GitHub website is down – Turkish hackers claim they did it

GitHub, the web-based Git repository hosting service is down right now and Turkish hackers from Turk Hack Team claim they are behind this attack.

In an exclusive conversation with one of the hacker from THT on Twitter HackRead was told the reason for targeting GitHub (github.com) is nothing but fun. 

THT is the same group who last month shutdown Vatican City official website against Pope Francis’ remarks in which he used the word ‘genocide’ to refer to mass killings of Armenians by Turks.

Have a look at the Tweet sent to us by hacker himself: 

https://t.co/o5q3j6a6yf İS DOWN @HackRead @Cyber_War_News #github pic.twitter.com/mHftbBLhMQ

— Herakles (@THTHerakles) May 6, 2015

GitHub’s official Twitter account has also sent out some tweets acknowledging that their website is down: 

"We're doing emergency maintenance to recover the site".

— GitHub Status (@githubstatus) May 6, 2015

"We're seeing high error rates on http://t.co/2qUwMFsmyu and are investigating".

— GitHub Status (@githubstatus) May 6, 2015

At the time of publishing this article, GitHub website was down with following ‘down for maintenance’ message:

Stay Tuned..!

Update: 

GitHub website is back online, but still unclear who was really behind the attack or if there was any attack.

"We've finished emergency maintenance and are monitoring closely".

— GitHub Status (@githubstatus) May 6, 2015