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06 Dec 2010
PayPal has been hit by a distributed denial-of-service (DDoS) attack in retaliation for its decision to cut off the account used by whistle-blowing site WikiLeaks to receive donations.
The online payments firm said in a blog post on Friday: "PayPal has permanently restricted the account used by WikiLeaks due to a violation of the PayPal Acceptable Use Policy, which states that our payment service cannot be used for any activities that encourage, promote, facilitate or instruct others to engage in illegal activity."
Just hours later, the activist group known as Anonymous, which was involved in launching DDoS attacks against the sites of creative industry organisations as part of Operation Payback, appears to have done the same to the PayPal blog, according to a blog post by Panda Security researcher Sean-Paul Correll.
The Twitter feed of Anonymous member AnonyWatcher read: "Close your #Paypal accounts in light of the blatant misuse of power to partially disable #Wikileaks funding. Join in the #DDoS if you'd like."
DDoS attacks have already been aimed at WikiLeaks by pro-US military supporters in an attempt to prevent the site releasing any more embarrassing US diplomatic cables.
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Do you agree?
Wikileaks funding
Forget Paypal you can fund Julian Assange's freedom of information by donating directly by post. Please do so as this is an affront to freedom of information and democracy.
Posted by: ab 07 Dec 2010
Simple
Wow thats quite shocking, First amazon now Paypal, definite misuse of their power i think, they were fine with it until just recently taking their percentage cut!
Posted by: Carl Dean 06 Dec 2010
Just goes to show.
The lengths that governments and institutions will go to!! Paypal closes the account with 60,000 euros and now the bank has frozen the assets because of a small error on the paperwork regarding his residing address. I wonder if this was a normal joe blogs like myself and not a major website owner/ admin currently on every news channel going i'd be treated with the same contempt. And to go that one step further allegations of sexual criminal offenses surface too. Once again confirming that agencies and governments and bodies of power should not be trusted.
Posted by: Carl Dean 06 Dec 2010