back to article BNP DDoS 'mega-assault' not actually mega in the least

A supposedly massive denial of service attack against the British National Party website has been exposed as a gross exaggeration. The assault, which began on Friday, was described by the party in an email appeal for funds as the "largest cyber attack in recorded history" and comparable only to a 2001 assault against Microsoft …

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  1. Andy ORourke
    Happy

    Fixed it for you:

    Clear Channel has a policy of carrying advertising "from all the legal political parties, without bias or favour, and regardless of the company’s own views, as long as the advertising is legal and clearly branded for the relevant party".

    Should read

    Clear Channel has a policy of carrying advertising "from all the legal political parties, without bias or favour, and regardless of the company’s own views, as long as the advertising is PAID FOR".

  2. Jimmy Floyd
    Coat

    Leaving aside the rights (oh, and wrongs) of attacking the BNP

    "...a legitimate attack."

    As opposed to ... an illegitimate attack?!?

    Mine's the ... oh, just give it here.

  3. Greg

    Hahahaha, I knew it!

    The lying, self-important, egotistical little twat.

  4. Code Monkey

    No surprise

    The initial article smelled somewhat of shite. This just confirms it.

  5. Haku
    Black Helicopters

    "Help! Help! I'm being repressed!"

    /the words that came into my mind when seeing that Monty Python image

    How do we know this isn't just another publicity stunt, in that the DDoS attack was paid for by someone in the BNP just so they can cry "we're being attacked!" ?

    I'm just disappointed it ISN'T the biggest DDoS in history.

  6. Anonymous Coward
    Thumb Down

    Why

    It's bad enough that the whole of the UK media is showing bias in that they attack the BNP yet now The Register is doing it too ?. In case you haven't checked their are millions of people voting BNP now and so you are attacking them too!

  7. Matt B
    Thumb Up

    Hahaha hahaha hahahaha

    I cannot stop laughing! How effing stupid are they going to look now?!

  8. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    @Greg

    "The lying, self-important, egotistical little twat."

    How dare you be so rude to Gordon Brown! Oh, wait a minute you're referring to *another* lying, self-important, egotistical little twat...

  9. Will Godfrey Silver badge
    Happy

    No Wucking Furries

    The prat is his party's own worst enemy. He comes over as more arrogant than that Austrian gezzer some 60 years ago.

  10. Richard
    Thumb Up

    ROFL

    just ROFL

  11. Anonymous Coward
    Alert

    If they were more intelligent

    ...then I'd start to think they did it themselves so that their supporters would cough up to help protect them against "Johnny Foreigner".

  12. Dr Who
    Happy

    Not that insignificant

    600 Mbps is 75 MBps which amounts to 264 GB per hour. Given that many hosting providers will have an outgoing bandwidth cap of 100GB per month per server, I wouldn't call that level of traffic insignificant for a single website of an insignificant party. Agreed it doesn't amount to a massive DDoS attack, but are you sure the bloke got his figures right?

  13. Tony Green

    I wouldn't be surprised...

    ...to find out that the fascist scumbags actually paid for a small DDOS attack just so they could trumpet how hard done by they are.

    Clear Channel aren't exactly nice people either; they provided a hell of a lot of funding for Dubya's election campaigns, so it's hardly surprising they happily deal with British nazis as well.

  14. Austin Chamberlain
    Unhappy

    Freedom of political speech

    "We understand that the matter of whether the BNP's website breaks the hosting firm's terms and conditions is under review."

    If that's the case, then the hosting firm will *surely* also decline to host a website for Labour, Conservative, SWP or any other party.

    I think the BNP are a bunch of mindless thugs*, but how on earth did we get to the state where a legitimate political party can be denied service because people don't like their policies? Freedom of speech is an absolute - or how long until another party is added to the Forbidden Parties Register? (yes I know libel and "fire in a crowded theatre" and so on and so forth on limiting freedom of speech. That's clearly not the case here, so stop trying to muddy the issue).

