Construction of Hawaii Telescope Comes Under Cyber Attack

In an apparent bid to draw attention to local resentment over the construction of a massive telescope on Hawaii's Big Island, hackers brought down the website of the organization behind the construction.

The website of Thirty Meter Telescope (TMT) was down for two hours after it suffered a denial of service attack on Sunday. A spokesperson for the organization confirmed the attack but could not say which group was responsible. The incident is being investigated.

"TMT today was the victim of an unscrupulous denial of service attack, apparently launched by Anonymous. The incident is being investigated," said the project's spokeswoman Sandra Dawson, according to IB Times.

Meanwhile a blog site called Operations Green Rights claimed the attack was launched by Anonymous to stop native rights abuses. Native Hawaiians consider sacred the summit of Mauna Kea, in the vicinity of which one of the world's largest telescopes is being constructed. The blog also claimed that Hawaiian government websites were attacked but reports have not been able to confirm if government sites were affected.

"Nothing will ever justify the destruction of ecosystems; filthy money can never replace them. Stand with the Hawaiian natives against Thirty Meter Telescope," a post on the website reads.