Activist Hackers Temporarily Block Putin's Website Favorite 

From Reuters
By Vladimir Soldatkin

Hackers temporarily blocked President Vladimir Putin's web site on
Wednesday, carrying out a promise to disrupt government information
portals two days after his swearing-in for another six-year term that
has drawn street protests.

The hacker activist
group Anonymous used the "Op_Russia" twitter account to publicize the
attack, saying "kremlin.ru - TANGO DOWN" and "Anonymous shuts down
Kremlin's websites".

Internet users in Russia said they were unable to access the http://www.kremlin.ru website for several minutes on Wednesday.


"All the relevant departments are taking the necessary
measures to counteract (such) attacks," a spokesman for the Kremlin
Internet security division said.

"This is routine
work. There is always some external influence. Today we are witnessing a
splash of activity (by the attackers) ... (But) they failed to achieve
their goal."

Putin won a presidential election in
March and on Monday launched his third term as head of state, a day
after some 50,000 protesters took to the streets of Moscow over what
they called a rigged vote.

Police forcibly
dispersed the rally, although it had been approved by the Moscow city
authorities, and several opposition leaders were detained.

Last week, Anonymous said it would attack Russian government websites in support of opposition protests.


Anonymous hacked into the emails of a pro-Kremlin youth
organization earlier this year in what it said was a response to a
growing number of hacker assaults by pro-government groups on
independent news outlets and opposition bloggers.


For their part, pro-Kremlin activists are increasingly using underground
hacker networks to suppress the political opposition and independent
media which they see as a threat to Putin's hold on power, the
Britain-based human rights advocacy website OpenDemocracy said in a
report last month.

But the increasing accessibility
to hacker tools in Russia has also given the political opposition a
chance to inflict damage on pro-Kremlin targets.