There’s a lot of negative reactions to the recently passed Anti-Cybercrime law, and the citizenry has expressed their outrage through social networks and private blogs about the implications of said law. Some netizens however, are expressing their anger through different means – the Philippine wing of the hacker collective Anonymous has just brought down and defaced not one, but two government websites (as of press time): Bangko Sentral ng Pilipinas (BSP) and the Metropolitan Waterworks and Sewage Systems (MWSS). The hackers are particularly angry at the libel clause included in the bill, which infringes on free speech online. Here’s the full text of their statement:
The Cybercrime Prevention Act of 2012 is the most notorious act ever witnessed in the cyber-history of the Philippines, and the language of the bill is cunningly designed to make you think it only applies to individuals who are deep in cyber-technology and doesn’t apply to everyone, but some part of the bill basically says it can imprison anyone who commits libel either by written messages, comments, blogs, or posts in sites such as Facebook, Twitter, or any other comment-spaces of other social media in the Internet.
New technologies give us new opportunities to connect with a lot of people not only in this country but all over the world. They can also provide us with a medium through which our political, public and even private views can have an immediate and direct impact on individuals, communities and even countries. It is just so disappointing that our government, in adopting our 80-year-old antiquated libel laws to the Cybercrime Law, again seems to have retarded our march with the rest of the world with respect to giving full force to the people’s freedom of expression. We ask for a revision of the said bill for the betterment of the Filipino denizens.
If you remember, the MWSS website was hacked earlier this month by the same group which wanted to expose the corruption in the said government sector. Seems like the webmasters of both government sites will be in for a rough night.
[UPDATE #1] And another one bites the dust. The American Chamber of Commerce of the Philippines has also been hacked and replaced by the image you see on the BSP and MWSS websites. (Via Neil Ross Goco)
[UPDATE #2] And another one is hit. This time it’s the Pilipinas Anti-Piracy Team.
[UPDATE #3] The DOH’s Anti-Smoking website has also been taken down.
[UPDATE #4] The Institute for Development and Econometric Analysis (IDEA) is also down for the count.
[UPDATE #5] The DENR website for Region 3 has also been hit. Anon has been busy tonight, we see.