Hackers Target Malaysian Government Sites

A number of Malaysian government Web sites fell prey to cyber attacks Wednesday night in a coordinated effort possibly organized by members of the clandestine Web group, Anonymous.

Ninety-one Web sites were attacked starting at 11:30pm local time, the Malaysian Communications and Multimedia Commission told Bloomberg. Seventy-six have since come back online.

Earlier this week, an image from Anonymous circulated, calling on supporters to attack malaysia.gov.my on June 15 at 7:30pm GMT.

In a YouTube video (below) posted on June 14, Anonymous criticized Malaysian government officials for their censorship of the Web.

"We have seen the censorship taken by the Malaysian government, blocking sites like The Pirate Bay, and WikiLeaks," according to a voice in the video, which was set to music from the movie Inception. "Malaysia is one of the world's strictest governments, even blocking out movies, and television shows. These acts of censorship are inexcusable. You are taking away a basic human right. The Internet is here for freedom, without fear of government interference."

The video went on to warn Malaysian officials that "this is a sign, a warning, and an opportunity to listen to ideas above your own."

"Now we will wash your corruption away so be prepared. Take this as a favour," the group concluded.

Malaysia, however, has not been mentioned on the AnonOps Twitter feed or blog. Most recently, those sites have named Federal Reserve chairman Ben Bernanke as the next Anonymous target. Anonymous, however, is a rather splintered group. If you say you are a member of Anonymous, you are a member of Anonymous, making the group difficult to track. Bloomberg reports that many of the Malaysia attacks came from unidentified local hackers, who set up a blog to share updates.

The fractured nature of Anonymous, however, hasn't stopped some officials from crackdowns. Members of the group were arrested in Spain and Turkey this week over distributed denial of service (DDoS) attacks similar to the ones that affected the Malaysia sites.