CHINA: Baidu files damages suit at US provider

2010-1-21

By Ding Yining  

BAIDU Inc has taken legal action against a United States domain service provider for compensation over a hacker attack last week. China's leading search engine provider said in a statement yesterday that last week's malicious attack was due to the negligence of Register.com, and it has filed a lawsuit at a court in New York.

"The malicious attack, which lasted several hours, has brought Baidu serious damages," the company said in the statement.
It didn't specify the amount of compensation it is seeking. It is also considering changing its domain name registration service provider to a Chinese company.

Baidu suffered from its worst attack last Friday since it was established 10 years ago, and its service wasn't restored until four hours after the attack.

Baidu seriously condemned the behavior of attacking legal Websites in an e-mail statement sent to the media.

Baidu said its domain name was externally manipulated, and its search service and online forums were disrupted. Internet users said they were led to an image showing an Iranian flag and a slogan saying "This site has been hacked by Iranian Cyber Army," when they entered the address of baidu.com last Friday morning.
Baidu's revenue in the third quarter last year was 1.28 billion yuan (US$176 million).

View Article in the Shanghai Daily