Wikileaks: We are currently under a mass distributed denial of service attack.

[Turborama]

Source: Wikileaks Twitter





Read more: http://twitter.com/wikileaks/statuses/8920530488926208

---

UPDATE: El Pais, Le Monde, Speigel, Guardian & NYT will publish many US embassy cables tonight, even if WikiLeaks goes down
4 minutes ago via web

From: http://twitter.com/wikileaks
____________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________


Wikileaks 'hacked ahead of secret US document release'

Source: BBC

Whistle-blowing website Wikileaks says it is under attack from a computer-hacking operation, ahead of a release of secret US documents.

"We are currently under a mass distributed denial of service attack," it says on its Twitter feed.

It adds that several newspapers will go ahead and publish the documents released to them by Wikileaks even if the site goes down.

=snip=

The newspapers set to publish details of the US embassy cables include Spain's El Pais, France's Le Monde, Germany's Speigel, the UK's Guardian and the New York Times.

Full article: http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-us-canada-11858637

____________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

BREAKING NEWS 5:13pm UK, Sunday November 28, 2010

WikiLeaks Claim: 'We're Under Cyber Attack'

Alison Chung, Sky News Online

Thousands of potentially embarrassing US documents are due to be published by whistleblower website WikiLeaks - but the organisation says it is under cyber attack.

The secret files - believed to be the first batch of up to 2.7 million documents to be published - are expected to be released this evening.

But Wikileaks has written on Twitter: "We are currently under a mass distributed denial of service attack."

Sky News has been able to access the whistleblower website and news outlets that have already seen the documents insist they will go ahead in publishing the contents.

Full article with video report: http://news.sky.com/skynews/Home/World-News/WikiLeaks-Set-To-Reveal-Secret-US-Files-Between-Washington-And-US-Embassies-Around-The-World/Article/201011415836445?lpos=World_News_Carousel_Region_0&lid=ARTICLE_15836445_WikiLeaks_Set_To_Reveal_Secret_US_Files_Between_Washington_And_US_Embassies_Around_The_World

[Catherina]

1. Wikileaks should have released that stuff last night.

But I'm sure this DOS attack comes as no surprise and they have a plan A, B, C, and D.

[BetsysGhost]

39. THEY ARE OUT!!

http://www.guardian.co.uk/

[gtar100]

43. And the state department calls Wikileaks "irresponsible". Ah, sure, ok.

"We are all bracing for what may be coming and condemn WikiLeaks for the release of classified material," state department spokesman PJ Crowley said. "It will place lives and interests at risk. It is irresponsible."

Where the hell do I start? The US government alone has on it's list of completed items far too many that are irresponsible and place lives and interests at risk.

• Escalated war in Afghanistan


• Assist BP in covering up the real damage in the Gulf


• For-profit health care system remains intact


• Minimize regulations over the oil industry


• Maintain "free trade" agreements; seek to expand them


• Keep Wall Street and banks afloat (an understatement)

Add to that all the other criminal organizations that run as governments throughout the world. Shit, what a bunch of assholes.

Who the hell are these fucking small-minded assholes to say what is irresponsible and dangerous for people. Because of the decisions these assholes make on a daily basis, people suffer in abject poverty and work for hardly enough to stay alive (think sweat shops, long hours every single day, in prison-like conditions, with pennies to show for it). Children starve to death, water is scarce but guns are plentiful. Yet still they want to call the actions of Wikileaks irresponsible. Fuck off!!

[truedelphi]

61. + 1. n/t

[bemildred]

2. Gee, who could have predicted this? nt

[xchrom]

3. +1

[Kablooie]

30. We'll see how long it lasts and how powerful US government hackers are.

[ananda]

4. Three major news outlets already have the leaks.

And I understand that Der Spiegel posted them early and then took them down.

They'll still get out, I think.

[Poll_Blind]

5. They just posted a little Q&A FAQ about them, FWIW. But they and the...

...other newspapers working with WikiLeaks do have copies, have likely had copies for weeks, yet.

PB

[notesdev]

6. Oh boy

The people doing the attacking are morons, everything they do against this guy only serves to further enhance his credibility.

