FreeMediaOnline.org & Free Media Online Blog, May 02, 2010, San Francisco — An unknown hacker has posted a pornographic video on the Voice of America (VOA) LiveJournal blog website. The image seen on the VOA site showed a naked woman in a sexually suggestive pose. The post was titled “sexy.” The image was not removed from the site for at least several hours. It was seen and saved by Free Media Online at 4:16 PM PT.
This is not the first time that the Voice of America websites have experienced a cyber attack in recent years. VOA websites came under a crippling cyber attack during President Obama’s first official visit to Russia and were out of commission for several days.
In 2008, the Broadcasting Board of Governors, which manages the Voice of America, terminated all VOA Russian programs just 12 days before the Russian military attack on Georgia. At that time, BBG executives claimed that VOA Russian Service can reach a vast audience in Russia through the Internet by using such platforms as LiveJournal. They ignored warnings from Free Media Online and other media freedom advocates which pointed out that LiveJournal, which was purchased by a Russian company, is highly vulnerable to attacks by hackers and can be easily controled by the Russian security services. As a result of the BBG decision to terminate most VOA Russian radio and TV broadcasts, its audience reach in Russia has been drastically reduced. VOA Russian Service website draws only a few thousand visitors in Russia despite huge investments for private consultants and advertising.
FreeMediaOnline.org website has also been a target of hacker attacks in recent weeks. The source of the attacks could not be identified.