On 28 January 2013, the website "BananaLeaks.co" was under attack by unidentified hackers. The page was hacked after the publication of an article that revealed the alleged existence of two bank accounts owned by President Rafael Correa in Switzerland.
(Fundamedios/IFEX) – On 28 January 2013, the website “BananaLeaks.co” was under attack by unidentified hackers. The page was hacked after the publication of an article that revealed the alleged existence of two bank accounts owned by President Rafael Correa in Switzerland.
The Colombian-American journalist Santiago Villa, who was named BananaLeaks’ spokesman, confirmed during a multimedia program on radionexx.com, hosted by Ecuadorian journalist Emilio Palacio, exiled in Miami, that the page had been attacked by hackers.
According to Villa, the page went down within hours of the publication of the report about Correa’s alleged secret accounts. “They have investigated and realized that it is a hacker attack”.
On 28 January the site’s Twitter account announced: “BananaLeaks’ page was taken down this morning. We will keep you informed”. The next day it reported that “BananaLeaks.com returned at dawn but we have been informed that it was immediately sabotaged by the Ecuadorian government with a DDoS attack”.
A few days earlier the portal had broadcast the documentary “Rafael Correa portrait of a father of the nation”, directed by Santiago Villa, and a report concerning a collective dissertation that was allegedly used by the family of public officials Vinicio and Fernando Alvarado to earn a Ph.D.