Looks like we're in for some very nasty revelations indeed if they are going to do something this obvious.

[bemildred]

9. Yep, it's kind of a "tell" that they are doing it at all.

But on the other hand, the cyber-warriors have to justify their salaries.

[villager]

56. but but... if you haven't done anything bad, you have nothing to hide, right!?

:shrug:

[bemildred]

58. Just seems dumb to me.

DDOS is just vandalism, and it will have no effect on what does or does not get leaked and released and discussed. It could even be counterproductive by attracting attention.

[Name removed]

12. Deleted message

Sub-thread removed by moderator. Click here to review the message board rules.

[obxhead]

29. "The people" likely involved in this attack is likely us

though our CIA, NSA, etc etc etc.

Obviously I have zero proof of that, but I feel safe in that guess none the less.

[jberryhill]

47. Or millions of people attempting to access a heavily promoted site

But that would be too simple.

[liberation]

77. ... or too wrong.

.

[superduperfarleft]

7. If the information is already out there via bitorrent, then this attack is completely pointless.

The files aren't just on the wikileaks website, they're hosted from the home computers of everyone who downloaded the file.

[Paper Roses]

8. Just one more step, it never ends. What freedom of information? n/t

[cal04]

10. Wikileaks 'hacked ahead of secret US document release'

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-us-canada-11858637

Whistle-blowing website Wikileaks says it is under attack from a computer-hacking operation, ahead of a suspected release of secret US government files.

(snip)
Wikileaks founder Julian Assange has said the US authorities are afraid of being held to account.

[Pavulon]

11. DDOS is 4chan stuff.

for the fuck america crowd we own the DNS servers, we OWN IOS and JUNOS (the OS the internet routers run) we have no need to DDOS these guys. Kinda like killing alquida guys with machetes when you have software that recognizes their faces and fires missiles at them.

We could redirect all wikitraffic to the rape crisis page in sweden.

[bemildred]

14. Who do you think is doing it?

It's an interesting question. I would suspect that Wikileaks might make it up, do a bit of provocation on their own, but they are savvy guys, so they would know they would be exposed. It seems silly - as you point out - for government agencies to be doing it. Maybe some dumb authoritarian government somewhere, stamping it's foot. Script kiddies looking to gain noteriety. It's really more in the area of theater than anything.

[pscot]

69. That's a good point

The Reuters article I saw said foreign diplomats were named. Israeli? Russian? French? Probably none of them want to see their dirty laundry hung out in public.

[bemildred]

70. Well, it's a long list, but they have to be dumb too.

Cause this DDOS will not stop the release. The other possibility is some form of theatrical effort.

[RaleighNCDUer]

15. That's OK - take a deep breath

and remember that the release of the Pentagon Papers was once considered to be treason, too.

[patrice]

37. This is going to be a case of the pot and the kettle, a bunch of them actually.

[jaybeat]

16. Two words: Plausible deniability

Who U.S.? We would never do such a thing? I mean, we wouldn't have to! We could just pull their plug if we wanted to. Oh, no, it wouldn't make any sense for U.S. to do it. Silly tin foil hatters!

Exactly why I'm sure "we" are behind it, directly or indirectly.

Futile. Silly. Childish. Typical.

[ProudDad]

21. "we" CAN'T 'pull the plug'

Thanks to cold war paranoia, The internet was designed to be impervious to damage or shut-down of even a majority of the computers in the network.

Not to mention the fact that their corporate masters who make the lion's share of money from the infrastructure of the internet wouldn't allow them to "pull their plug" because that would mean pulling EVERYONE's plug!

And would the National Security Apparatus of the Corporate States of Amerika do such a thing...you bet your ass they would! And, yes, they are that fucking stupid...

[jeff47]

44. Sure we can.

The internet relies on DNS. DNS translates names like "wikileaks.org" into an IP address used by computers. At the moment, wikileaks.org translates to 46.51.186.222

There's nothing to prevent changing that DNS record, and the US Gov't owns the 'root' DNS servers. So they could change it so that "wikileaks.org" comes back as 72.14.204.103 (google.com). Or any other address they felt like using.

