‘Anonymous’ attacks Spanish police website following 3 hacktivists’ arrests

Following the arrest of three of its alleged members last week, the hacktivist group known as “Anonymous" claimed on Sunday to have attacked the website of the Spanish National Police over the weekend. Anonymous said it launched against the Spanish National Police website on Saturday a successful “distributed denial of service" (DDoS) attack, which is an orchestrated attempt to make a computer resource unavailable to its intended user. “The attack is a direct response to the Friday arrests of three individuals alleged to be associated with acts of cyber civil disobedience attributed to Anonymous," it said in a blog post. It said the DDoS attack, codenamed Operation Policia, paralyzed the police site — www.policia.es — for hours on Saturday, making it inaccessible to visitors. But as of Sunday afternoon (Manila time), the Spanish police site was accessible and appeared to be normal. On Friday, Spanish authorities announced they had arrested three Anonymous hackers suspected of participating in cyber-attacks against the Sony PlayStation Network as well as other corporate and government websites. Immediately after the arrests, Anonymous issued a press release where it said DDoSing “is an act of peaceful protest on the Internet." “Arresting somebody for taking part in a DDoS attack is exactly like arresting somebody for attending a peaceful demonstration in their hometown," it said. “Anonymous believes this right to peacefully protest is one of the fundamental pillars of any democracy... You have not detained three participants of Anonymous. We have no members and we are not a group of any kind. You have, however, detained three civilians expressing themselves... You are providing us with the fuel, but now you must expect the fire," it said. Earlier, Anonymous posted a blog entry the warning “Expect US" which was accompanied by an image of “V for Spain," referring to the imagery of the movie and comic book franchise “V for Vendetta." Another blog entry showed Spanish authorities wearing the Guy Fawkes masks that the group has adopted as one of its symbols, also taken from the “V for Vendetta" series. Anonymous owns up to attack on Turkey govt sites Meanwhile, the group also claimed responsibility for a DDoS attack against the Turkish government. It said the attack took down several official government websites, including http://tib.gov.tr/ and www.­sgk.­gov.­tr. “Anonymous is protesting Internet censorship in Turkey. The Turkish government plans to implement a filter on Internet browsing on Aug. 22 under the pretense of protecting the youth from ‘harmful elements on the web,’" it said. The group said its cyber attacks against the Turkish government consist of DDoS attacks using a coordinated network of Low Orbit Ion Canons (LOICs). — MRT/KBK, GMA News