    * The fact that such a disclaimer is necessary shows how far the rot has gone.

  15. Anonymous Coward
    Thumb Down

    You laugh

    But if they ever got into power, they'd make the Norks look like Neville Chamberlain

  16. LJ
    Paris Hilton

    Eh?

    Just as a small point...the key part of all this is that they want £5k to buy enough servers to get them out of the crap. £5k would probably be just about enough to buy 1 or 2 mid-range servers and get them put into the rack. If that would insulate them from this attack, then it's probably the *smallest* DDoS in history, not the largest.

    Paris, rack...need I say more?

  17. Jon Thompson

    Exposed as a gross exaggeration...

    Now THERE'S a frickin' surprise. <rolls eyes skyward>

    This Griffin character: he's hardly a master of spin is he?

  18. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    All I want to know is....

    What do I need to download to become part of this botnet?

  19. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    @Greg

    Missed out racist

  20. The Jase

    @ AC

    "In case you haven't checked their are millions of people voting BNP now and so you are attacking them too!"

    Defending them I see.

    According to Griffin and other BNP members, they do not want the Gurkhas to settle in the UK. They would pay them more pension and have them f-off back to Nepal.

    So why do you hate the Gurkhas so much then?

  21. Gareth
    Stop

    @"The BNP is a legitimate political party"

    The BNP has gotten into a lot of trouble for inciting racial hatred, which is quite rightly illegal.

    They've tried to clean up their public image a bit recently, but nasty old racism is alive and well under the surface, especially with the rank-and-file of the party.

    Not to mention that hosting services are privately owned businesses and can deny service to anyone they see fit (except, ironically, on the basis of race/gender/etc)...

  22. Andy Gates
    Dead Vulture

    Ha! Ha!

    Maybe it was the biggest cyber-attack in the BNP's petty little history? Woo, frightening, just like the party itself.

    Austin, hosting companies routinely have terms that say they won't host you if you post a variety of unsavoury material, including hate-speech and racism. That's their choice - they're a private company, they make the rules, and not everyone wants to say "absolutely free speech for all". Most ISPs choose to have terms that are vague and woolly and broader than the legal minimum, so that they can yank odious stuff that catches their eye.

  23. Austin Chamberlain

    @Andy, @Gareth

    You're right, of course. It's the right of a private company to do as they like. It's the broader support for suppressing political parties that gets to me. I'm not from around here, so it's an outsider's perspective, but I really don't like the "I don't like what they say, so lets stop them saying it" attitude.

    It annoys me that I have to defend the BNP while doing it, but, as Voltaire said "I disagree with what you say, but I will defend to the death your right to say it".

  24. Dave Harris

    @Austin

    I think it's probably in terms of exceeding their AUP, rather than the site content, ie, only paying for the sort of traffic you'd see on a site for Little Twattington parish council, rather than a nationwide political party and the requisite resilience. After all, the data centre's other customers might be a little peeved if all traffic in is somewhat slow due to even a minor DDoS on just one organisation.

  25. Graham Marsden
    Boffin

    @Why

    If you hadn't noticed, El Reg takes pot shots at ALL political parties, the BNP is as much fair game as the rest of them.

  26. Dave Stark

    Chinny chin chin.

    Chinny reckon /indeed/.

  27. Rob Crawford
    Paris Hilton

    Here we go again

    Oh FFS no doubt they signed up for some service which is entirely inappropriate for their needs which means they are in violation of their T's & C's. Also depending on the T's & C's may prevent certain content.

    If that's the case then they should have checked their contract.

    Oh dear the BNP are having hosting issues I can't say I am upset about that.

    @AC 27th May 2009 14:06 GMT

    Millions of people voting for them (not from previous evidence from election data) but then those who support the BNP are not very strong on things like logic, numeracy or literacy.

