2010: Hack Attack?

It's October. Could political shenanigans be afoot?

Back to Basics, the political action committee that's running negative ads about Gov. Rick Perry and Republican House candidates across the state, is having some trouble with its computer servers this morning. The Democratic group funded by Houston-based trial lawyer Steve Mostyn runs various anti-Republican websites like ricksdirtydeals.com (about Perry's relationship with insurance companies), handsoffourland.com (about the Trans-Texas Corridor) and doubledipdriver.com (about incumbent state Rep. Joe Driver). All were inaccessible this morning, and the PAC's spokesman, Cliff Walker, blames hackers.

"Nearly all of the other websites we've released are crashing after being targeted by repeat denial of service attacks. The attacks are still coming on strong, but our web team is working to make sure we're back online," Walker said in an e-mail.

A denial of service attack means that unprecedented traffic is being sent to the sites, causing the servers minor meltdowns. "It's as if hundreds of people were calling your phone at once, and you wouldn't be able to take any calls," explained the Tribune's Chief Technology Officer Higinio Maycotte.