HSBC Websites taken down by Anonymous

Anonymous is at it again.

Just this Thursday night, a splinter group of the infamous hacktivist organization has claimed responsibility for attacking several HSBC (Hong Kong and Shanghai Banking Corporation) Holdings websites, knocking them down for the count.

Fawkes Security, a United-Kingdom-based affiliate of the 4chan-based Anonymous party admitted to the packet flood attacks on HSBC sites. 

HSBC has been on the wrong end of DDoS attacks as of late, such that many of its named websites have been rendered inoperable by the Anonymous UK affiliate yesterday.

From hsbc.ca to hsbc.com and hsbc.co.uk, they've been all brought down to their knees by the hacking might of the Fawkes Security group. 

 

The Pastebin post was apparently brought out in order to stop anyone else from claiming responsibility for the assault.

It further alleges that the proof that it was Fawkes Security who executed the packet flood can be found in the time, date, and targets listed on their Twitter account tweets.

At any rate, there is presently some circumstantial evidence showing that Fawkes Security really was accountable for the HSBC sites takedown. 

 

Earlier, people suspected that Muslim hacktivists were behind the HSBC hacking.

It was only after Fawkes Security came out and claimed responsibility that the lending institution realized that they've been hit by domestic online terrorists instead.

At least with the Muslim terrorists, the attack would've made sense; they've been staging protests and producing denial of service attacks against U.S.-based banks in regards to the YouTube video (now removed) entitled "Innocence of Muslims". 

 

It wouldn't be a stretch of the imagination to see them attacking HSBC websites too.

At any rate, the bank has released a statement saying that it has been able to restore regular access to the online banking services of its attacked websites within the United Kingdom, Canada, and the United States around this Friday, on October 19.