MasterCard, Visa sites taken down in WikiLeaks revenge

By Jennifer Scott on Dec 9, 2010 4:25 AM
Filed under Security

'Anonymous' hackers claim DDOS attack.

Updated: The websites of credit card heavyweights MasterCard and Visa have been taken down in what appears to be a revenge attack for the company’s stance on WikiLeaks.

Earlier this week, MasterCard confirmed it would not be processing donations made by its cards to WikiLeaks – the site responsible for leaking a number of confidential US Embassy cable communications to the public.

It now seems to have become the latest target of the WikiLeaks-supporting hacker group ‘Anonymous,’ who claimed to have launched a distributed denial of service (DDOS) attack on the company’s website.

A post on Twitter from the group, which goes under the username @Anon_Operation, said: “WE ARE GLAD TO TELL YOU THAT http://www.mastercard.com/ is DOWN AND IT'S CONFIRMED! #ddos #wikileaks Operation:Payback(is a bitch!) #PAYBACK.”

Similar tweets were published just after 8am Australian time as a DDoS attack was launched against the Visa.com website.

MasterCard has been contacted for comment but it had not responded to our request at the time of publication.

If the attack has been launched by Anonymous, MasterCard will join an ever increasing list of WikiLeaks ‘enemies’ being targeted.

PostFinance, the Swiss bank which blocked payments to WikiLeaks, has already fallen victim to Anonymous and the group has claimed it will target PayPal after the service also suspended transfers to the site.

Julian Assange, the founder of WikiLeaks, was yesterday arrested in London, accused of sexual assault, which allegedly took place in Sweden back in August. He is now fighting against extradition back to the country.

This article originally appeared at itpro.co.uk

MasterCard, Visa sites taken down in WikiLeaks revenge

4 comments in this discussion

"I agree 100% with the above comments, but what can you do? Where is the competion in the credit card market? ACCC you listening? Most people haven't got an option to show their displeasure by ..."

By realitybites

Tags

mastercard, site, ddos, attack, wikileaks, revenge

KGB successor blamed in Russian site attacks

WikiLeaks suspends ops to raise cash

Pirate Bay backs global file-sharing research

Russian citizens targeted in Ustream DDoS

Breaking Stories

Hackett steps down from Internode

ACCC approves Optus NBN deal

Australia shares $2bn Square Kilometre Array

RIM to cut 2000 jobs

NSW retains right to veto data centre co-tenants

Readers of this article also read...

Comments: 4

Graeme Harrison (prof at-symbol post.harvard.edu) Dec 9, 2010 3:41 PM	I've suggested on IT News for some years that US Homeland Security must be paying for all the hard disks to enable Hotmail (MS), YahooMail (Yahoo) and Gmail (Google) to host for free the email of the great unwashed of the world. Clearly the issue is that it is easier for Homeland Security to check all email if on a few US servers, than trying to break-in to lots of servers around the world. And why did Hilary Clinton ask for US diplomats to get credit card details for the Head of the of the UN etc? Clearly once one has the credit card details, you can use the two US companies Visa and Mastercard to spy on where someone is, what rooms they are booking into (ahead of time to bug), and if they have any weakness that could be exploited (paying for women/porn/gambling etc). Now, I think the world needs to work out if it wants all of its credit handling systems to be subject to the whim of the US government. Any transaction put through Visa or Mastercard is subject to Homeland Security tracking. We now also know that transactions to legal entities can be terminated by simple request (no judicial order required) if something upsets the US government. Mitch McConnell (Republican senator) might think Assange is a terrorist, but WikiLeaks has not done anything to instil fear into the population generally... it has only scared the US politicians! And the Swedish crime he's committed, not using a condom, is hardly a crime worthy of extradition! Bring back 'Bankcard' as at least that was only subject to the whim of the Australian government! Graeme Harrison [Former Harvard Consultant to The White House]
jabein Dec 9, 2010 5:20 PM	Graeme is 100% correct. It is easy to push private enterprise to take action on behalf of government agencies and therefor escape the legal justifications and political embarrassment. There is nothing for free on the free mail host sites. Actually even if users paid for hosting on such sites their data is still being mined, exploited, controlled and reported. Had Assange been an Iranian or Chinese dissident, he would have been invited to the White House, the Canberra House, and given a Nobel Prize by the UN House.
Ezy2Confuze Dec 9, 2010 6:39 PM	"MasterCard confirmed it would not be processing donations made by its cards to WikiLeaks" Maybe some quick thinking lawyer can get together some MasterCard customers for a class action, after all it's the customers who made the donations and what right does a Financial institution have to tell a customer what they are allowed to spend their money on? Maybe even just the merest threat of such a class action being brought against them will force them to backpeddle on the issue. Unless of course MasterCard is the "bank" WikiLeaks has the juicy details on?
realitybites Dec 9, 2010 8:43 PM	I agree 100% with the above comments, but what can you do? Where is the competion in the credit card market? ACCC you listening? Most people haven't got an option to show their displeasure by cutting them up.