Computer hacking has been declared "legal by default" in a test case in Buenos Aires against a group of political 'hacktivists'.

The country's Supreme Court ruled that as hacking did not harm people, animals or property it is not technically illegal, but the court added that computer crime presented a "dangerous legal void".

The case revolved around a group of hackers called X-Team that vandalised the deeply unpopular Supreme Court website in 1998 with photographs of a murdered journalist and slogans claiming human rights cover-ups by the country's judges.

In a manuscript obtained by Reuters, the ruling judge claimed that the case "allows us to warn that there is a serious legal void that these days does not allow us to repress these [crimes]".

X-Team posted photos of journalist Jose Luis Cabezas on the court's site after he was murdered and his case quashed. Cabezas had been investigating the relationship between a Buenos Aires tycoon and former president Carlos Menem.