    Somehow I imagine you sounding rather Dalek like when reciting your post for public consumption. Quite frankly I am happy for BNP supporters to be attacked, just as I would for those foisting the current fluffy nanny state (read suvelance state )upon us to be attacked for their actions.

    @Austin

    The BNP are barely legitimate, I have been on the receiving end of their supporters simply because I come from the wrong part of the UK. The BNP are a poorly executed re branding exercise carried out by the NF

    Even Paris dosen't suck as much as Griffin (or anybody else in the BNP)

  28. Martin Silver badge

    Freedom of speech

    >If that's the case, then the hosting firm will *surely* also decline to host a website for Labour,

    >Conservative, SWP or any other party.

    I'm sure they would happily host any party's site that paid.

    What they might object to is a site that is likely to get a huge volume of traffic being hosted on a cheap personal site package.

    Otherwise all the people that are sharing a single copy of Apache running on the same cheap 1U server as the BNP site might reasonably complain.

  29. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    The reason the BNP gets attacked

    is not because they are racist, the BNP is being attacked by self confirmed racists for not being racist, rock and a hard place and all that.

    It is because the BNP could take over, and if they do a lot of people in power at the moment will be on the sharp end. A big shake up would happen in the BBC, Media, Police, Civil Service and Judiciary.

    The British Nazis are Labour, no other political party has done so much to bring a Fascist regime into play as them, so many freedoms stomped upon by the Labour boot of oppression.

    It could be the BBC behind all of this, they do have track record.

  30. Natalie Socrates
    Linux

    Microsoft Attack Did Happen

    25th January 2001

    http://www.out-law.com/page-1340

    or

    http://www.networkworld.com/news/2001/0125mshacked.html

  31. Anonymous Coward
    Coat

    @"The BNP is a legitimate political party"

    NO, it isn't. How many political parties can you remember that only allow members who pass a racial purity test (yes folks, if your skin is too brown you ain't joining, even if you are 10th generation English - but they claim they aren't racist...)? I'll give you one clue - the only example I can think or starts with National and ends with Socialist, and was very popular in Germany about 70 years ago.

    Mine's the one with the "anti-nazi league" badge in the lapel

  32. Ken Hagan Gold badge

    Re: Why

    "In case you haven't checked their are millions of people voting BNP now and so you are attacking them too!"

    According to http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk_politics/vote_2005/frontpage/4519347.stm, that would be 0.2 millions, up from 0.05 millions in 2001. But of course, you can't trust anything you read on that pinko site. Even if it is true, I assume the returning officers conspired to under-report the BNP's votes, as part of the worldwide Jewish conspiracy.

    Yes, it is shocking that El Reg feels the need to mock a party just because they are considered objectionable by the vast majority of the population, and both they (original article) and their supporters (you) are demonstrably innumerate. But this is a tech site, and we take numeracy seriously, so what did you expect?

  33. Rich

    @AC

    > In case you haven't checked their are millions of people voting BNP now and so you

    > are attacking them too!

    The BNP received 192,746 votes in the 2005 general election (0.7% of the total cast) and 18,020 in the 2008 London Assembly election (also 0.7% of the total cast), so "millions" have not voted for the BNP. It's a bit difficult to see how you could extrapolate those figures to suggest "millions" this year, especially when turnout is traditionally low for local and European elections.

    Even if there were millions, it would still be right to attack a party espousing bigotry and hatred.

  34. mike2R
    Flame

    Re: Why

    Because the BNP are scum.

    They stand on a carefully constructed platform that, while fairly extreme, does realistically reflect the views of a significant minority in this country.

    However most people, even those who agree with what they say in public, are smart enough to realise they are a bunch of lying nazi shits who's real aims would seem an insane fantasy, were it not for the fact that they were put into practice across Europe within living memory.

  35. David
    Stop

    Re: Why

    "In case you haven't checked their are millions of people voting BNP now"

    And where would we check this, given that the opinion polls don't suggest support that high? (1m votes at the Euro elections equates to about 6%)

  36. Anonymous Coward
    Stop

    @Austin Chamberlain

    I think you'll find that the chappie was referring to the hosting firms terms and conditions as applied to the bandwidth limits, not the content!

