Drudge Suspects US Gov't With Cyberattack On Website

A tweet from conservative media icon Matt Drudge's verified Twitter account Thursday night appeared to accuse the government of interfering with his website, DrudgeReport.com, just hours after the Barack Obama administration announced new sanctions against Russia over election hacking.

Is the US government attacking DRUDGE REPORT?

Biggest DDoS since site's inception. VERY suspicious routing [and timing].

— MATT DRUDGE (@DRUDGE) December 30, 2016

"Is the US government attacking DRUDGE REPORT? Biggest DDoS since site's inception. VERY suspicious routing [and timing]," the tweet to Drudge's 457,000 followers read, according to
 IBT.com.

A large-scale distributed denial of service attack, or DDoS, can cause major Internet disruptions. In the past, such attacks have shut down major websites such as Twitter, Spotify, Netflix, Amazon, Tumblr, and Reddit. The attack sends a server many illegitimate requests to make it hard for real requests to get through, effectively shutting down the site.

Drudge Report was down briefly around 7 p.m. EST, but working hours later. Meanwhile, the conservative Washington Times wrote: "Matt Drudge suggests U.S. government cyberattack on Drudge Report website. DDoS attack comes same day Obama announced countermeasures against Russia for hacking of Democrats."

In a later tweet, Mr. Drudge said the “Attacking [was] coming from ‘thousands’ of sources. Of course none of them traceable to Fort Meade,” referring to the Maryland base that houses the headquarters of United States Cyber Command and the National Security Agency.

Mr. Drudge’s news-aggregation site was one of the highest-profile outlets to take a favorable tack on Donald Trump during the 2016 presidential campaign.

Earlier Thursday, President Obama announced sanctions against several Russian agencies and individuals over purported cyberattacks on Democratic Party institutions. Many liberals are blaming these actions for Hillary Clinton’s defeat at Mr. Trump’s hands.