Hackers disrupt Al-Jazeera website

Hackers today replaced the English-language website of controversial Arab satellite television network Al-Jazeera with a US flag and the message Let Freedom Ring.

The hackers, calling themselves the Freedom Cyber Force Militia, briefly hijacked Internet traffic destined for Al-Jazeera’s website and redirected it to a different webpage on computers operated by Networld Connections Inc, an Internet provider in Salt Lake City.

The likely hacking technique, called DNS poisoning, fools so-called domain name servers across the Internet and is relatively difficult to defend against.

The page also included the message, God bless our troops, signed by a self-described “Patriot”. There was no response to an e-mail sent to an address on the Web page.

“Certainly, it has been hacked,” acknowledged Jihad Ali Ballout, a spokesman for Al-Jazeera. He described the attack as “a frontal, vicious attack on freedom of the press” and urged anyone with information about the hackers to contact authorities.

The Arab network’s website has been suffering disruptions for days, ever since it showed pictures of dead and captive British and US soldiers in Iraq.

Al-Jazeera, also based in Qatar, is an unusually independent voice in the Arab world.