two rows of four with the larger ninth eye in the center), each corresponding to one of the nine tailed beasts. The eyes don't appear to be in any specific order, as the eye representing the one-tailed Shukaku is the second on the upper row while the eye representing the three-tailed beast is the third on the lower row.
After the summoning, the host or tailed beast (depending on if it is sealed in a person or not) is placed in front of the statue while each Akatsuki member stands on the finger that corresponds to their specific ring. The members then perform Sealing Technique: Illusionary Dragon Nine Consuming Seals to draw the spirit of the beast (or the beast itself) into the statue. Once the beast is sealed, all the eyes open, and the pupil of the eye that corresponds to the beast appears, indicating that it has been successfully sealed. It's unknown if the statue serves any other purpose than to contain the captured tailed beasts.



Rings
Each Akatsuki member wears a single, unique ring, and no two members wear a ring on the same finger. Each member wears their ring on the same finger as the spot they occupy on the giant statue. In total, there are ten rings, but Akatsuki only possesses eight; Orochimaru kept his after defecting and Kakuzu's body (and ring) is in Konoha's possession. Orochimaru's ring still rests on the little finger of the severed left hand from his original body. The rings seem to have some special significance; Tobi believed that he could become a member after finding Sasori's ring, and although Zetsu claims it's not as easy as that, Tobi does indeed become a member. Deidara reinforces the significance of the rings after losing both his arms by expressing more concern for finding the arm with his ring, rather than finding the arm itself. Each ring bears a unique symbol, the first kanji of its name.

Forehead protectors
The members of Akatsuki continue to wear forehead protectors from their former home villages, but scratch a line across the symbol of their village. This is done to indicate that their ties to the village have been severed and they no longer give any allegiance to their former homes. Currently, the Akatsuki leader, Tobi, and the one unnamed Akatsuki member have not been shown wearing forehead protectors, so it is unknown where they are originally from. Additionally, Hidan's forehead protector, while clearly visible, features a symbol not correspondingwith any known village, so his place of origin is a mystery, as well.