Cape Town - A few days after they brought down Independent Newspapers’ servers, the hacking group known as Anonymous Africa have not halted their attack, targeting a range of websites belonging to the Zimbabwean government.
By Thursday night, the Zimbabwe’s Ministry of Defence’s website had become the latest Anonymous target.
Claiming to be fighting against Zimbabwean President Robert Mugabe and his supporters, the group are now recruiting members and even accepting donations from a list of its 250 followers on Twitter.
IOL editor Alastair Otter said the attacks began at about 11am on Wednesday as the group executed Distributed Denial of Service (DDOS) on Independent Newspapers’ e-mail servers and website. The method involves crashing a system by flooding it with too many queries.
Anonymous Africa, which had been counting down to the attack, tweeted: “IOL your website is tango down for supporting the dictator Mugabe.”
The attack was in response to an opinion piece entitled “Mugabe hero of African liberation” which ran in the Sunday Independent earlier this month.
Independent Newspapers’ systems were restored at about 1.30pm.
But the group quickly moved on to their next targets, which included the websites of Mugabe’s party, Zanu-PF, and Zimbabwean newspaper The Herald.
IT specialist Arthur Goldstuck said the group or individual behind these attacks was using incredibly sophisticated hacking methods.
Most DDOS attacks make use of a “Botnet”, which is essentially a collection of computers that are used to bombard websites with queries.
“(The hackers) gain control over other people’s computers by distributing malware (viruses), and use them for this purpose,” said Goldstuck.
As a result, the attacks are difficult to trace because most, if not all, of the online addresses involved belong to unknowing participants.
But Goldstuck said while the group might be a collection of “hacking geniuses”, their political ideology was flawed.
Goldstuck cited an attack last month in which a hacker gained access to the personal details of thousands of “whistle-blowers” on the SAPS website.
While the hacker claimed this was being done for the Marikana miners and to undermine the police, it was ultimately members of the public who suffered.
Anonymous Africa’s popularity continues to grow, gaining followers and even opening up job positions. “The African cyber army is recruiting. If you have leet (elite) skills or access to a giant Botnet, contact us,” tweeted the group.
Goldstuck said this was a perilous time for any hacking group. Most intelligence agencies were looking to enter these groups of “hacktavists”, and recruitment provided the perfect opportunity.
Meanwhile, the group has also asked for donations, using an online currency known as Bitcoins. The currency is favoured by “hacktavists” because it is untraceable and independent of governmental influence. - Cape Argus