A group says it had taken down Philippine government website Gov.ph through a distributed denial-of-service (DDoS) attack, according to a statement released by the supposed attackers.

The attackers, calling themselves Cyber PH for Human Rights, released a statement on Wednesday afternoon, March 10, condemning the Duterte government. The group holds it responsible for the March 7 crackdown on activists which led to 9 deaths.

“We hold President Duterte personally responsible for all of these deaths, together with National Security Adviser Hermogenes Esperon, Jr., Philippine National Police Chief Debold Sinas, and AFP Southern Luzon Command Chief Lt. General Antonio Parlade, Jr. for serving as Mr. Duterte’s ringleaders in the killing of unarmed civilians,” the group wrote in the strongly worded statement.

“In defense of human rights and justice, at 4 pm, we have launched a cyberattack on the main website of the Philippine Government (www.gov.ph)  through a Distributed Denial-of-Service (DDoS) Attack,” it added.

Gov.ph appears to be accessible sporadically as of 5:30 pm. Attempting to access the site may show an internal server error message, be slow to load, or be otherwise inaccessible to the general public.

The group stated the DDoSing of the website “aims to send a message to President Duterte and his government, to stop the killing of unarmed civilians.”

The group also warned it intended to fire off “another round of sustained DDoS attacks on government websites which had been complicit in perpetuating barefaced lies on the killing of unarmed civilians and the worsening of the nation’s human rights situation.”

Confirming the DDoS attack

During a press briefing with Presidential Spokesperson Harry Roque on March 11, National Bureau of Investigation – Cyber Crime Division (NBI-CCD) Chief Victor Lorenzo confirmed a distributed denial of service attack occurred, but did not specify who committed the attack as an investigation still has to be done.

Lorenzo said, “We are in close coordination right now with DICT (Department of Information and Communications Technology). There was indeed a denial of service attack.”

Lorenzo added, “Nagkakaroon na ng proper attribution ang DICT, and we will be requesting them the necessary details that they have doon sa attack so we can officially begin the investigation.”

(The DICT is working on proper attribution, and we will be requesting the necessary details from them regarding the attack so we can officially begin the investigation.) – Rappler.com