The official website of an Oct. 26 campaign against Saudi Arabia's ban on female drivers was hacked Saturday. The site and campaign aimed to fight and raise awareness of the ban, which local police regularly enforce.
In the past, women such as activist Manal al-Sherif have been arrested for driving or posting videos of themselves behind the wheel.
On Saturday, visitors to Oct26Driving.com could only a black background with red lightning bolts and black skulls. English text at the top of the page said, "Hacked by G6RaaT Hacker ... Freedom for KSA." Arabic text then appeared on screen, while audio of a man speaking Arabic, and an Arabic song played in the background.
See also: Loud and Brave: Saudi Women Set to Protest Driving Ban
The Arabic text read, "Reason for the hacking: I am against women driving in the land of the two holy shrines," according to Reuters.
As of Sunday, the site remains hacked, but now shows text in both English and Arabic, and includes "No Woman, No Drive" — the song from the satirical music video created by artist and social activist Hisham Fageeh — as background music. The English text appears to come from emails sent to the Oct. 26 campaign. The site also displays the campaign's apparent email address, oct26thdriving@gmail.com, near the hackers' apparent email address, g6raat@gmail.com.
Despite the hacking, many Twitter users continued to show support for the Oct. 26 campaign by using the hashtags, #Women2Drive and #Oct26Driving. One Twitter user even asked Reddit founder Alexis Ohanian to "lend the Saudi women some Twitter power."
.@alexisohanian Can you lend the Saudi women some Twitter power today? #Women2Drive #oct26driving
— Kelly (@KellyFJames) October 26, 2013
VROOM! "@KellyFJames: .@alexisohanian Can you lend the Saudi women some Twitter power today? #Women2Drive #oct26driving"
— Alexis Ohanian (@alexisohanian) October 26 2013
Other users also shared the "No Woman, No Drive" music video.
«no woman no drive» from @HishamFageeh, made for the auspicious occasion of #oct26driving is kind of amazing http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aZMbTFNp4wI …
— rahel aima (@cnqmdi) October 26 2013
Eventually, a new hashtag emerged on Twitter: #Nov31Driving. Although it could cause confusion since November only has 30 days, various tweets explain it as a way to make the campaign continuing and open-ended.
#Nov31Driving Hey everybody, It's an open-ended driving campaign. From now till death. PLEASE don't stop it!
— @Samera Almutairi (@SameraAlmutairi) October 26 2013
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Image: Mashable