14 DAY TRIAL // The memorial website of the Nazi Mauthausen camp in Austria was hacked by unknown individuals last week.
The annual celebration of the inmate liberation took place on Sunday, which could suggest that the hackers planned their strike for this event.
Defacement attack plastered illegal child images
The attack on the website occurred on Friday and it did not last long as the company managing it was able to stop it and restore the original content. According to an official notification, the defacement consisted in placing child pornography image materials.
“The company in charge of our website has deactivated it immediately. The Federal Ministry of the Interior condemns the attack on the website of the Mauthausen Memorial and has initiated investigations,” the notification informs.
Austrian Interior Minister Johanna Mikl-Leitner said that the ministry was working with experts to identify the authors behind the incident, whom she classified as “sick” and “criminal.”
“I simply cannot comprehend what sick minds stand behind such deeds,” she said, according to Deutsche Welle.
Over 100,000 people were killed in the concentration camp
The Nazi labour camp at Mauthausen was one of the largest when Austria was at the time annexed to Germany, between August 8, 1938, and until inmates were liberated by the US in on May 5, 1945.
Although the number of deaths is not known, it is estimated that between 120,000 and 320,000 people met their end due to horrific work conditions in the entire complex, which included 49 permanent sub-camps at Mauthausen and the nearby Gusen village.
Mauthausen was a category III camp, where prisoners considered with remote potential for reform would be incarcerated, which meant that a release was highly unlikely and extermination by work would be the most frequent result; however, many of them were gassed, starved or shot.