Anonymous takes Tunisian portal of public procurement offline

by Steve Ragan - Jun 27 2011, 13:16

In response to Tunisia’s move to filter the Internet, Anonymous has taken the website of the National Observatory of Public Procurements (NOPP) offline, replacing the domain with an AntiSec-related image and message.

The NOPP was taken offline earlier this year during Operation: Tunisia, one of many Tunisian government domains knocked down as Anonymous supported those protesting the regime of President Zine El Abidine Ben Ali.

This time, the NOPP was taken out for two reasons - Internet censorship and AntiSec. Earlier this morning, visitors to the NOPP’s domain were greeted with the AntiSec logo, and a message that the domain was seized in the name of the AntiSec movement itself.

“Greetings Government of Tunisia,” the message left by Anonymous started.

“Over the past few months you’ve ignored demands from Anonymous to withdraw from your quest for internet censorship, despite many attacks from Anon. With recent events, more and more have joined Anon, only to prove that for each fallen Anon, there are many. In the heights of #ANTISEC, people from all over the world will join united against corrupt governments throughout the world, including you Government of Tunisia, and fight for the truth.”

Earlier this month, the Tunisian Internet Agency (Agence tunisienne d'Internet or ATI), said that it would block pornographic materials, following a court order to do so. The court ruled that the block was needed, as the pornographic sites were viewed as a danger to young people and stood against Muslim values.

However, the ruling has led to fears of a much wider move towards Internet censorship. Ironically, ATI’s director, Moez Chakchouk, was reported by local media to have commented that no filtering equipment would be placed in his home.

In January, The Tech Herald broke the story that ATI was responsible for injected JavaScript that harvested usernames and passwords from the login pages of GMail, Yahoo, and Facebook.

The information surrounding the embedded JavaScript came to our attention thanks to a user on AnonOps, where supporters for Operation: Tunisia were gathered. In response to the intrusive injection, Anonymous offered Tunisian users help with a browser add-on that stripped the added code.

In addition to the warning for the government, Anonymous spoke to the Tunisian people as well.

“People of Tunisia, continue fighting for truth, and know that #ANTISEC is on your side. We will not stop until all corrupt governments of the world are exposed, and truth rains down.”

As this story was published, the NOPP domain was completely offline.

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