Anonymous hits UK government websites in Assange protest

Hacktivist collective Anonymous says it has launched attacks on government websites in retaliation for the UK's handling of the Julian Assange case.

It claimed responsibility on Twitter for the denial-of-service attacks.

Websites affected included those of No 10 Downing Street and the Home Office.

Wikileaks founder Mr Assange is taking refuge inside Ecuador's embassy in London to avoid extradition to Sweden for questioning over sexual misconduct allegations, which he denies.

The UK says it is obliged to extradite Mr Assange and he will be arrested if he leaves the embassy.

Anonymous, a loose collection of computer hackers, has gained notoriety by launching denial-of-service attacks, which flood websites with requests, causing them to operate more slowly or fail, on international government and corporate websites since 2010.

A spokeswoman for the Ministry of Justice website said it "had been experiencing some disruption".

"This is a public information website and no sensitive data is held on it. No other Ministry of Justice systems have been affected," she said in a statement.

"Measures put in place to keep the website running mean that some visitors may be unable to access the site intermittently. We will continue to monitor the situation and will take measures accordingly," she added.

The attacks were launched on Monday and most of the affected websites appear to be operating normally now.