  37. Alex
    Stop

    @Not that insignificant

    I have to agree with Dr Who in questioning these numbers - According to Rapidswitch's own published network information they use 10Gbit pipes between their dispersed facilities and only 2gbit between their redbus and telehouse suites, so yes while a 600mbit DDOS is one their network as a whole can undoubtedly take without a significant problem, it would be incredibly remiss of them if traffic that amounted to roughly 1/15th of their total network capacity between entire datacentres (or roughly 1/3 of the available capacity if BNP were hosted in one of their Redbus suites) being directed at one server "hardly hit their radar".

    By all accounts if the 600mbit figure is accurate it's certainly a laughably tiny DDOS in comparason to real attacks, but considering it's easily enough to take a single server offline and would crap out the networks of most small to medium providers, I have to wonder if an extra zero got tacked onto there or something when it gets dismissed as barely noticeable.

  38. James
    Happy

    WAAAAAHHHHHHHHHHH!!!!! MUMMY!

    This sounds like a child telling mum about their sibling teasing them only lying to get more sympathy and get the sibling in more trouble.

    Ignorant tossers.

    WAAAHHHH!! ><

  39. Anonymous Coward
    Stop

    @AC: Millions of voters?!

    I'm sorry, millions of people are voting BNP? I think that maybe untrue. In the 2005 election BNP managed 192,746 votes country wide, or .7% of the count. Just over 27million votes were cast.*

    In no way at all will they achieve a 1000% increase required to meet what you are saying. Maybe it should be you checking your facts, eh?

    * From http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_Kingdom_general_election,_2005

  40. Graham Bartlett
    Pirate

    "Lying or ill-informed..."

    How unlike the BNP we know and, er, despise, to be lying and/or ill-informed. Surely that's never happened before? Oh wait, there was this thing called the Holocaust which they think didn't happen...

    Oh, and for the benefit of the AC above - yes, I *do* register my displeasure with anyone I meet who says they're voting BNP. I make sure they're informed that the BNP are neo-Nazi scum (yes, those are the words I use). Been there, done that.

  41. Matthew

    @Gareth

    Did you mean "...privately owned businesses... can deny service to anyone they see as UNfit"?

    :-)

  42. Richard
    Coat

    See, the BNP aren't racist

    They've let foreign packets come over here, take down their server... and use Polish spitfires and Oregon construction workers in their election pamphlets

    Why wasn't the website set up to only allow good, clean British traffic in? A touch ironic for a party that gives it big on border control.

  43. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    Freedom of Speech . .

    . . . has to be guaranteed for everyone but fortunately that also lets us all express our opinions about the BNP. I'm sure millions (well thousands anyway) of people do support the BNP but I'm equally sure many of them have been taken in by their softly, softly "we just want to be fair to the people who built this country" spiel. Their PEB was a model of "we're all reasonable people here" marketing.

  44. Austin Chamberlain
    Stop

    @Gareth

    Yes, the BNP are racist swine, but is it a proscribed organisation? Is it a banned party? No, it's a legitimate political party.

    FFS, forget the bloody BNP. I loathe them, you loathe them, all reasonable people loathe them. NONETHELESS, it's the principle of the thing that so important, and that principle seems to sail over the heads of everyone. If, today, you can deny one group service because of their political views, tomorrow it could be YOUR party.

  45. Anonymous Coward
    Flame

    Still.......

    .....now they've admitted they're completely exposed to an attack....

  46. Gilbert Wham

    @ Austin Chamberlain

    Voltaire never actually said that, though. Plus, DDOSing the BNP hadn't been invented yet.

