Spamhaus cyberattack accused says he is victim of conspiracy

An internet activist accused of launching one of the biggest global cyber attacks in years that slowed computers across Europe, has claimed he was the victim of an establishment conspiracy. 

Sven Kamphuis, a Dutch internet operator, was accused of engineering a vast flood of data that targeted Swiss internet agency Spamhaus. 

The firm is responsible for maintaining a catalogue of computer viruses used by security programmes to protect computer owners. 
The cyberattack saw the Spamhaus servers hit at a rate of 300 billion bytes per second. 

But Kamphuis told the The Daily Telegraph that allegations against him were caused by a bitter row his company Cyberbunker had with Spamhaus. 

According to the report, he portrayed himself as a campaigner for internet freedom in the mould of Julian Assange, the WikiLeaksfounder. 

Kamphuis said Spamhaus pretends to be a non-for-profit firm, but they 'are a little censorship club working their way up.' 

The firm wants get their way and shut people down. If people do not comply with their demands they just list the entire internet provider. That's what happened, he said. 

According to the paper he said that the row can be traced back two years when Spamhaus blacklisted Cyberbunker's internet provider for hosting clients, including spammers and pornography providers. 

Dutch police were investigating claims that Kamphuis was waging the attacks from a former Nato cold war nuclear command centre in Kloetinge, southern Netherlands. 

But it emerged that the bunker was undergoing renovation and its owners, BunkerInfo were irate at the suggestions that Kamphuis had mounted his attack from their facility, the paper said. 

Cyberbunker had operated internet servers in Kloetinge before it was sold 18 months ago but has no association with the facility, it added.