LulzSec's website goes down: Hackers hack hackers

With LulzSec having just released a fresh batch of material taken from Arizona law enforcement, its website has gone offline, leading many to question whether in the midst of its Operation Anti-Security rampage, LulzSec may itself have fallen victim to hackers.

Intermittently the hacking collective LulzSec's website has gone down, with the message, "This website (http//lulzsecurity.com/releases/) is currently offline", appearing.

A tweet issued by LulzSec has revealed the cause of these intermittent -- and often brief -- outages to be distributed denial of service attacks inflicted by rival hackers or hacker groups.

The tweet that went up today read, "That clown Jester taking credit for other people's work again? Our site has had 24/7 heavy DDoS attempts for weeks. Good old CloudFlare!"

The revelation indicates that the groups has been dealing with attacks for some weeks now without too much trouble. But only today the error message appeared at least two times, indicating the frequency and intensity of the attacks may be increasing.

DDoS attacks bring down websites by overloading them with requests. The techniques is one of the simplest tools in a hackers disposal.

The technique has been used by both LulzSec and Anonymous on numerous occasions. Most recently by LulzSec against the U.K. Serious Organised Crime Agency's and two Brazilian Government owned websites.

Anonymous has inflicted numerous DDoS attacks against the Turkish Government in its ongoing "protest" against the country's internet censorship laws.

The websites slightly more regular periods of outage come just after LulzSec revealed Arizona law enforcement as its most recent victim. The attack is the most recent perpetrated by LulzSec in it and Anonymous' ongoing Operation Anti-Security campaign.

Outlined as a new campaign against the world's governments, Operation Anti-Security has seen a marked change in LulzSec's M.O.

Rather than simply hacking targets willy-nilly in pursuit of "lulz" -- laughs -- Operation Anti-Security has seen the collective take on a slightly more serious tone, taking on several of the hacktivist policies of its 4Chan-born and new brother-in-arms Anonymous.

The campaign is designed to act as a form of protest and rebellion against the any government or organisation seeking to moderate of censor the internet.

"As we're aware, the government and whitehat security terrorists across the world continue to dominate and control our Internet ocean. Sitting pretty on cargo bays full of corrupt booty, they think it's acceptable to condition and enslave all vessels in sight.

"Our Lulz Lizard battle fleet is now declaring immediate and unremitting war on the freedom-snatching moderators of 2011," read LulzSec's opening Operation Anti-Security statement.

Since the news broke there has been one arrest made in relation to LulzSec recent attack on SOCA -- though LulzSec has since denied the individual's membership.

The campaign has split opinion across the world over with many who had previously supported or tolerated LulzSec's "shenanigans" viewing its involvement and leadership of Operation Anti-Security as a step-to-far.

Whether these attacks will gain momentum and actually manage to cause any serious damage to LulzSec's site remains to be seen, though given the fact that LulzSec has already hung-out-to-dry two hacker "snitches" that crossed it, many with the skills to do so may be hesitant to try.