Posted in: Sports, TV, WWE | Tagged: dave meltzer, wrestling

Wrestling Observer Website Defaced by Hackers

F4WOnline.com, the home of Dave Melter's Wrestling Observer Newsletter, was defaced by hackers on Thursday. The as-yet-unidentified perpetrators apparently infiltrated the website and edited all of the site's html and css files, rendering the site nearly impossible to read. The hackers also apparently gained control of the site's Twitter account, which brazenly tweeted:

The cowardly and senseless attack sent shockwaves throughout the Internet Wrestling Community, which found itself blinded by empty, white space and confused by typography that ensures no single line of text stands out in any whatsoever. Visitors to the website described the near-complete lack of color or style as painful, depressing, and oddly sedative, like getting a bad concussion or watching a WWE six-man tag match that spans multiple commercial breaks. Whatever the hackers' motives, it's clear that they must have a major grudge against Meltzer and co-owner Bryan Alvarez to engage in such disgusting vandalism. Has anyone seen Hulk Hogan lately?

At press time, no group had yet taken credit for the attack, perhaps out of shame for committing such a heinous act. Regardless, the effect was immediately felt by clickbait wrestling news aggregator websites, who found themselves unable to quickly parse the website to locate issues of the Wrestling Observer Newsletter or its spinoff podcasts in order to dissect Meltzer's every word and turn his offhand comments into "news" stories with salacious headlines. Combined with an apparent Twitter hiatus by Dave Bautista in recent weeks, even this very website finds itself desperate for clickbait article fodder. The effects of the attack on the internet wrestling click economy could be both substantial and long-lasting if the damage to the website isn't repaired quickly.

Bleeding Cool offers our deepest sympathies to the F4WOnline in these dark times. If anyone wants to start a GoFundMe for the victims, we'll be the first to contribute. Now if you'll excuse us, we need to go throw some stones at glass houses.

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