Now, if you happen to know the old address for wikileaks, you could still get there. But if you didn't happen to save that (and who would?) then you're going to go to the new address.

A little under a year ago, Pakistan used this technique to 'accidentally' knock YouTube offline (http://news.cnet.com/8301-10784_3-9878655-7.html)

And this assumes the US Gov't only has publicly-known attacks.

[ProudDad]

51. The DNS root servers are private

not owned by the U.S. government...

Of course, that doesn't mean that the "National Security State(tm)" couldn't illegally coerce those private companies into screwing up the entries -- but that's another discussion...

And, in practice, the I/P address would be common knowledge around the world within minutes of any attempt to block the URL...

I'm saying that thanks to DARPA the essential infrastructure of the internet tubes is pretty secure against any one government's actions...


http://www.tech-faq.com/dns-root-servers.html

[jeff47]

53. The money to run them comes from the Department of Commerce

That might as well be 'owned'.

"And, in practice, the I/P address would be common knowledge around the world within minutes of any attempt to block the URL"

Why, exactly? DNS holds the numeric addresses, so we don't bother to.

"I'm saying that thanks to DARPA the essential infrastructure of the internet tubes is pretty secure against any one government's actions"

Only when it comes to routing the packets. Addressing is a completely separate issue.

[boppers]

88. By the numbers:

1. "The money to run them comes from the Department of Commerce"

False, the money and hardware comes from all over the world, because there are servers and RP's all over the world.

2. "DNS holds the numeric addresses, so we don't bother to."

I memorize the IP addresses for sites, because that kind of information is quite helpful when troubleshooting DNS (occasionally part of my sysadmin duties). For sites that have to be especially reliable in their responses, see number 3:

3. "Addressing is a completely separate issue."

The current system, as designed, is globally distributed. You could take *every* root DNS server offline, right now, and the lower level servers would already be cached, so, to take out wikileaks, you'd have to compromise the hundreds of "." servers, the hundreds of 'org' servers, and the 4 wikileaks DNS servers, and any caching nameservers (which would be in the millions) that had cached records already. At the same time... And you'd have to maintain it for hours.

...Oh, and you'd also have to take control over every computer connected to the internet, because /etc/hosts (it's in various locations, depending on your operating system) can hold static entries, where external servers are *never* checked for those addresses.

FWIW, attacks on the roots are incredibly common. How many times has all global DNS been compromised (hint: it's never happened, because it's near impossible)?

[boppers]

87. A chart:

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/e/ee/Root-current.svg

From: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Root_nameserver

The roots are controlled by the ICANN DNS Root Server System Advisory Committee, not the US government (though there are US agencies who have root responsibility).

Oh, and the Pakistan youtube issue had nothing to do with DNS. They were broadcasting bad routing tables, which is a totally unrelated thing... they left the IP address intact, but said "Oh, you want to get to those youtube machine addresses? They're here, in Pakistan. Oops, can't get to them, sorry."

[Warren Stupidity]

17. 'we' could gin up a rape crisis too!

boy oh boy when 'we' are given the green light there is no telling where 'we' will go!

[ShamelessHussy]

18. that would be a bit revealing

better to go with the 4chan stuff... low tech, very effective, plausible deniability...

[go west young man]

22. Interesting that you are the only DU'er to bring up that Rape bs.

in this thread. Gotta keep perpetuating the myth eh?

[davidwparker]

52. You mean you think people on DU are here only to cast

doubt, intimidate/name call, and influence the discussions we have?

Not any more. Those departments within DNC, NSA, CIA, RNC, this candidate's staff, that politician's staff have been shut down long ago.

:hi:

[Pavulon]

63. Swiss pass law to expel non citizen criminals. One more nation off the list

for assange. I bet his world gets really small soon, his merry idiots as well. This is all about money and people don't like loosing it.

[erikdane]

66. I didn't think he was convicted yet?

I am pretty sure it's only for convicted criminals. Otherwise its also looks like no skiing in the Swiss Alpes for Bush and Cheney as well!

