US calls out China on cyberattacks as human rights issue -- GCN

US calls out China on cyberattacks as human rights issue

By GCN Staff
Jun 16, 2011

After a series of cyberattacks linked to IP addresses in China, the U.S. State Department is tying the issue to human rights in that country, InformationWeek reports.

In a meeting with China's Ministry of Foreign Affairs, a top official from State raised the issue of a distributed denial-of-service attack against the website Change.org, which had featured a petition calling for China to release imprisoned dissident artist Ai Weiwi.

According to a letter released by the department, a U.S. official specifically mentioned the attack with the Chinese government at a meeting on human rights held in April. In the same letter, State issued a broader condemnation of all such DDOS attacks that are "designed to stifle free speech" online.

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