WEF - Web site crashed, DoS attack possible

February 1, 2002 —

The exclusive World Economic Forum (WEF) had planned to share highlights and live session broadcasts of this week's annual meeting with the public through its Web site, but that site has been down since the meeting opened Thursday.

"We don't know what's causing the site problems. Your guess is as good as ours," said WEF Director of Communications Charles McLean, in a phone interview Friday. High traffic is a likely cause, he said, but the WEF isn't sure whether traffic spikes are coming from reporters and the public or from protestors deliberately hitting the site in a denial of service (DoS) attack.

A group called the Electronic Disturbance Theater had been trying to arrange a DoS attack on the WEF site, encouraging visitors to its own Web site to download a "virtual sit-in tool" to flood the WEF site with traffic. The group, in conjunction with anticorporate activist group RTMark, is protesting corporate globalization and what it sees as a business-backed erosion of human rights and environmental protections.

"LOOKS LIKE THE WEF IS DOWN

ITworld.com