July 15 2000 BRITAIN Hackers force Cabinet to pull plug on website

BY GARY JACOB COMPUTER hackers forced the Cabinet Office to pull the plug on its website after they daubed it with electronic "graffiti" calling for "cheap beer and low-price fuel". The website was the latest to be brought down by the cyber-pests and yesterday computer specialists were still struggling to return it to normal.

Internet users who visited the site's home page were greeted with the message: "Cabinet Office? Not any More. Believe me, I could have OWNED this server, but chose not to. Protest to your MP. Demand qualified systems administrators, cheap beer and low-price fuel."

The openness of the Internet makes it especially vulnerable to such incursions.

A spokesman for the Cabinet Office confirmed that the attack had taken place.

"Everything possible is being done to remedy the situation and ensure that the site is brought back up again," he said.

It is not clear how the hackers got into the site. In general, however, they can try to gain access to the computer network or web server that hosts the pages. Once in, they change the computer code in the computer files which creates the web pages. They can then effectively display what they want.

http://www.the-times.co.uk/news/pages/tim/2000/07/15/timnwsnws01023.html

-- Martin Thompson (mthom1927@aol.com), July 16, 2000