Hackers Attack Senate Website

Reuter reports:

The Senate's website was hacked over the weekend, leading to a review of all of its websites, in the latest embarrassing breach of security to hit a major U.S.-based institution.

The loosely organized hacker group Lulz Security broke into a public portion of the Senate website but did not reach behind a firewall into a more sensitive portion of the network, Martina Bradford, the deputy Senate sergeant at arms, said on Monday.

Despite the breach, the Sergeant at Arms Office, which provides security for the Senate, said that the breach had not compromised any individual senator's information.

Lulz announced the hack on Monday.

"We were responding to their allegations. Basically what we're saying that the server they got into is for public access and is in the public side," said Bradford.

Lulz Security, who have hacked into Sony's website and the Public Broadcasting System, posted online a list of files that appear not to be sensitive but indicate the hackers had been into the Senate's computer network.

"We don't like the U.S. government very much," Lulz Security said at the top of their release. "This is a small, just-for-kicks release of some internal data from Senate.gov - is this an act of war, gentlemen? Problem?"

The comment refers to reports that the military had decided that it could respond to cyber attacks from foreign countries with traditional military force.