Expect more crashes on the Net

Suspicion falls on BN cybertroopers

PETALING JAYA: Whistleblower websites, activist blogs and some online newspapers are crashing as the clock ticks down to the Sarawak state election.

Barisan Nasional cybertroopers may be at work, said National Union of Journalists (NUJ) president Hata Wahari. And the Centre for Independent Journalism is equally suspicious.

“These cyber attacks have been going on since last week,” Hata said today. “We’ve seen sites like TV Selangor and others being affected.

“I think there is a cyber war going on because people are looking for information on Sarawak.”

Sarawak Report, a popular site dedicated to exposing the alleged corruption of Sarawak Chief Minister Abdul Taib Mahmud, and similarly critical sites such as Radio Free Sarawak, Dayak Baru and Anil Netto’s blog have all been apparently attacked.

Most were still down as this report was uploaded.

Hata alleged that the attacks were part of a government strategy to force Malaysians to depend on the BN-aligned media for news.

“When people can’t access theses sites, and they need information, they will have to rely on the mainstream media,” he said.

“I was informed that all the newspapers in Sarawak are running supplements of the good things done by the government there.”

He worried that the voting pattern would be affected.

Timing is suspiciou

CIJ executive officer Masjaliza Hamzah said the timing of the attacks made them suspicious.

“They create suspicion in the people who rely on the Internet for alternative news,” she said.

She expects more of such sites to crash in the next few days.

“I think if you present alternative viewpoints, the likelihood of being attacked is quite high,” she said.

Sarawak Report owner Clare Rewcastle Brown yesterday told FMT that the site was hit by a Distributed Denial of Service (DDoS) attack, such as happened to international whistleblower WikiLeaks.

Masjaliza urged alternative news sites and blogs to beef up their online security measures.

Blogger Netto, however, said it was possible that these sites were downed by recent heavy Internet traffic, but admitted that he had “no idea” of what was the actual cause.

He said the Sarawak election had raised interest in the East Malaysian state.

“In a sudden stretch, the traffic will increase beyond a server’s hosting package,” he said. “If you’ve noticed, over the last week or so, traffic has gone up two or three times.

“If you have genuinely high traffic, the server may be unable to cope with it. This happened during the last general election as well.”

Netto’s own site (anilnetto.com) crashed close to midnight last night and remained down for more than six hours.

Hata disagreed with Netto, arguing that there could not be so many visitors to websites during those late hours. - FMT