Hacker group Anonymous on Saturday made the Formula One its latest victim when it performed a DDoS (distributed denial of service) attack on its official website (formula1.com), as well as defacing its fan site f1-racers.net and several partner websites.
Anonymous attributed the attack to Formula One’s decision to go ahead with the Grand Prix in Bahrain, where protests have been taking place.
On Friday, the infamous hacktivists warned Formula One’s CEO, Bernie Ecclestone, in the form of a press release talking about ‘Operation Bahrain’. The group also encouraged its supporters to hack Formula One executives.
As part of the website’s defacement, the group posted a message explaining the motives behind the attack.
“For over one year the people of Bahrain have struggled against the oppressive regime of King Hamad bin Al Khalifa. They have been murdered in the streets, run over with vehicles, beaten, tortured, tear gassed, kidnapped by police, had their businesses vandalised by police, and have tear gas thrown in to their homes on a nightly basis,” it read.
“Still the regmine persists to deny any meaningful reform and continues to use brutal and violent tactics to oppress the popular calls for reformation. Not only is the Human Rights situation in Bahrain tragic, it becomes more drastic with each passing day. For these reasons the F1 Grand Prix in Bahrain should be strongly opposed. The Al Khalifa regime stands to profit heavily off the race and has promised to use live ammunition against protestors in preparation. They have already begun issuing collective punishment to entire villages for protests and have promised further retribution “to keep order” for the F1 events in Bahrain. The Formula 1 racing authority was well-aware of the Human Rights situation in Bahrain and still chose to contribute to the regime’s oppression of civilians and will be punished.”
Anonymous concluded by making requests to Bahrain’ government.
“We demand the immediate release of human rights worker Abudlhadi Alkhawaja who has spent over 70 day son hunger strike. He has committed no crimes and is being punished by the regime for advocating people’s basic human rights. Free him and all other political prisoners in Bahrain. End torture. Deport all mercenary police and stop the use of tear gas against civilians.”
