Hackers target Home Office site in protest at extradition

The group Anonymous appeared to take credit for the crash in a message on Twitter. It also cited plans to increase surveillance by monitoring calls, e-mails, texts and website visits, and other proposed extraditions for the attack.

It is understood a virus was used to make more computers log onto the website at one time than it was capable of handling.

The Home Office website was down from about 9pm on Saturday until around mid-morning yesterday.

In a message on Twitter, claiming to be from Anonymous, the hackers said the action was “for your draconian surveillance proposals”.

Another said it was in protest at the UK’s controversial extradition treaty with America.

It read: “You should not give UK citizens to foreign countries without evidence. If an offence happened in the UK, so should the trial.”

Another tweet, also claiming to be from members of Anonymous, said the action had been taken in “protest of the potential extradition of Gary McKinnon, Christopher Harold Tappin & Richard O’Dwyer”.

There were also claims on Twitter that the group had disrupted the websites of the Ministry of Justice and Number 10.

However, Number 10’s website was only down for a matter of minutes, while a spokeswoman for the Ministry of Justice said it had been unaffected.

One message said: “Anonymous launched a cyberattack on http://www.number10.gov.uk, http://www.homeoffice.gov.uk & http://www.justice.gov.uk resulting in multiple TANGO DOWNS.”

Glasgow-born Mr McKinnon, 46, from Wood Green, north London, who has Asperger’s, is still waiting to hear whether he will be extradited over charges he hacked into US military computers ten years ago.

Retired British businessman and all-Kent Golf Club Union president Tappin, 65, is being held in jail in New Mexico while he awaits trial on arms dealing charges after being extradited last month.

Student Richard O’Dwyer, 23, of Chesterfield, is also fighting extradition after being accused of breaking American copyright laws by using his computer in the UK.

The Home Office insisted that no sensitive information was accessed during the attack.

A spokeswoman said: “The Home Office website was the subject of an online protest last night. This is a public-facing website and no sensitive information is held on it.

“There is no indication that the site was hacked, and other Home Office systems were not affected.

“Measures put in place to protect the website meant that members of the public were unable to access the site intermittently.”