HACKER ATTACK GEMA

The GEMA website was first hacked by “Anonymous” on Sunday (8/21), and a second successful attack took place the following Tuesday.

On Sunday the hacker group found a security gap on the site’s web server and from there on in blocked and stalled it for hours at a time. The GEMA website kept making it back but only for limited periods - on Tuesday the hacker attacks couldn’t be kept under control anymore: all website content was defaced with the text “Unfortunately this page is (not only) not available in Germany because it might refer to a company that hasn’t yet obtained the necessary freedom rights from Anonymous. Sorry about that! Not!”

Does that sound familiar? Of course, the message is a variation on the GEMA statement commonly known in Germany: “Unfortunately this video [...] is not available in Germany, because GEMA doesn’t control the publishing rights.” This is the stop sign one gets on a multitude of video clips for which the international licensing rights aren’t yet clarified.

Youtube and Googles’ conflict with GEMA is ongoing and a final resolution doesn’t seem to be around the corner. GEMA’s demand for 0,1278 € per click from Google is deemed completely unacceptable by Google, so progress is stunted. The consequence is obvious - Users, Hackers and Web Activists have had enough and are letting GEMA know about their irritation. Back to the attack - the GEMA website was in the meantime taken completely offline and just returned on Wednesday. Without the defacement - the rights appear to have been cleared.