"Anonymous" has struck again – this time declaring war on Australia.

Hackers identifying themselves as "Anonymous" launched a denial-of-service attack Wednesday against a web site for Australian Prime Minister Kevin Rudd to protest a government proposal to filter internet content, according to the Australian Associated Press.

The hackers also targeted a web site belonging to the Australian Communications and Media Authority and planned to attack a web site for Communications Minister Stephen Conroy as well.

According to a message posted by the purported hacker on a different web site, the government proposal to introduce a mandatory internet filtering plan would amount to China-like censorship.

"Not only will your rights be at stake, our internet speeds will slow down by 70 percent, be mandatory for all Aussies and will not protect us from evil AT ALL."

The attack began at 7:00 p.m. local time and within 18 minutes the prime minister's site was down. But it's unclear if the site's collapse was a result of the attack, or a defensive move by an administrator.

A note posted by the hacker at 7:11 p.m. read, "we've confirmed on site (via a source) that the sites due to be attacked have been taken down from the coordination page, possibly before the raid."

The Associated Press reported that more than an hour later the prime minister's site was still down.

Either way, a government spokesman said the attack was misguided since the internet filtering plan only proposed to block content such as child porn and images depicting rape and bestiality.

"The campaign that they're mounting is erroneous and misinformed," the spokesman said.

Photo: Jim Merithew/Wired.com

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