Cracker hits HSBC bank site

The Web site of UK bank HSBC has been defaced by infamous UK cracker Herbless in protest of the government's refusal to tax petrol.

The cracker recently defaced over 100 corporate Web sites in the UK in support of truck drivers protesting tax on fuel. The bank sites that were attacked this time were: www.banking.hsbc.co.uk, www.hsbc.es, www.hsbc.gr and www.bacb.co.uk.

In his latest political defacement, Herbless says, "Due to the recent announcement by the British government that it will not, under any circumstances, bow to public opinion and alter tax policy, it looks increasingly likely that the protests will be restarted again in two months time." His defacement also includes a picture of prime minister Tony Blair with a speech bubble that reads "Listen to Herbless. He talks Sense."

HSBC has apologised for the inconvenience caused to customers whilst the sites were down, but has stated that no customer details or bank accounts were either accessed or affected. A spokeswoman at HSBC said "it was only the homepages that were tampered with that are managed by an external marketing company, all of our security services are managed inhouse". The bank are not intending to review their security network, despite reported criticisms by experts that their security procedures are lax.

The now renowned cracker also gives his advice to others contemplating cyber vandalism as a means of political protest. He tells would-be crackers not to target charities, delete data, or steal financial information and even warns: "Check your hacks for spelling and grammar. Dum speeling missstakes stewpid look."

Herbless recently told ZDNet that his campaign of defacement would continue after receiving hundreds of messages of support.

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