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By LOUISE NORDSTROM, Associated Press
STOCKHOLM WikiLeaks' American domain name system provider withdrew service to
the wikileaks.org name after the secret-spilling website once again became the
target of hacker attacks.
EveryDNS said in a statement that it dropped the website late Thursday because
the attacks threatened the rest of its network. WikiLeaks responded by moving
to a Swiss domain name, wikileaks.ch.
EveryDNS said in a statement that "Wikileaks.org has become the target of
multiple distributed denial of service attacks. These attacks have, and future
attacks would, threaten the stability of the EveryDNS.net infrastructure."
EveryDNS provides access to some 500,000 websites.
In a tweet on Friday, the owner of EveryDNS, Dynamic Network Services Inc.,
wrote that "trust is paramount: Our users and customers are our most important
asset." It did not specify whether it was referring to WikiLeaks, however.
WikiLeaks confirmed the move in a separate tweet, saying "WikiLeaks.org domain
killed by US everydns.net after claimed mass attacks." It was not clear where
the alleged attacks were coming from.
Earlier this week, WikiLeaks' Swedish server host, Bahnhof, confirmed that the
website had been hit by a cyber attack just before it leaked thousands of
classified U.S. diplomatic cables.
In addition to the latest batch of sensitive documents, WikiLeaks has angered
the U.S. and other governments by publishing almost half a million secret
documents about the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq. It is not clear how WikiLeaks
obtained the diplomatic documents, but the U.S. government's prime suspect is
an Army private, Bradley Manning, who is in custody on charges of leaking other
classified documents to WikiLeaks.
On Wednesday, Amazon.com Inc. who had provided WikiLeaks with use of its
servers to distribute embarrassing State Department communications and other
documents evicted it. The site remains on the servers of its Swedish
provider.
The ouster from Amazon came after congressional staff questioned the company
about its relationship with WikiLeaks. Sen. Joe Lieberman praised Amazon's
action and said it should "set the standard" for companies WikiLeaks is using
to distribute "illegally seized material"
In its decision to terminate the service, EveryDNS cited what it called a
violation of the provision stating that a member should "not interfere with
another member's use and enjoyment of the service."
Andre Rickardsson, an expert on file-sharing and information technology
security at Sweden's Bitsec Consulting, said domain name providers normally
don't drop their clients unless the clients themselves have breached their user
contract. "WikiLeaks is not behind the disturbance here, but individuals trying
to disturb WikiLeaks' operations," he said.
Rickardsson said he had never experienced a user being shut off under similar
circumstances. "I don't believe for a second that this has been done by
EveryDNS themselves. I think they've been under pressure," he said referring to
U.S. authorities.
Mark Stephens, the London-based lawyer for WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange's,
also speculated that outside pressure had forced EveryDNS to pull the plug on
WikiLeaks.
"Pressure appears to have been applied to close the WikiLeaks domain name," he
wrote on the micro-blogging website.
Australian Assange, 39, has been out of public sight for nearly a month. Sweden
has issued an Europe-wide arrest warrant for him over allegations of rape,
sexual molestation and unlawful coercion, but the exact nature of the
allegations are still unclear. Assange's Swedish and British lawyers claim
their client has attempted to assist in the questioning but that his offers
have so far been turned down. According to his lawyers, he has also yet to
receive formal notice of the allegations.
An American defense official has also indicated that U.S. government lawyers
are investigating whether Assange can be prosecuted for spying. He is also
risks legal action in his homeland, where Australia's Attorney General Robert
McClelland has said Australia would detain Assange if possible in response to
the warrant filed in the Swedish case by Interpol.
Assange has spoken publicly only through online interviews.