Hacker group Anonymous threatens to attack Brazilian World Cup sponsors

The hacker group Anonymous is preparing a cyberattack on corporate sponsors of the World Cup in Brazil to protest against the lavish spending on soccer games in a country struggling to provide basic services, said a hacker with knowledge of the plan.

Earlier this week, Anonymous attacked the computer networks of Brazil's foreign ministry and leaked dozens of confidential e-mails.

"We have already conducted late-night tests to see which of the sites are more vulnerable," said the hacker who operates under the alias of Che Commodore. "We have a plan of attack."

"This time we are targeting the sponsors of the World Cup," he said in a Skype conversation from an undisclosed location in Brazil. Asked to name the potential targets he mentioned Adidas, Emirates, Coca-Cola and Budweiser, which is owned by Anheuser-Busch.

There was no way to confirm Che Commodore's identity or his affiliation with the group Anonymous.

The sponsors did not immediately respond to requests to comment on the threat.

A Distributed Denial-ofService (DDoS) is a low-cost attack aimed at taking a website offline by simultaneously requesting access from thousands of computers in order to jam the host server.