Two Europeans were indicted by a Los Angeles federal judge for involvement in the distribution of denial-of-service (DDOS) attacks targeting two U.S.-based Web sites in 2003.

The indictments were made public yesterday by the U.S. Department of Justice. The two Europeans – a German national and a British citizen - were brought to justice in connection with the same DDOS attacks four years ago.

The LA federal grand jury indicted Axel Gembe, 25, and Lee Graham Walker, 24, for conducting online DDOS attacks which targeted retail Web sites Rapid Satellite and Weaknees, according to a Deutsche Welle report on Friday. The two have allegedly hacked the Web sites of the two retail companies in order to damage their computer networks.

DDOS attacks are usually conducted by attacking a single computer network from multiple other computers. DDOS attacks eventually cause the other visitors of the attacked Web sites to receive error messages when accessing.

The two men may face extradition to the United States and be sentenced to as much as 15 years in prison.

According to court documents, the two European residents were operating under a contract from Jay Echouafni, the former CEO of Orbit Communications. They had been hired to damage or disable the Web sites of the competing retail companies.

Echouafni was indicted in 2004, but he fled soon after and he is now sought by the FBI. A colleague of the former CEO has served two years in prison for being involved in the conspiracy.

The two hackers managed to shut down Weaknees' Web site for two weeks in 2003. This caused the company a loss ranging from $200,000 to over $1m.