[Lars77]

68. And if he was convicted?

What has that got to do with these documents?

[Kablooie]

32. I'd bet it's the US trying to utilize their government hackers.

It's lame.
That's why I think it the US.
They are clueless when it comes to network management.

[Pavulon]

59. Hey when you get bored, look up the guys who wrote IOS and JUNOS

if you know that those things are. Look at their background. Hmm, like I said ddos is a poon play. Writing code that breaks PLC controllers, not so much.

[Hissyspit]

82. Here:

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_mesg&forum=389&topic_id=9646632&mesg_id=9646632

Authoritarian hacker-type, apparently. Could be liar, of course: http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_mesg&forum=389&topic_id=9646632&mesg_id=9646632

[kgnu_fan]

Some of you need to take a nap. Too much movie and fantasy.

[Name removed]

13. Deleted message

Sub-thread removed by moderator. Click here to review the message board rules.

[ProudDad]

19. Memo to Fascist National Security Apparatus

of the Corporate States of Amerika...

It ain't gonna work, assholes...

[dipsydoodle]

26. Backed up elsewhere, left, right and centre

I'd guess.

[Turborama]

20. Wikileaks: Tomorrow's Der Spiegel's cover today...

[JDPriestly]

23. Here you go!

Westerwelle -- aggressive (See, you, too, can read German)
Merkel -- Avoids risks, rarely creative.
Horst .... -- unpredictable
Wiegel -- not to be trusted
Ahmadinejad -- is Hitler
Medvedev -- pale, hesitant
Putin -- alpha male
Kim Jong Il -- epileptic seizures
Karzai -- driven by paranoia
Ghaddafi -- has a buxom blond as his nurse
Sarkozy -- emperor without clothes
Berusconi -- wild parties

Who needs Wikileaks to know the personalities of those characters.

Frankly, I'm reassured. Our diplomats (or whoever wrote those e-mails) are pretty good judges of character.

[dipsydoodle]

25. Ghaddafi -- has a buxom blond as his nurse

Sensible fellow. :rofl:

[Turborama]

33. Thank you!

Much appreciated! :hi:

[NYMdaveNYI]

24. We live in a country in which

we do not prosecute a man who marched us into an illegal war, but rather threaten to hang a man who seeks to end it.

KEEP ON FIGHTING, MR. ASSANGE.

[ProudDad]

27. +1000

[micraphone]

31. Amen to that...

K&R

[patrice]

35. +1~

[midnight]

40. It kind of sounds like just that.

[davidwparker]

54. +1

Hopefully, with all the "diplomatic chatter" urging to strike Iran, when the next false flag is thrown, we can connect the dots quicker.

[high density]

57. Where was he when Bush was leading us into this war?

Seems a bit late to the party.

[Dinger]

60. Please Post That As A Separate Thread. It Deserves Its Own

+ infinity!

[NYMdaveNYI]

90. 'Tis a separate thread. It's currently on the homepage

With 242 votes.

[Bodhi BloodWave]

72. my apologies but how exactly does most of these diplomatic releases

help stop the war?

I agree a few seems to be on the theme, but overall i don't see much helping end it

[harun]

73. +1

[Odin2005]

28. The PTB are going all out to stop the truth from getting out.

[patrice]

34. Would WikiLeaks be leaking if RepubliCONS had played START straight? The World is TIRED of our SHIT!

[ProudDad]

36. Yep

There are more than enough republicrat and democan crimes to report on...

[patrice]

38. Either way, I hope this puts a stop to the crap that's going on over those baby-nukes in START. nt

[WHEN CRABS ROAR]

55. Phone Sen. Jon Kyl 202-224-4521 tell him yout tired too!

[patrice]

74. Thank you very much. You are a good person! nt

[jeff47]

41. Um...this is likely self-inflicted

There's only so many requests a server can handle.

Wikileaks has spent months hyping this document release. They've now released the documents, and are receiving an onslaught of requests. Far more than normal, and more than they can handle. Geeks call it the Slashdot effect

Could it be the US govt? Doubtful. It's not a particularly helpful attack, since the information was already released to the media before today. Attacking today serves no purpose.

