Author yanks WikiLeaks e-book from Amazon

Amazon narrowly avoids cyber attack when hackers can't organize their forces

The organized cyber attacks on Visa, Mastercard, and PayPal this week, along the looming threat of an attack on Amazon, has prompted one author to remove his WikiLeaks-themed e-book from Amazon.

Heinz Duthel’s book, which is sure to win the award for the least creative title of the year—“WikiLeaks documents expose US foreign policy conspiracies”—stirred quite a bit of controversy over the fact that Amazon recently booted WikiLeaks from its servers for hosting illegal information, leading some to charge that while Amazon did not want to be associated with WikiLeaks publicly, the company had no problem profiting off the sale of WikiLeaks material. 

Amazon refuted the allegations, noting that it would not pull the e-book because it did not include the leaked cables themselves.  “This book contains commentary and analysis regarding recent WikiLeaks disclosures, not the original material disclosed via the WikiLeaks website,” a note on the product detail page said. 

When questioned about the book’s removal, the company maintained that the removal was not at the behest of Amazon and was the author’s exclusive decision.

The book’s removal follows a string of cyber attacks on major corporations involved in the censorship of WikiLeaks and the downfall of its founder, Julian Assange.  The attacks are part of an effort called “Operation Payback,” which is headed by a group of hackers united under the name “Anonymous.”  On Thursday morning, in a move reminiscent of the protesting students in Les Miserables, Operation Payback tweeted: “TARGET: WWW.AMAZON.COM.”  Vive le resistance!

Fortunately for Amazon, the group could not organize its forces to get everyone to target Amazon at the same time, as most of the group went after PayPal, which, like Amazon, recently dropped WikiLeaks from its service.

Several hours after the initial proclamation of war against Amazon, Operation Payback retweeted another user’s message: “No one is attacking Amazon, dude.  Everyone’s going to www.paypal.com.”  “This seems to be true,” replied the group.  “Fire now.”

PayPal confirmed the attacks, but said that they only slowed its service.

One of the first arrests for the recent attacks on Visa and Mastercard was made Thursday morning, when the Dutch High Tech Crimes unit arrested a 16-year-old in The Hague, Netherlands after he boasted of participating in the attacks on his website.  It remains unclear what his level of participation actually entailed.

Image source: amazon.co.uk