  47. Anonymous Coward
    Stop

    Euro elections not general election

    The figures from the last General Election are hardly relevant, since the BNP did not stand a complete slate of candidates. The proportional-representation 2004 European election is a better comparison:

    http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/European_Parliament_election,_2004_(United_Kingdom)

    in which the BNP won over 800,000 votes. By all accounts their support has grown significantly since then, so "millions of voters" is an accurate claim. In most local elections where the BNP stand they achieve around 15-20%. It's almost certain the the BNP will win a seat in these Euro elections unless Labour fiddle with the ballot boxes!

    No one should be dissuaded by the lies in the mainstream media, like the fake Gurkha leaflet in the Sun, and the continual stream of ignorant comments on forums like this from brainwashed lefties. The real racists are those who think the native British people have no right to self determination, so it's OK for foreigners to colonise our country. According to the Marxist doctrine that has been dominant for the last 40-50 years, we British don't even exist ("there's only one race...") hence why they think it's OK to destroy us!

    Over 50% of newborns in London now are to foreign-born mothers, and that doesn't even take into account 2nd / 3rd generation immigrants. So even if we had a BNP government tomorrow, it is inevitable that native Brits will be a minority in our own capital city. The critical question is how soon we elect a BNP government as that will determine whether the rest of the country will fall.

    If this occurs we can look forward to a divided state where no ethnic group has a majority, and we will all be competing for power. You only have to look to the Balkans, Iraq, Palestine, Somalia etc. so see how "enriching" it is to live in such as society. That will only be a halfway house since eventually one group will emerge dominant..

    PS. Sorry to offend anyone if the truth hurts.

  48. Steve Anderson
    Alert

    Anglo Saxons

    I always have a wry chuckle at the notion of the "indigenous people" that the BNP like to go on about, it inevitably involves the term "Anglo Saxon". The Angles and the Saxons turned up in Britain from what is modern Germany, and - gasp - interbred (no, the HORROR) not only with each other but with the existing Celtic race. Bloody foreigners, coming over here, stealing our jobs, spoiling our racial purity, grumble grumble.

    So, this assisted repatriation thing? Anyone "Anglo Saxon and proud" with a BNP leaning can bugger off back to Germany any time they like and leave us happy Liberal Celts behind, thanks.

  49. Anonymous Coward
    Flame

    Racial Purity? LOL

    I lived in London for 14 years. I (often) challenge anyone to name a more tolerant city in a more tolerant country. The BNP represent jack shit.

    Since the 'East European Invasion' the BNP have been able to claim that they aren't racist any more, because now they don't care what colour your skin is, they just don't want you to come here. They are Equal Opportunities bigots.

    Speaking as a proud, pastey white Englishman of pastey white English parents, I'd like to know how such a term as 'racial purity' could possibly be applied to this of all countries, when we could win prizes for being, generally speaking, the least pure.

    We are the mutts of history. Everyone came here (for the sex, apparently). We are the product of over a thousand years of a mish-mash of cultures and bastards. It's the price we paid for our role in history.

    Who exactly are the 'true' British? A couple thousand inbred descendants of Ancient Britons that the Romans or the Anglo Saxons or the Celts or the Normans couldn't be bothered to kill, and were too ugly to rape? Did someone say Master Race?

    IMO, if your stated aim is a Superior Human Race, then a wide gene pool is a better gene pool. And you don't get much wider than ours! Therefore, progressive Human evolution depends on us ALL shagging Johnny (or Joan) Foreigner, wherever we may find them.

    I call the UK's doubtful parentage and murky past A Good Thing, and something to be justifiably proud of. In contrast look at aristocrats, or pure bred dogs, or that kid with the banjo in Deliverence.

    ...and then, one day, teh Mongrels will rule the planet! All hail!

  50. James O'Shea

    re Ac 21:36 GMT

    Congrats. You have just ensured that I'll be voting Conservative for the very first time ever. There's no way that Gordo would ever get my vote, and the LibDems won't win. Meanwhile, the Tories can be counted on to squash you nazi thugs flatter than dead roaches.

    And you'll note that _I_ am not posting anonymously.

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