Talking Points Memo Brought Down in Apparent Hacker Attack

Talking Points Memo (or TPM, as the kids call it), was down for about 8 hours overnight. This major site interruption comes after they ran 14 mugshots of alleged members of the hacker group Anonymous after their arrests. TPM obtained the mugshots through the Freedom of Information Act and were not the only site to post the images (Gawker posted the images as well, but their site didn't face any apparent issues). There is no direct evidence that it was an Anonymous attack, but the timing is one hell of a coincidence.

Site editor John Marshall wrote the following after the site was repaired:

As I noted in my overnight post, TPM continued to publish news at its temporary home on Tumblr during the most extreme phase of last night' DDOS attack. Still it disrupted some of our publication and reporting. We are now in the process of publishing stories that we were not able to publish yesterday afternoon and evening. The attack is on-going. But we have put in place countermeasures that are allowing the site to remain online and accessible, albeit in a diminished, less robust capacity.

Talking Points Memo is up and running at what looks to be full speed now--including their slideshow of alleged Anonymous members "Unmasked."

Talking Points Memo Hacked After Posting Mugshots Of Alleged 'Anonymous' Members [Gawker]

[@nickgreene][ngreene@villagevoice.com]