Russia Today: As a result of WikiLeaks, the Obama Administration may introduce a new bill that would allow government officials the ability to spy on Americans through the internet. Meanwhile, an army of hackers rally behind WikiLeaks by shutting down MasterCard and PayPal because they stopped all payments to WikiLeaks. Investigative journalist Wayne Madsen says we could see massive government surveillance of our personal computers, phones and surveillance of our internet activities.
Hackers Strike Back to Support WikiLeaks
CASSELL BRYAN-LOW in London And SVEN GRUNDBERG in Stockholm
WSJ
Wednesday, December 8, 2010
A growing list of organizations and individuals that have tangled with WikiLeaks and its detained founder, Julian Assange, have suffered online attacks, in what appears to be an effort by hackers bent on exacting revenge for the document-leaking website.
The attacks stepped up Wednesday, a day after Mr. Assange was arrested and denied bail in London in connection with sexual-misconduct accusations in Sweden. A range of organizations, including MasterCard Inc., Visa Inc., and the Swedish prosecutor’s office, reported technical difficulties with their websites that appear to stem from so-called denial of service attacks, in which computers flood a server to prevent it from displaying a Web page.
The attacks in recent days have hit eBay Inc.’s PayPal as well as MasterCard, both of which have pulled services from WikiLeaks in recent days. Also affected: Swiss bank PostFinance. The unit of Swiss Post recently closed Mr. Assange’s account, saying he provided a false address in Geneva, failing to meet the bank’s requirement of Swiss residency for account holders. While the attacks caused some business disruption, they were mostly annoying rather than crippling.
The Swedish Prosecution Service said Wednesday that its website had been flooded overnight by denial of service attacks. The prosecutors’ office said it reported the incident to Swedish police. The website for Claes Borgstrom, the lawyer representing the two women making the accusations against Mr. Assange, also crashed.
A WikiLeaks spokesman couldn't be reached to comment. In a television interview Wednesday, WikiLeaks spokesman Kristinn Hrafnsson said moves by companies that have cut off WikiLeaks are "causing an outrage among the general public that actually might hurt their own business."
By Wednesday morning in Europe, MasterCard also was suffering attacks on its website that slowed its function. At the same time, several Twitter posts claimed that the credit-card company's site was suffering.
"http://www.mastercard.com/ is DOWN! #ddos #wikileaks Operation:Payback," said one post under the name "Anon_Operation," whose Twitter page is identified as part of Operation Payback, a campaign against "anti-piracy & anti-freedom entities."
Social network Facebook Inc. removed the "Operation Payback" page on its site late Wednesday after the group used the page to urge hackers to launch an unlawful denial of service attack.
MasterCard confirmed its consumer website was experiencing heavy traffic, which appeared "to be the result of a concentrated effort to flood our corporate website with traffic and slow access." The Purchase, N.Y.,company added that it was working to restore normal service and that its "systems have not been compromised and there is no impact on our cardholders' ability to use their cards for secure transactions globally."
The company later said that it had made "significant progress" in restoring access to the site. MasterCard cardholders who had enrolled in a separate security program also experienced some disruptions when trying to use that service.
MasterCard had said on Monday that it was working to suspend payments to WikiLeaks "until the situation is resolved."
Rival Visa Europe, which handles global payments to European companies, followed suit Tuesday, suspending payments to WikiLeaks "pending investigation into whether it contravenes Visa operating rules, including compliance with local laws in the markets where we operate." Both companies facilitated contributions to WikiLeaks that donors charge on their credit cards.By Wednesday afternoon, attacks hit the corporate website of Visa Inc. The San Francisco-based company said it was taking steps to restore operations.
Mr. Assange is in custody in London after being arrested on an international warrant issued by Sweden, where he is accused of rape, molestation and unlawful coercion by two women. The WikiLeaks founder, who for the past few months has hopped among countries, had sexual encounters with the women during a stint in Sweden last summer. Mr. Assange, who has confirmed the sexual encounters but denied the assault allegations, hasn't been charged in either case.
According to a description of the allegations read in a London court on Tuesday, a lawyer for Swedish authorities said one of the women alleges that Mr. Assange forcibly held her arms and legs, preventing her from moving, and had sexual intercourse with her without using a condom despite knowing it was a prerequisite for her. The other woman alleges that Mr. Assange had sex with her while she was asleep, again failing to wear a condom despite knowing she required it.
Mr. Assange's personal legal problems come against the backdrop of the site's showdown with the U.S. government over WikiLeaks' release of thousands of classified documents. The U.S. considers the documents "stolen," though no charges have been filed against WikiLeaks or Mr. Assange. But tThe situation has caused additional fallout for WikiLeaks, as an array of operators including PayPal and Amazon.com Inc. ceased providing services for WikiLeaks in recent days.
PayPal spokesman Anuj Nayar said the company did so because a review by the online-payment company determined the account collecting donations for WikiLeaks "to be in violation of our [acceptable use policy]."
Mr. Nayar said PayPal had been the victim of attacks, which had at times slowed its website down, "but have not significantly impacted payments." He said PayPal's website "was fully operational" Wednesday. Amazon, which has stopped hosting WikiLeaks from its Web servers, didn't report system outages for its Web services Wednesday.
While it isn't clear exactly who is behind the attacks, some security specialists say they are being organized by a group of online activists calling themselves "Anonymous" as part of the so-called "Operation Payback" effort.
Sean-Paul Correll, a Los Angeles-based researcher at software firm Panda Security, says the effort is a loose-knit group that uses servers hosted in Russia, but that there is no reason to believe that is where the individuals are based. He added that the group appeared to be able to corral thousands of computers, which are then used to bombard servers of a target Web site with data.
Mr. Correll described the attacks as more organized than sophisticated. "People are finding out they don't need to stand in a picket line anymore. They are using technology to fight back."
Bruce Schneier, a cyber-security expert, said it was a common type of attack, "and not a particularly interesting one at that…It's kids playing politics, no threat whatsoever."
