Payback: Hackers down DOJ, Universal Music sites

The Web site of the U.S. Department of Justice was inaccessible this afternoon following the arrest of a group accused of piracy crimes by operating the Megaupload site and it appeared to be the work of supporters of the Anonymous online activist collective.

Online chat sessions operated by Anonymous show participants discussing the DOJ site being down and talking about other U.S. government sites to target. The activists are angry about two proposed antipiracy bills backed by the music and movie industries, SOPA and PIPA, that critics say would give authorities broad power to shut down Web sites for the mere accusation that they had pirated content on them.

"Seems like some friendly ships are launching torpedos justice.gov as we speak. The site seems down to us! (via @AnonOpsSweden)," Twitter accounts associated with the Anonymous online activist group posted today.

Shortly before the outage, seven people were named in an indictment and four were taken into custody on online piracy charges, including Kim Dotcom, aka Kim Schmitz, the founder of Megaupload, a popular Internet locker service.