Palace websites down again, hackers post target list online

At least two websites administered by Malacañang were inaccessible again Wednesday night, even as hackers who claimed responsibility for the attacks posted a list of their targets online.

 

The Official Gazette (www.gov.ph) and Office of the President (www.president.gov.ph) sites were inaccessible as of 7:50 p.m., with visitors getting an error message.

 

Both sites, which had been occasionally inaccessible earlier in the day, indicated they were "temporarily available or too busy."

 

Hackers had attacked several government sites early Wednesday, the first day the controversial Anti-Cybercrime Act took effect.

 

Many groups had questioned the new law, particularly its provisions on online libel, which they said can threaten the right to freedom of speech.

 

'Occupy Philippines'

 

As this developed, one of the hacker groups that claimed responsibility for the attacks posted on Pastebin.com a list of government and private sector sites to attack as part of their "Occupy Philippines" plan.

 

The group calling itself xL3gi0n Hackers even outlined the method of attack on the targeted sites, including distributed denial of service attacks (DDoS) and botnets :

 

- www.dilg.gov.ph

- www.pia.gov.ph

- www.papt.org.ph

- www.smokefree.doh.gov.ph

- www.mmda.gov.ph

- www.meralco.com.ph

- www.doj.gov.ph

- www.titosotto.com

- www.bir.gov.ph

- www.customs.gov.ph

- www.pnp.gov.ph

- www.nbi.gov.ph

- www.ntc.gov.ph

- www.doh.gov.ph

- www.bsp.gov.ph

- www.senate.gov

- www.gov.ph

 

The site www.titosotto.com is the official site of Senate majority leader Vicente Sotto III, who had been criticized for supposedly inserting a provision including libel as an offense covered by the law.

 

Sotto, however, denied suggesting a 12-year jail term as punishment, even as he lamented he was being made a favorite whipping boy by critics of the law. — TJD, GMA News