Pro-Wikileaks hackers may target British websites

LONDON: Pro-Wikileaks hackers are likely to target British websites in retaliation for the arrest of Julian Assange, the whistleblower site's editor, a senior security official has warned.

Britain's National Security Adviser Peter Ricketts told senior civil servants that Whitehall should be prepared to come under fire from "hacktivists" outraged by Assange's detention in Britain.

A string of companies have been attacked by Anonymous, an online network, after withdrawing support for WikiLeaks, in response to legal concerns over its release of secret diplomatic cables.

The credit card companies MasterCard and Visa both had their websites brought down by the group last week while PayPal, the online payment company, and Amazon, the online retailer, were also targeted, the Telegraph reported.

The "distributed denial of service" attacks - which bombard websites with bogus visits - came after the financial companies blocked donations to WikiLeaks and Amazon evicted it from its server space.

Websites belonging to the government in Sweden, to which Assange faces deportation over allegations of rape and sexual molestation, and the lawyers of his alleged victims, were also crippled by attacks.