That being said, there's also the possibility of a script kiddy getting his "patriotic" jollys by doing this. But I think that's more remote.

[KamaAina]

45. There's a difference betwen a server getting slammed and a DDoS attack.

And it's easy to spot, especially for experienced techs like the WikiLeaks team.

[jeff47]

46. All we have is a tweet from their "PR department"

And I suspect their PR department is not as technically savvy.

Again, it's possible they're under an attack. But slashdotting strikes me as much more likely. It happened the last time they did a document dump.

[Hissyspit]

79. Here:

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_mesg&forum=389&topic_id=9646632&mesg_id=9646632

[jeff47]

84. I put my comment in that thread

Summary: Blogger trusts the bragging of a script kiddy as authoritative. Small chance of being correct, very large chance of looking like an idiot.

The last time wikileaks did a dump, they got overwhelmed. They called it a DDoS attack at first, but later corrected that to their servers got overwhelmed.

[Hissyspit]

86. I saw it. Yes...

Big grain of

[jberryhill]

48. O RLY?

I once had a high traffic client switch to a new hosting provider, and the provider shut off his server fairly quickly, claiming it was being "attacked".

It took us a while to make the provider understand, "No, that's our normal traffic."

"Experienced techs" like Microsoft and Apple have historically had problems on Christmas day, when everyone's new goodie wants to download updates.

[Hissyspit]

80. Here:

Possible source. Take with grain of Internet salt, of course: http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_mesg&forum=389&topic_id=9646632&mesg_id=9646632

[Hissyspit]

81. .

[AngryAmish]

42. Did they violate rule 1 and 2?

[DreamSmoker]

49. Us Pays Hackers???????

I will bet the farm this is set up by our very own Government...
I believe these documents will show that the American Military tactics are no different than the Terrorist..
Just as Evil or more so too....
Remember Our Government does not think Water-boarding is Torture....
Now info is leaking out that we too killed innocent civilians as one of many tactics used just to get info on the Enemy..

[RoccoR5955]

64. Better to hire hackers than throw them in jail.

Hackers are a great resource for computer security. There are white hat hackers, black hat hackers and grey hat hackers. I consider myself a grey hat.
Would you rather organized crime hires them to commit crimes?

[jonthebru]

50. Play with fire, you are bound to get burned.

[aquart]

62. I'm pretty sure the entire midEast is trying to log on.

Judging from the people I follow in Dubai and Iran. They're having a high old time with what they've already read and I'm guessing all their friends are trying to see for themselves. Is this is a DOS or extreme popularity?

[Clear Blue Sky]

65. Walk in the park for the NSA or CIA...

[Pavulon]

67. Like a master chief serving you prego and limp pasta

DDOS is beneath them.

[Clear Blue Sky]

78. True. Maybe some freelancing high school geek.

[fascisthunter]

71. This Only Delays the Inevitable

[humbled_opinion]

75. The righties are already spinning this as ....

Obama's fault, failed diplomatic relations, unable to control Top Secret Material inside government..

Where were these Leaks in during BUSHCO?

[Riftaxe]

76. Have they provided any evidence of a DDOS

yet? Or is it possible just cheap publicity and bad hosting?

[Hissyspit]

83. UPDATE:

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_mesg&forum=389&topic_id=9646632&mesg_id=9646632

Believe or not.

[jberryhill]

85. Lulz

Too funny. The site gets hammered with traffic and some guy tweeds "It wuz me".

Some day I'll have to publish the "secret insider confession" of the guy who blew up the BP oil rig.

The files are multiply backed up and distributed, and anyone with an IQ above room temperature knows that taking out that site isn't going to stop their distribution.

[sabrina 1]

89. I wonder why THAT happened?

:sarcasm:

I'm sure they expected it. This does show how far this government will go with the press, and explains why maybe, the press is so compliant in this country. Who wants to be assassinated by the CIA if they can avoid it?

Assange is a very courageous person. It takes real guts to expose the lies that have killed so many people.

I wonder what Daniel Ellsberg is thinking tonight?

Thanks Turborama, :kick: and rec'd