Thursday 9 May 2013

Thailand prime minister's homepage defaced with insults

Thai prime minister Yingluck Shinawatra's official homepage was hacked on Wednesday, defaced with messages and a doctered picture deriding her on her homepage.
The PM Office's site was hacked around noon, Thailand time and was taken down for several hours soon after, The Bangkok Post reported. Checks by ZDNet showed the site was still down at press time.
One message appeared beside an edited image of Yingluck laughing, and made derogatory remarks about the premier's intelligence and sexual morality.
At the bottom of the page, a message in smaller words read, "I know that I am the worst prime minister ever in Thailand's history!!!", along with the name "Unlimited Hacked Team!!!". However, the group posted a message on its Facebook page denying responsibility for the hack.
thailandhack
The Web site was defaced with a doctored image of Yingluck Shinawatra laughing and the message "I know that I am the worst Prime Minister ever in Thailand history!!!" (Source: The Bangkok Post).
The cyberattack appears to be a direct response to Yingluck's request for Thailand's Information and Communications Technology (ICT) Ministry to take action against people spreading groundless accusations against her online.
She had made the call to growing online criticism after her decision to file a defamation suit against newspaper cartoonist Chai Ratchawat, who called her an "evil woman" on his personal Facebook page, a separate report on The Bangkok Post noted.
The ICT Minister Anudith Nokornthap said his ministry was working with the Thai police to track down those responsible and will conclude the probe on Thursday, but said he did not believe the incident was related to the ministry's clampdown of people posting insulting messages against Yingluck.
The PM Office's secretary-general Suranand Vejjajiva said gains in technology had made it easier to hack a Web site, and also for authorities to track down those responsible. Those found responsible will be prosecuted according to the law, he said.
This is not the first time Yingluck had been targeted by hackers. In July 2012, Yingluck's Twitter account was hacked and eight tweets criticizing her policies posted, according to a BBC report.
Last year, up to 2,960 Web sites were hacked from September 2012 to January this year, of which 1,250 belonged to the government, the report noted. Thailand's government is in the midst of reforming the country's computer crime law as it does not address current IT security issues and is planning a public hearing for citizen participation in the law revision, which is expected to take up to three years.

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