Hackers get The Sun, claim Murdoch's dead

Lulz Security has claimed responsibility for attacks on Sony, Nintendo, the US Senate, an FBI partner and others. Photo / Thinkstock

As the scandal surrounding phone hacking in Britain deepens, it appears one of Rupert Murdoch's newspapers has now been targeted itself.

The Sun's website has been hacked by LulzSec, a group which has claimed responsibility for hacking into big business and government websites in recent months, including those of Sony and the CIA.

The hacker group is claiming to have taken down 1,024 websites owned by News Corp.

The attacks began this morning, when The Sun's site was redirected twice.

The first time, to a fake lead story which claimed Rupert Murdoch, the media mogul who heads News Corp., had been found dead.

The "story" reported Murdoch had "ingested a large quantity of palladium" and died in his garden.

LulzSec quickly took credit for the hack, claiming on Twitter "We have owned Sun/News of the World - that story is simply phase 1 - expect the lulz to flow in coming days".

The site was quickly fixed, but appears to now have been targeted again.

The website was redirecting to the LulzSec Twitter account.

Early this afternoon it appears many of the websites belonging to News Corp. publications, including the Sun and The Times were not accessible.

It's been a bad day for News Corp.

Earlier Standard & Poor's warned News Corp that its credit rating could be cut as the snowballing British phone hacking scandal threatened to claim more victims.

S&P placed News Corp's BBB+ rating on a negative watch - a prelude to a potentially costly downgrade - citing "increased business and reputation risks" from investigations into the widening phone hacking scandal in Britain.

- Herald online staff with AFP