The city of Chicago’s website was alleged to have been brought down by a possible cyberattack by the hacker group Anonymous. And, while the city was fending off cyberattacks on its websites, several Twitter accounts claiming to be affiliated with Anonymous also called for assaults on NATO’s homepage. Despite that, the NATO site has remained online for much of Sunday afternoon.

At McCormick Place, NATO Assistant Secretary General of Emerging Security Challenges, Gabor Icklody, said cyber defense is a high priority for the alliance. But he appeared to downplay the threat posed by so-called “hacktivist” groups.

“We shouldn’t imagine that a sixteen-[year]-old from the darkness of his room can bring very, very large networks down,” he said, adding that the biggest threat comes from cyberwarfare between countries.

A YouTube video posted Sunday seemed to confirm that the group was taking responsibility for the attacks on the city of Chicago websites. The video became private/unavailable shortly after posting.

“What we saw tonight watching a bit of the protest was everyday, average people fighting back and finally refusing to stand down. The NATO Summit is being utilized in such a way, and we couldn’t have predicted it more accurately,” a masked person read in a statement.

The city of Chicago is looking into whether hacking is responsible for outages of both the city of Chicago’s own site as well as the Chicago police department’s site.
“We are aware of the potential issue with the city’s website and are working with the appropriate federal authorities to address the situation,” said Pete Scales, spokesman for the city of Chicago.

The U.S. Secret Service is also investigating the outages.

Statement text prior to being disabled on YouTube:

Greetings fellow citizens of the world, we are AntiS3curityOPS.

While this has come to no surprise, the NATO protests are already reaching a boiling point. As tonight we have already witnessed the Chicago Police Dept sending out a request for two water cannons deployed on Michigan Avenue, which the protesters briefly were able to close of the street completely. Just a few moments ago we witnessed cops on horses seemingly all too content with the destiny that has turned their hearts cold, trampling over protesters trying to intimidate. And you know what we saw during this? Protesters locking arms and holding their ground. A few had Anonymous masks’ on, a few were girls who looked like they belonged safely off on the sidelines bravely charging cops with shields and on horse. All the while the protesters are chanting “Take those animals off those horses”, drowning out any attempts by the Chicago police to get a word in. Everyone of you are hero’s to us.

What we saw tonight watching a bit of the protest was everyday, average people fighting back and finally refusing to stand down. The NATO Summit is being utilized in such a way, and we couldn’t have predicted it more accurately. On the video we saw Mother’s, teenagers, elderly, the anarchists, white, black, hispanic, this movement see’s no skin color. every sort of person is well represented in these actions.

This is not a time to have our differences divide us, this is a time we all need to come together and rally around our brother’s and sister’s bravely in the street’s of Chicago risking their lives to make the one voice they have, heard. If every single one of us has a voice, one opinion, let us unite and show the violent Chicago police, and the government big brother tactic’s that we are not gonna take this.

We are actively engaged in actions against the Chicago Police Deptartment, and encourage anyone to take up the cause and use the AntiS3curityOPS Anonymous banner. For those able, chicagopolice.org should be fired upon as much as possible. We are in your harbor Chicago, and you will not forget us.

So for those unable to engage in attacks online by ddos, share with everyone you know what’s presently going on in Chicago, Tweet celebrities on twitter with the #SolidarityWithChicago #FuckNATO #FTP hashtags and get it trending. Also keep watching the live feed’s, and spreading the live feed links all relevant places. Together, we the people, are gonna take the power back.
We are AntiS3curityOPS.
We are Anonymous.
We are legion.
We do not forget.
We do not forgive.
Chicago Police Deptartment, expect us.