News from Australian atheists

I guess we have somebody worried.

Atheist Foundation of Australia and Global Atheist Convention Websites Attacked

The Atheist Foundation of Australia and Global Atheist Convention websites suffered a DDOS (Distributed Denial of Service) attack yesterday, which caused the websites to be taken offline.

These attacks affected our upstream providers and numerous other websites, cost a large amount of money and time, and have left the Atheist Foundation of Australia and the Global Atheist Convention websites without hosting for the interim.

While we do not have enough information to confirm the source or reason for the attacks, they came in the wake of news that The Rise of Atheism Global Atheist Convention, to be held in Melbourne next March, has already sold 1,000 tickets and is set to become the largest gathering of atheists in Australia's history.

AFA President, David Nicholls, says, "We have been informed that the Atheist Foundation of Australia and the Global Atheist Convention sites were the specific target of the attacks. This may be not just an attack on atheism, but an attack on freedom of speech."

Nicholls says that the Global Atheist Convention is not about attacking the beliefs of individuals but, rather, opposes the undue political influence of religious institutions and lobby groups in society.

"The Atheist Foundation of Australia supports freedom of thought, and that includes freedom of religion. Our aim is to keep the Australian government, education and welfare systems secular," says Nicholls. "Unfortunately, some people in our society find that very confronting."

The Atheist Foundation of Australia has raised this matter with the appropriate authorities and is discussing this situation with them.

The Atheist Foundation of Australia technical staff are working hard to restore the site and once it is restored, tickets for The Rise of Atheism Global Atheist Convention will again be available at http://www.atheistconvention.org.au.