A shooting on July 3rd left one person dead, and the Bay Area Rapid Transit the target of protests. When the transit authority learned that a protest would be held on one if its underground station platforms, officials decided to shutdown the system’s cellphone service, in an attempt to keep the protestors from organizing using their mobile devices.

The tactic has invoked the ire of free speech advocates, government officials, and has made BART the target of the international hacker group named Anonymous.

The group announc3ed that they would wage attacks on the system’s computer networks in response. BART has since acknowledged several breaches of its computer security, and the hacker group posted the personal information of some 55,000 riders to the internet.

Additional protests are planned, but there is no word yet of how the transit authority will handle them, including whether or not they will disable the cell service again.

From the San Francisco Chronicle:

An international group of hackers threatened Saturday to wage a cyberwar against BART in retaliation for the agency’s decision to cut cell phone service to prevent a separate protest last week.

The activist group, known as Anonymous, also called for a nonviolent protest Monday evening at BART’s Civic Center Station.

Members of the Anonymous group have claimed responsibility for disrupting Tunisian and Libyan government websites to coincide with street protests.

Read the full article here.