One of my research areas is the odd but interesting area of online civil disobedience. The basic problem her is whether or not the internet can be used in political forms of protest. The trend has been to limit the ability to use denial of service (even manual attacks) and web page defacement as legitimate forms of political protest. My opinion has been that this discriminates against online activities. For my arguments read the chapter Participation in the draft of my thesis Disruptive Technology here.
Five years ago the groups “Libertad” and “Kein Mensch ist illegal” (No Human is Illegal) organised 13000 people in an online blockade (With a script- client- based distributed denial of service attack) of the airline Lufthansa. The protest was against the companies part in the deportation of asylum seekers.
Now the Higher Regional Court in Frankfurt says online demonstration is not force but a legitimate form of political protest.
Decision by the Frankfurt Appellate Court (in German only, 22.05.2006)
http://www.libertad.de/service/downloads/pdf/olg220506.pdf
Statement by Libertad on the ruling (in German only, 1.06.2006)
http://www.libertad.de/inhalt/projekte/depclass/verfahren/libpe010606.shtml
In German (1.06.2006)
http://www.heise.de/newsticker/meldung/73755
In English (2.06.2006)
http://www.heise.de/english/newsticker/news/73827
(via EDRI newsletter)