Vigilante meetup site 4chan falls to DDoS attack

Image-based bulletin board 4chan, reportedly used as a forum by the hacker group Anonymous, succumbed Tuesday to a distributed denial-of-service (DDoS) attack, according to the site's founder, Chris Poole.

Poole wrote in a Tuesday post on 4chan's status blog that the site was hit but was back operating normally on Wednesday.

The incident may be retaliation for members of Anonymous recently unleashing a flurry of DDoS attacks against organizations, such as MasterCard and PayPal, which severed ties with whistleblower site WikiLeaks after it began releasing secret U.S. diplomatic cables.

"Site is down due to DDoS," Poole wrote. "We now join the ranks of MasterCard, Visa, PayPal, et al. — an exclusive club."

Anonymous also has been responsible for the takedown of anti-piracy sites and the internet home of the Church of Scientology.

Meanwhile, according to The Smoking Gun, the FBI has raided a Texas business to confiscate a server that authorities believe was used in the DDoS against PayPal.