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This must be the mother of all free-speech-versus-religion battles, as an entire church is set to be in the line of fire of the siege engines of bloggers and hackers across the Internet.

That is if this Guardian story is to be believed (though you can also find it in the Telegraph, The Times and more).

All hell seems about to break loose, as hackers propose a wave of attacks against the Church of Scientology, after it was accused by a group calling itself Anonymous of a “campaign of misinformation” and “suppression of dissent”.

The Times, says,

The group . . . is a disparate collection of hackers and activists. It called for a wave of attacks against Scientology, after accusing the church of “campaigns of misinformation” and “suppression of dissent”. At least one Scientology website was still down this morning.

The group also claims to have stolen a number of “secret documents” from the church’s database, which it says are now circulating on file-sharing networks.

Anonymous has spearheaded attacks against other websites in the past, and is calling on its supporters to “rise up against the church” after a video of its second-in-command, the Hollywood actor Tom Cruise, was leaked onto YouTube. This video was taken down after, it’s believed, the church claimed violation of copyright.

In the embarrassing vid, Cruise says, among other things, “We are the authorities on getting people off drugs, we are the authorities on the mind, we are the authorities on improving conditions . . . we can rehabilitate criminals . . . we can bring peace and unite communities.”

The Times story continues:

In response, the group – which calls itself an “Internet hate-machine” – set up a website to co-ordinate a string of attacks using phone, Internet and fax methods, which it called Project Chanology.

The website asked members to bombard the church’s website with hits so that it would collapse – a technique known as a “denial of service” attack, as well as exploit the vulnerabilities in the site using sophisticated hacking techniques.

The “intensity of the battle shows no signs of easing”, says the Guardian:

A day of free speech protests have been planned outside Scientology centres around the world next Sunday, with campaigners mobilising on Facebook and YouTube.

Protesters are vowing to picket buildings in London, Birmingham, Manchester, Edinburgh and York on the British leg of the day of direct action, three weeks after a group of internet activists called Anonymous vowed to destroy the movement.

Roll on next Sunday, then. Should be a good scrap. Bets, anyone?

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JCbKv9yiLiQ[/youtube]