Hackers Attack The Epilepsy Foundation Website Causing Headaches and Near-Seizures

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The breach on the site has caused some viewers to experience severe migraines and near-seizure reactions when they viewed the images. People who have photosensitive epilepsy can have seizures when exposed to flickering images.

The hackers found a security hole in the foundations publishing software that allowed them to quickly make multiple posts and overwhelmed the site's support forums.

The posts looked like helpful spots with a link that lead viewers to pages that had kaleidoscopic images.

"They were out to create seizures," said Ken Lowenberg, senior director of web and print publishing for the foundation, which is based in Landover, Md.

Because of the attack users will no longer be allowed to post images to the support forum or have direct links to other sites. The attack also made 24 hour a day moderation a need. The FBI is investigating the attack.

Security experts say this and other recent hacker attacks illustrate the dangers that websites face when allowing users to post content on parts of their sites.

Another recent example of hacking came when someone went into the coding of Senator Barack Obama's site and redirected users to Senator Hillary Rodham Clinton's site.

The attack on the Epilepsy Foundation's site does not appear to be motivated by profit. There was no attempt from the hackers to gain control of a victim's computer by coding. The result though was quite cruel.

"I count this in the same category of teenagers who think it's funny to put a cat in a bag and throw it over a clothesline - they don't realize how cruel it is," said Paul Ferguson, a security researcher at antivirus software maker Trend Micro Inc. "It was an opportunity waiting to happen for some mean-spirited kid."