Anonymous Hack of Syrian Government Emails Reveals Just What They Think of the West

Anonymous has leaked hundreds of emails from Syria's top officials within the Ministry of Presidential Affairs, revealing not only content but passwords as well.

SlashGear reports that 78 inboxes were accessed by the hacking collective and points out that while breech of security may be embarrassing to the Syrian government, the exposed content reveals "valuable insights into how top-level politicians perceive and are briefed on the West."

Haaretz states that the content of one of these emails was about President Bashar Assad preparing for his interview with Barbara Walters in Dec. 2011. Sheherazad Jaafari, who helped set up the interview and knew violence by the country against its own people would be discussed, advises Assad to say that mistakes had been made:

"[...] the American psyche can be easily manipulated when they hear that there are 'mistakes' done and now we are 'fixing it.' It's worth mentioning also what is happening now in Wall Street and the way the demonstrations are been suppressed by policemen, police dogs and beatings."

[...]

"It would be worth mentioning how your personality has been attacked and praised in the last decade according to the media. At one point H.E. was viewed as a hero and in other times H.E. was the 'bad guy'. Americans love these kinds of things get convinced by it."

Haaretz reports that emails from the Minister of Presidential Affairs Mansour Fadlallah Azzam and Assad's media adviser, Bouthaina Shaaban, were also included in the attack.

SlashGear notes that poor password choice such as "1234" and "iloveyou" were likely to blame for the infiltration by Anonymous.

This email attack comes as violence has been raging in the country in the last few days.