veganbikes

I just happened upon it and was greeted by a message from some most likely snot nosed kid and one of those Japanese Animation characters claiming to be part of Anonymous (I doubt it, as I see no reason for the actual Anons to go after bike tourists, their main targets are of more importance and usually more political in nature)

I thought it rather funny, that someone took down a bike touring blog not seemingly because they were against bike touring but just to show they could do it. However you can still get all around the site aside from the home page so they didn't do a good job. Though the site hasn't been updated in years so it seems a waste. It is all rather laughable.

NeilGunton

I emailed Jamie about this (he's the site owner), and he says he's working on getting the site back up again.

Neil

350htrr

Laughable? Not in my book, Jail is more like it, and I don't care if the little snot is only 16 years old either... Or a stockade where people can throw rotten vegies at him/them...

hilltowner

If that was the little snot's attitude toward bike tourists I think I might have met his father at least once going by in the family car.

Vintage_Cyclist

Looks like just the home page for the site. It seems navigable via the table of contents Bicycle Touring 101: Complete Table of Contents

RomansFiveEight

I doubt it had ANYTHING to do with the bike site. In other words, I seriously doubt it was specifically targeted. Most likely a script kiddie who got some sort of access to the web host and it just ended up being theirs. Maybe they were the site with the most traffic of those they had access to.

Anonymous, by their own admission, don't pull stunts or do things "just because they can". When they do something it's because there is a clear political motive that fits their ideology. I can't imagine what this site would've done. But if you're a script kiddie who happened to get access to a web host somewhere then you're probably going to claim to be big bad anonymous. Sort of like how every middle aged man at a bar was in special forces and "almost made it to the NFL".

veganbikes

Jail for a non-violent crime that took down just the homepage of a website that hadn't been updated in years? I think whoever did it is a jerk and someone should take him down via the internets but aside from that nobody was harmed so there is little need to go beyond that.

Jail/prison simply turns minor criminals into more hardened individuals. It doesn't help people learn from their mistakes and become better people it usually will make them worse or stay the same. If there was a restorative justice system than I might change my tune but there isn't. I know plenty of lives that have been completely ruined because of jail/prison stints over non-violent misdemeanor offenses. If the person is out raping and killing they probably won't change much and might have a harder time being restored and do need to be kept away from the general public. Kids hacking the front page of a minor website, just need to grow up.

I don't think it was an attack on bike tourists or even bikers or really even anyone. The kid was just going after something easy because the more advanced chapters in his "Hacking for Dummies" book were too hard to read and let's face it this kid isn't very bright. He could have taken down a Pokeman or Call of Duty site if there was one closer within reach than the random bike touring site.

antokelly

brilliant