The Mail & Guardian’s website has been shut down temporarily after coming under a severe attack by hackers.

“Because of the scale and severity of the assault we have decided to shut down the site while securing and repairing it,” says online editor Chris Roper.

“This was a painful decision for a news organisation such as ours to take, compromising as it does our ability to keep updated about 750 000 users in SA and around the world. We cannot, however, risk compromising their security.”

A technical team was working “flat out” to try to restore the site as soon as possible.

This is the second time in a week that the site has been hit by cyber security troubles. Hackers compromised the site at the weekend, planting a virus masquerading as antivirus software.

Mail & Guardian editor-in-chief Nic Dawes says: “We’d like to extend sincere apologies to all of our users, and hope that they will understand that we had to prioritise their security over other considerations for a brief period.” — Staff reporter, with Sapa