Hacker collective Anonymous has hit out at the Vatican for the second time in a week, citing heretics and sexual abuse of children by priests as the instigator.
The hacktivists last week took down the Vatican's official website, and according to The Register, and this week also took down its news service, L'Osservatore. Both the official Vatican site and news service redirected to other sites carrying a message from Anonymous.
In a statement, translated from Italian, the attackers described the city as being "less secure than what you would like to believe, because, while the hype was directed toward the darkening of vatican.va, we took the liberty to implement a small incursion into your systems".
The Anonymous statement said: “The reasons that led us to dedicate ourselves to you are not just so frivolous [in] nature. Without going into the merits of the messages that your radio spreads (we have already expressed our thoughts on this matter at obscuration of vatican.va), we once again remind people like these messages are disseminated.
“Unfortunately it is now an established fact that you use repeaters with power transmission largely outside the bounds of the law, and is also sadly note the correlation between exposure to electromagnetic waves of high intensity and the onset of serious diseases such as leukemia cancer, cancer and many other terrible diseases.
“Many citizens who have the misfortune to reside in the vicinity of your repeaters have filed lawsuits, following the decline of their health. Anonymous can not tolerate these crimes continue, and we remind you that you are ‘guests' on Italian soil.”
It called for a review of the location of power and transmission equipment and warned that an attack will be extended again, "even [on] vatican.va just for the lulz".