Web Sites Face 'Syn' Attack

June 14 -- Several of the Internet's major news and information sites were under a denial of service attack today, keeping millions of Web users from accessing content.

The attacks, which began Thursday, caused intermittent outages and slowdowns at Web sites such as Foxnews.com, ESPN.com and ABCNEWS.com. (ESPN.com and ABCNEWS.com are divisions of the Walt Disney Co.)

Officials at some of the sites said they are still investigating and could not confirm if the attacks were deliberate.

"We have been experiencing some issues with our site today," said Angela Fisher, a spokeswoman for weatherchannel.com. "We are currently investigating the source [of the problem]."

A spokeswoman at Foxnews.com, however, did confirm that the site's difficulties were due to a deliberate attack. "We are indeed under a denial of service attack. We first noticed it midday Thursday," she said.

And much of the Fox News site's content remained inaccessible today.

"We are still experiencing some attacks today, but we are doing everything we can to try and get the site back up to normal, " the spokeswoman said.

At the Walt Disney Internet Group, which hosts ABCNEWS.com and ESPN.com, spokeswoman Kim Kerscher would not associate site problems with the attack. "We can confirm that ABCNEWS.com and ESPN.com did experience intermittent outages yesterday but are performing normally today. Beyond that, we do not comment on security issues," she said.

But ABCNEWS.com Executive Producer Steve Jones said attacks appeared to be under way. "I understand that several sites have been targeted but our performance largely has been unaffected," he said. "I've spoken to colleagues at two major Internet competitors who have been under siege since yesterday and are having a more difficult time keeping their sites stable."

A source at a major Internet service provider who requested anonymity confirmed the attacks originated in Asia, possibly China. He described the severity of the attacks as "moderate but sustained."