Now, ‘Brit Govt websites could be hacked in Wikileaks revenge attacks

LONDON - Britain’s national security adviser has warned that Wikileaks supporting computer hackers could target sites containing British taxpayers’ data.

The Telegraph quoted Sir Peter Ricketts as telling senior civil servants that Whitehall should be prepared to come under fire from “hacktivists” who are annoyed with British authorities over the arrest of Wikileaks founder Julian Assange,

A number of companies have been attacked in the recent past by Anonymous, an online network, after withdrawing support for WikiLeaks in response to legal concerns over its release of secret US diplomatic cables.

Last week, two credit card companies-MasterCard and Visa-had their websites brought down by the group, while the online payment company PayPal, online retailer Amazon were also targeted.

On Monday, Prime Minister David Cameroon’s spokesman said that Sir Peter had earlier advised the heads of government departments to guard against similar attacks.

He said there was particular concern about sites belonging to the Department for Work and Pensions, which holds information on benefits claimants, and HMRC, which has data on all taxpayers.

“My understanding is that the National Security Adviser has spoken to permanent secretaries about the security of Government websites. Obviously the priority there would be websites where we are dealing with information that belongs to members of the public,” he added. (ANI)