After stealing Bethesda's internal data yesterday, brazen hacker group Lulz Security -- responsible for recent attacks on Fox.com, Sony Music, PBS, Nintendo, and Sony Pictures, among others -- today launched Titantic Takeover Tuesday, a cyber assault directed at gaming sites and servers that has already claimed The Escapist, Eve Online, and Minecraft as its victims.
Roughly three hours ago the denial of service attacks began on gaming website The Escapist, with Lulz Security posting updates on its twitter account, "Nothing like the great taste of raging gamers for lunch... Primary Lulz Cannon is making toast of Escapist Magazine. The real disruption ammunition is secretly causing hell for their sysadmins. umad?"
An hour later, Eve Online became the target. Publisher CCP confirmed the security breach with a statement: "Eve Online and related services experienced an internet attack. We have taken them down as a security precaution."
Most recently, Minecraft's login server and website were attacked, and both are offline as of this writing.
"Welcome to #TitanicTakeoverTuesday where everyone is laughing at crybabies getting Lulz Cannoned," LulzSec tweeted.
The exact reasons for the attacks, beyond the "lulz," remain unclear. After the group fessed up to stealing Bethesda's internal data yesterday, it noted on its website that it opted not to reveal the user data of the roughly 200,000 Brink players, stating: "We actually like this company and would like for them to speed up the production of Skyrim, so we'll give them one less thing to worry about. You're welcome! Please keep making awesome games, guys, and you should totally add an official LulzSec top hat to new releases."
The recent spate of cyber attacks on sites and servers related to the video game industry began in April when hackers stole the user information of roughly 100 million PlayStation Network, Sony Online Entertainment, and Qriocity users -- the largest theft of consumer data in history.
Lulz Security, which has been bragging about its exploits on its website and twitter feed since early May, has managed to evade authorities, and is now actually accepting calls from those who would like to complain or comment on their work at 614-LULZSEC.
UPDATE: Add League of Legends to the list. Somewhere, Ryan Scott is pledging a blood vendetta.
