CIA Website Hacked, Struggles To Recover

[Jack]

An Anonymous-related Twitter channel claimed Friday that the group had successfully taken down the CIA's public-facing website.
The CIA website reportedly remained inaccessible several hours after the attack, then appeared to be offline intermittently for the rest of the weekend, as well as on Monday, in the face of what appeared to be a distributed denial of service (DDoS) attack. Anonymous had previously been making a habit of targeting the FBI on Fridays.
The CIA has acknowledged that it's been having website issues, but hasn't publicly commented on the cause. Interestingly, it's not clear if Anonymous was indeed responsible. "We'd remind media that if we report a hack or ddos attack, it doesn't necessarily mean we did it...FYI," according to a tweet from YourAnonNews, which is a reliable source of information about Anonymous activities.

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[HeffeD]

Whenever I see news reports like this, I always think of this xkcd comic.

 

[Jack]

Exactly, and the more fun part is that Annon didn't even tore up the poster...which will be up again in a few hours....
I really doubt the CIA really cares that much about their website as it's just a service for citizens and not something that could affect their operation.

 

[HeffeD]

I really doubt the CIA really cares that much about their website as it's just a service for citizens and not something that could affect their operation.

That's why I find the comic so funny. The CIA's website is merely that. A website. It really isn't much of a blow to the CIA if you take their site down.

Sure, I guess someone could argue that it doesn't say much about the competence of the CIA if they can't protect their website from hackers. But I'd be willing to bet that while I'd imagine the webmaster is an employee of the CIA and not an outside contractor, he's likely just your average webmaster. (Yes, normal people with normal skills work for the CIA...) I highly doubt they'd put their top people on something as insignificant as a website.

 

[Prorootect]

'I highly doubt they'd put their top people on something as insignificant as a website.'

Me too. Script-kiddies or rumors only .. not significant.