Egypt’s Youm7.com website hacked

Egypt’s most read newspaper in terms of visitors, youm7.com, had its English edition hacked on Sunday early evening. The website was down for approximately 30 minutes and stories from the previous 7 hours were lost, Managing Director of the English Edition Sallie Pisch told Bikyamasr.com shortly after the hack.

She said that the staff are working around the clock to get everything back up to speed, but it is unclear who was responsible for the hacking.

“[We] don’t know who’s behind the attack or what their motivations were … I don’t know yet if we can find out or not,” she said.

in recent weeks the newspaper has been receiving flack from online activists who have accused it of misinformation and the spreading of rumors. Activists began a Twitter campaign against the publication, calling on their followers to unfollow anyone with connections to the newspaper.

Pisch said that no matter one’s beliefs “such attacks on independent media are unacceptable.”

Media outlets in Egypt have been under attack from activists and protesters, with reports stating that a number of journalists have been barred from covering the sit-in in Tahrir Square after they gave “unfavorable” coverage of the protests. Also, last week, al-Masry al-Youm quickly reported a statement from deposed President Hosni Mubarak’s lawyer that the ailing former leader was in a coma. Not long after their report went live, doctors at the hospital in Sharm el-Sheikh publicly stated that Mubarak had not gone into a coma and suffered a bout of low-blood pressure.