Baidu.com, one of China’s top search engines, has filed a suit against US-based Internet domain registrar Register.com for purportedly facilitating a hacking attack that left the search engine provider immobilized and vandalized.
On January 12, Baidu.com was disabled for several hours at a stretch and the site visitors were being redirected to a website that had a statement by a group called the Iranian Cyber Army claiming responsibility for the attack. This is the second time this group has carried out such a hacking attack – the previous one being on the popular social connectivity site Twitter last December.
In a recent statement, Baidu said that it has filed the lawsuit against Register.com in New York, and blamed the domain registrar’s “gross negligence” to be the primary reason that caused their website to be “unlawfully and maliciously altered”.
Register.com, on their part, stated that the accusation was “completely without merit”. They issued a statement saying that they regard cyber-terrorism to be very serious and are working with federal officials to look into the matter, along with the recent attacks on Google and Twitter.
The Chinese search engine market is currently going through a rough phase, with Google stating a few weeks back that the recent hacks into its system had originated from China. It even stated that it might withdraw its operations in China, to which the Chinese government reiterated that the companies doing business in their nation must stick to their policies.