TWO atheist websites in Australia which were knocked off-line in a major cyber attack on Tuesday are both up and running again.
Visitors to both the Atheist Foundation of Australia and the Global Atheist Convention got a “distributed denial of service” message when they tried to access the sites immediately after the attack.
The attacks, according to this report, may be related to the Global Atheist Convention, which is being held in Melbourne in March next year. Speakers include Richard Dawkins, author of The God Delusion and comedy writer Catherine Deveny.
About 1,000 tickets had through the Global Atheist Convention website, set up and is operated, by the AFA.
The AFA is billing the event as the largest gathering of atheists in Australian history but ticket sales were briefly halted due to the attack.
David Nicholls, president of the AFA, said it was not yet clear whether the attacks were motivated by religion or conservative Christian groups’ anger at the AFA’s lobbying for a more secular society.
However, the fact that two separate atheism-related websites were hit suggested the attack was targeted at atheists.
We have been informed that the Atheist Foundation of Australia and the Global Atheist Convention sites were the specific target of the attacks. This may not be just an attack on atheism, but an attack on freedom of speech.
The company hosting the websites disconnected them as a result of the attacks, which knocked out other websites hosted by the provider. But theA FA quickly found another host.
Said Nicholls:
Our aim is to keep the Australian government, education and welfare systems secular. Unfortunately, some people in our society find that very confronting.
The cyber attacks are reminiscent of last year’s major attacks on Scientology websites by a group of loosely connected group that called themselves Anonymous.
In May this year, 19-year-old Dmitriy Guzner from New Jersey agreed to plead guilty to playing a part in the attacks, which crashed Scientology websites. The final outcome of the case is not clear but he faced up to 10 years in prison.
Hat tip: David Griffiths
The Freethinker was founded in 1881 by GW Foote, an outspoken critic of religion. After the publication of 
October 22nd, 2009 at 10:44 am
Oh, they were just trying to do the will of God. And I’ve gotta say this is a way better approach than blowing up things.
Sorry, that’s all the silver lining I can see.
October 22nd, 2009 at 1:09 pm
Well it wouldn’t be suprising if atheists were targeted. After all, there’s nothing in the Bible about “Thou shalt not cause a distributed denial of service attack lest ye be cut off from thy ISP”.
October 22nd, 2009 at 2:31 pm
not related to DDOS’ but have you heard of the aussie internet blacklist? http://wikileaks.org/wiki/A_Bl....._Australia
I wouldn’t put it past people like that to attempt to curtail freedom of speech on wider issues, should their trial attempts be successful/popular enough.
P.S. is something going on with the comments system? I’m seeing duplicate posts and don’t seem to be able to login to intensedebate from the comments page – I freely admit this may just be because I am thick…
October 22nd, 2009 at 10:35 pm
Well, they’ve changed something in the last couple of days, Rog, though I can’t explain what. The comments aren’t hierarchical anymore, either. I will say I haven’t noticed duplicate comments.
October 22nd, 2009 at 11:46 pm
Mikespeir, we have reverted to our original comments method, having been driven to despair by the clunky, unpredictable and intensely annoying Intense Debate method which we gave a trial. Until something better comes along, I guess we will stick with what we have.
October 23rd, 2009 at 7:22 am
Hello from Russia!
Can I quote a post in your blog with the link to you?
October 23rd, 2009 at 8:19 am
Of course you can!
October 23rd, 2009 at 10:01 am
Couldn’t a forum just be set up and linked to a thread for each blog entry? That’s what Brian Thompson does with his excellent ‘Amateur Scientist’ blog.
Forum software is available for free, and is pretty mature now — like vBulletin.
October 23rd, 2009 at 1:45 pm
Brilliant. And the proof behind this is……? Oh there isn’t any. Gosh. Lovin’ the justice. I thought you guys were all about proof. Nevermind. Carry on regardless. Could it have been anarchists? Secular Hackers? No, of course not. Presumeably all of the viruses spread on the internet are intended to target incompetent atheist websites too? Must have been meany Christians trying to spoil your freethinking fun!
October 23rd, 2009 at 1:46 pm
BTW – it wasn’t me. I love reading your websites. Dilbert is another site I love. So amusing.
October 23rd, 2009 at 4:18 pm
Tim Danaher, vBulletin is not free actually, it costs a few hundred dollars.
Also, without going into a tirade about Anonymous vs Co$, that whole thing was about shits & giggles originally. I don’t like the comparison of the jovial pursuits of the headbangers at ebaumsworld and and these kind of cold and calculated attacks on free speech.
It would however be fun to see fundamentalist Christians running around covered in vaseline and pubic hair like Anon!
These shitheads probably hired out a botnet. It would be ironic if these attacks were coming from chinese or russian machines actually!
October 24th, 2009 at 3:33 am
@Barry
could this be an opportune moment to [re]suggest a bulletin board/forum; I mean if you are going to have to rework the comments section anyways?
October 24th, 2009 at 4:21 am
@ tim
http://www.phpbb.com is quite handy too.
I do think that a forum would aid in creating an online community, it is one this to post on [excelent] blog articles – yet, free debate is something else, it may bring more people towards an ‘active point of view’, you never know.
October 24th, 2009 at 1:35 pm
So, are the anarchists now working for God to smite the web sites of unbelievers?
Or is this a new type of holy crusade by believers themselves?